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Inequity in Higher Education: Campus Racial Tensions

Race-package photo (protest at GW)

The shooting of Michael Brown, a black teenager, in Ferguson, Mo., by a white officer in August 2014 drew attention to racial tensions in that city, and students demonstrated at colleges in nearby St. Louis. Across the country, as other racial conflicts erupted, the voices of minority students protesting inequities on campuses grew louder. Read The Chronicle’s coverage of racial bias, protests, and attempts at solutions on campuses around the United States.

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News
Yes, Students at Sarah Lawrence Are Demanding Free Detergent. But There’s More to It Than You Might Think.
By Vimal Patel
The request has drawn ridicule, especially from conservative news outlets. It’s part of activists’ broader push, though, to make the college rethink how it meets the needs of low-income students.
Students at the U. of Wisconsin at Madison used the hashtag #TheRealUW to share stories of racism and discrimination. University officials have used the hashtag too, and some activists see that as an act of reappropriation.
Students
A Thin Line Divides Engaging With Activists and Alienating Them
By Courtney Kueppers
Paying lip service to complaints without acting on them risks arousing student anger.
Jameelah Jones, at the microphone, is leading the creation of a multicultural student government at the U. of Kansas. "Student government should be a place where we can reimagine what change looks like," she says.
Race on Campus
After Protests Over Race, Kansas Experiments With a Multicultural Student Government
By Rio Fernandes
Much remains unclear about how the new body will function. But the aim is to give a place at the political table to students who have felt disenfranchised by the university’s Student Senate.
After a video of a fraternity’s racist chant went viral last March, Jabar Shumate accepted an offer to oversee efforts to ease tensions 
at his alma mater. 
New diversity officers 
for each college 
now report to him.
Race
Sustaining a Fight Against Racism
By Katherine Mangan
A year after an infamous video, a former student leader nurtures diversity at the University of Oklahoma.
A committee of the Tennessee House of Representatives plans to investigate how the state’s public colleges spend funds earmarked for diversity. But as lawmakers’ scrutiny has mounted, so has pressure from groups that support diversity-and-inclusion programs. A rally on the U. of Tennessee at Knoxville campus this month drew more than 300 people supporting those programs and other causes.
The States
Under Fire From Lawmakers, a Flagship Tries to Explain Why Diversity Matters
By Sarah Brown
A state legislative committee will soon investigate what the University of Tennessee at Knoxville does with money earmarked for diversity. How can campus officials persuade lawmakers who appear to be unpersuadable?
Marvin Krislov, Oberlin College’s president, saw a stridently worded 14-page list of demands as a nonstarter. But instead of rejecting it out of hand, he insisted that its authors agree to "collaborative engagement" in discussing it.
Leadership
Faced With Extreme Demands From Defiant Protesters, What’s a President to Do?
By Sarah Brown, Katherine Mangan
Talking to student activists often tempers their outrage, and can make for progress on campus issues, say presidents who have been there.
Danielle Walker, a graduate student in public policy, has helped lead the "Racism Lives Here" movement on the Missouri campus. As an undergraduate diversity peer educator there, she says, she found that white classmates often prefer to see racism as only a series of isolated incidents.
Race on Campus
What It’s Like to Be Black at the U. of Missouri
By Beth McMurtrie
Students on the flagship campus say they are used to feeling invisible at times, singled out at others. They are hardly alone.
The student protesters' encampment on the U. of Missouri at Columbia's main quad. Now that the activists have won an unexpected victory with the resignation of two top officials, the question is how the university will tackle the issues at the root of the protests.
Students
After Missouri’s Leadership Exodus, Hard Questions Loom on Race, Power, and Culture
By Katherine Mangan
The resignations of the system’s and the flagship’s top two officials represented a victory for student activists. But how will the university tackle the issues at the root of the protests?
Protesters at Princeton U. held an overnight sit-in last week at the office of the institution's president, Christopher L. Eisgruber. After meeting with Mr. Eisgruber, the protesters modified some of their demands.
Campus Unrest
Torn Over Tactics: Activists Refine Their Demands as Protests Over Racism Spread
By Sarah Brown, Katherine Mangan
Backlashes on some campuses and compromises on others have prompted some student activists to settle for less.
Teaching
How Professors in St. Louis Are Teaching the Lessons of Ferguson’s Unrest
By Katherine Mangan
Four faculty members see much more than a teachable moment in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black man and the violence that followed.
The U. of Mississippi has been striving to shift from its Confederate past, shedding traditions like waving the rebel flag at football games (as seen at a game in 1995) while taking steps to improve and celebrate its diversity. The institution’s successes and occasional setbacks highlight the difficulty of the task.
Administration
Removing Confederate Symbols Is a Step, but Changing a Campus Culture Can Take Years
By Katherine Mangan
The University of Mississippi is striving to shift from its Confederate past. Many colleges want to do the same, but the task can be difficult.
Police officers stand watch in Ferguson, Mo., a St. Louis suburb that has been rocked by protests, sometimes violent, since the fatal police shooting of an unarmed black teenager last weekend. Colleges are planning responses to the incident as they welcome students back for the fall semester.
Administration
A Shooting in a St. Louis Suburb Reverberates on Campuses Near and Far
By Katherine Mangan
Nearby colleges scramble to assure students that their campuses are safe. Elsewhere, students are protesting.
The Rev. Joseph Brown, 
a professor of Africana 
studies at Southern Illinois U. 
at Carbondale, is sought out 
as a mentor by minority students. 
“You never know who’s going 
to come through the door,” 
he says. “It’s like the oasis 
in the desert for students."
News
The Invisible Labor of Minority Professors
By Audrey Williams June
The hands-on attention that minority faculty members willingly provide to a diversifying population of students is an unheralded linchpin in helping them succeed.
Douglas Kline, for 13 years an associate professor of information systems at the U. of North Carolina at Wilmington, “wasn’t trying to push the clock” in applying for a promotion, he says. His application, which included two binders of material, was successful.
BACKGROUNDER
The Uncertain Path to Full Professor
By Audrey Williams June
Vague criteria may signal to some faculty members, especially women and minorities, that a promotion to the top is out of their reach.