Silent Sam, Charleston, Charlottesville and George Floyd made the headlines. On a less visible but equally impassioned front, faculty of color at Chapel Hill believe this is the moment for action toward equity.
by Barry Yeoman
ISTOCK/JASON D. SMITH ’94 38 CAROLINA JANUARY/FEBRUARY ’21 39 ALUMNI REVIEW ia Caldwell woke up June 18 Veterans to maintain the Confederate Some faculty of color say they see with the news heavy on her memorial, Silent Sam, which protesters goodwill on the part of campus leaders. mind. had toppled in August 2018. “We had a meeting with the administra- For months it had been dom- That June morning, Caldwell also woke tion,” said Miguel La Serna, a professor of Kinated by a single headline: the COVID-19 up thinking about the University’s “Road- history. “They actually were saying that pandemic, which in the U.S. has blazed map for Fall 2020,” the plan for the return they felt like they can get on board with a most mercilessly through communities of most students, faculty and staff to cam- lot of these things and that they would be of color. Then, in late May, came George pus amid the pandemic. She worried that happy to work with us toward implement- Floyd’s asphyxiation under the knee of students and faculty of color, who faced ing them. So that was a really encouraging a Minneapolis police officer. The video outsized health risks, were excluded from sign.” of Floyd, calling out for his late mother, the formal decision-making process. But La Serna, Caldwell and others add pierced the na- For Caldwell, all these elements felt that intentions aren’t enough. It will take tional conscience In 2019, Kia connected. “A historic social uprising for an ambitious, well-funded, collaborative and highlighted Caldwell and racial justice was taking place,” she said. effort, they say — an effort central to Car- the ever-length- 13 colleagues “As an academic, I felt that my university olina’s mission — to craft an institution ening list of wrote a memo also needed to be part of the reckoning.” that reflects the diversity of 21st-century Black Americans describing “the So she sat down in her home office. She America. killed by white rapidly declining opened Google Docs. And she started COURTESY MIGUEL LA SERNA authorities and writing. An agonizing history racial climate at Miguel La Serna and others say it will take an civilians. Four days later, after her peers had ambitious, well-funded, collaborative effort Academia can be a rough place for Demonstra- the University.” offered edits and additions, Caldwell re- to craft an institution that reflects the diversi- what scholars call BIPOC faculty — Black, tors had gathered Morale, they wrote, leased the document. Called the Roadmap ty of 21st-century America. Indigenous and other people of color. U.S. in more than runs low among for Racial Equity, it proposed a three-year, campuses have been plagued by reports of 2,000 cities and Black and brown 13-part plan to diversify the faculty and staff and alumni. hostile work environments and lackluster towns. They faculty, who are administration and address racial bias. Carolina’s administrators say they diversity efforts. hoisted signs and underrepresented “We invite the University leadership and agree with the sentiments behind the “The widespread claims that higher blocked road- in proportion our faculty colleagues to stand and work Roadmap for Racial Equity and intend education is objective, meritocratic, and ways and dodged to the state’s with us,” said the preamble, “to make to dissect the University in search of the color blind, providing equity for all, do not tear gas and population. “We UNC-Chapel Hill a more equitable and causes of these disparities. “It’s not until hold up,” sociologist Ruth Enid Zambrana rubber bullets. inclusive campus, where all can succeed we actually get at the root [that] we can wrote in her 2018 book Toxic Ivory Towers. invite the University Their message and thrive.” really begin to reverse-engineer this insti- Underrepresented minorities are “expect- spread beyond leadership and our The 35 original signatories encouraged tution to eliminate all traces of structural ed to publish more, teach more, and serve the streets as faculty colleagues others to co-sign. And they did — more systemic racism,” said Blouin, who also is more to progress at the same pace” as their education, busi- to stand and work than 1,200 faculty members, students, executive vice chancellor. white peers. ness and political with us,” Caldwell The numbers at UNC mirror the na- leaders vowed said. tional trend. Blacks make up 22.2 percent to work against BLACK POPULATION 22.2% of the state’s population but 5.1 percent of racism in their own domains. the faculty, according to 2018 figures from For Caldwell, a professor of African, BLACK FACULTY 5.1% the University’s Office of Institutional Re- African American and diaspora studies, search and Assessment. Hispanics make the national news was inseparable from up 9.8 percent of the population and 4.5 HISPANIC POPULATION 9.8% events at Carolina. percent of the faculty. Indigenous people
