Wake Forest University announced this week that a student is no longer enrolled there after posting a video in which she referred to her residential adviser with a racial slur. Just days before, the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa expelled a student after she posted a video on Martin Luther King Jr. Day repeating and defending her earlier use of a racial slur.
In both cases, the institutions came out quickly and forcefully against the students’ conduct and the language in the videos. Those successive, similar situations suggest that such incidents have become more common with the use of social media and that colleges’ responses to them are getting swifter and firmer.
“With the ease of people posting these videos, perhaps we are more aware of these issues and can more readily respond,” Lori S. White, vice chancellor for student affairs at Washington University in St. Louis, said of the two incidents. “The difficulty before was that it was tougher for us to have actual evidence that this occurred. In those instances it would have been more difficult to sanction someone, but when you have a videotape scenario, it’s hard for someone to say, ‘That wasn’t me,’ or ‘I didn’t say that.’”
When you have a videotape scenario, it’s hard for someone to say, ‘That wasn’t me,’ or ‘I didn’t say that.’
One of the most prominent cases in recent years occurred in 2015, when two fraternity members were expelled from the University of Oklahoma for their involvement in a racist chant that was videotaped and that went viral online. Dozens of campuses have seen similar incidents.
Institutions that expel or discipline students who are caught on video using racial slurs often say they are doing so to maintain a safe learning environment. But in practice, a leader might be acting out of moral conviction, said Jabbar R. Bennett, associate provost and chief diversity officer at Northwestern University.
“Colleges and universities are issuing clear statements, making definitive decisions, and taking strong stances in an effort to underscore their missions and commitment to educate ‘all’ learners in a safe environment,” Bennett wrote in an email. “This is occurring at a time when academic freedom and freedom of speech are being challenged externally by those who do not clearly understand what these terms mean, and how integral they are to the rigor and vitality of higher education.”
Two days after the Wake Forest student’s video was posted, the university said she was “no longer enrolled” there but declined to say why. The University of Alabama also announced the student was no longer enrolled, according to a statement from a spokeswoman, and the student reportedly said she was in the process of moving back to New Jersey after being expelled.
After that announcement, three former American Civil Liberties Union officials wrote a letter to Alabama’s president stating that the university had violated the student’s right to free speech by expelling her. Public universities must walk a fine line on such issues, because they are explicitly bound by the First Amendment.
In a case from October 2017, two University of North Florida students posted a video of themselves jumping up and down like apes and mocking the Black Lives Matter movement.
An investigation found that the student who had posted the video was at an earlier Black Lives Matter rally, asserting that “all lives matter,” and noted that he was struggling emotionally at the time. A report compiled for the university’s president concluded that the students should be allowed to continue their studies at North Florida after they completed diversity training.
“It must be emphasized that UNF is a public higher-education institution where freedom of speech is paramount and where exchanges of thoughts and ideas, even those that many may find objectionable, is highly protected. Thus, to expunge one range of thought, idea, or activity over other thoughts, ideas, or activities inherently violates that stance,” wrote Cheryl Seals Gonzalez, the university’s director of equal opportunity and diversity, in the report. “However, if and when discrimination or discriminatory harassment is found, UNF can and is working to redress the matter to ensure the university fosters a nondiscriminatory educational environment.”
She added: “By no means should the students’ actions be minimized or go unaddressed, but their actions did not result in limiting or denying other students from participating and benefiting from UNF’s educational opportunities under the operative legal standards.”
This article has been updated (1/29/2018, 11:01 a.m.) with a statement from the University of Alabama.