In 2019, she and 13 colleagues had MAY UNC/MEGAN make up 1.7 percent of the population and HISPANIC FACULTY 4.5% written a memo describing “the rapidly Kia Caldwell: “A historic social uprising for racial justice was taking place. As an academic, I 0.6 percent of the faculty. declining racial climate at the University.” felt that my university also needed to be part of the reckoning.” The overall student makeup, based on Morale, they wrote, runs low among Black INDIGENOUS POPULATION 1.7% spring 2020 numbers from the same office, and brown faculty, who are underrepre- suring diverse voices at a cascading series met regularly with Provost Robert Blouin is 8 percent Black, 7.8 percent Hispanic sented in proportion to the state’s popu- of tables. “Every committee they need a to offer advice on “Carolina Next: Inno- INDIGENOUS FACULTY 0.6% and 0.5 percent Indigenous. lation. Some have left for other schools in Black face on, you get contacted to be that vations for Public Good,” UNC’s compre- But Carolina has a distinct story, too, what Jennifer Ho, a former UNC professor person,” says James H. Johnson Jr., the hensive strategic plan that has as its first ASIAN POPULATION 3.2% which dates to its 18th-century founding. of English and comparative literature, William R. Kenan Jr. Distinguished Pro- objective “Build Our Community Togeth- Enslaved people helped build the cam- described in an interview as “a kind of fessor of strategy and entrepreneurship at er,” focused on “creating a more diverse, ASIAN FACULTY 11.1% pus, and the University’s first Board of indictment and a statement.” Kenan-Flagler Business School. equitable and inclusive community.” Trustees consisted overwhelmingly of Many of those who remain say they face Several professors, including Caldwell, The advisory conversations broke WHITE POPULATION 62.6% slaveholders. Slavery funded the Uni- work demands related to race that their had met twice with administrators in 2019 down in December 2019, after the UNC versity, too. “Human beings were often white counterparts don’t — tending to to discuss the campus climate and develop System’s Board of Governors voted to give WHITE FACULTY 72.4% sold along with real estate by university the well-being of students of color and en- policy solutions. An overlapping group had $2.5 million to the Sons of Confederate attorneys, who received a commission on SOURCES: UNC OFFICE OF INSTITUTIONAL RESEARCH AND ASSESSMENT, 2019 U.S. CENSUS REPORT
40 CAROLINA JANUARY/FEBRUARY ’21 41 ALUMNI REVIEW was Silent Sam, erected when Confederate sition from many corners of our campus.” statues were designed to intimidate Blacks Faculty wanted to see more outrage. “We and reinforce segregation. During its 1913 were really hoping for a written condem- dedication, industrialist Julian Carr (class nation of the Sons of the Confederacy or of 1866) recalled having “horsewhipped [of] the settlement,” La Serna said. “And a negro wench until her skirts hung in we got neither.” shreds” because she “maligned a Southern lady.” Carr, who had leadership roles in the Tenure is tougher GAA and served as the association’s pres- La Serna, who is Peruvian American, ident from 1912 to 1917, added that “the grew up in a working-class neighborhood purest strain of the Anglo Saxon is to be in Sacramento “where police car chases found in the 13 Southern states — Praise ended up literally in my backyard, with God.” people jumping my fence and helicopters Members of the campus and Chapel overhead,” he said. Education was his Hill community had protested Silent “escape hatch.” After earning a history Sam since the 1960s, and in recent years doctorate in 2008, he came to Chapel clashed with monument defenders. Hill as part of the Carolina Postdoctoral “Campus is where students live,” said Program for Faculty Diversity. Caldwell. “So basically, this was their “It was a tremendous opportunity for UNC/DAN SEARS ’74 home environment that was being filled me to get my foot in the door,” he said. The Ronald Williams II suggests “decolonizing” with hate and danger.” program develops scholars in the hopes of the curriculum by requiring students to study African American, Asian American, Even after the statue’s toppling in 2018, preparing them for tenure-track appoint- Latinx and Native American history. Such the Silent Sam issue didn’t disappear. The ments at UNC and elsewhere. “And that a mandate would produce better-informed UNC System Board of Governors brokered ended up working out.” students and could draw more BIPOC faculty, a deal with Sons of Confederate Veter- In addition to his scholarship on Williams said. ans — a group that promotes a message, 20th-century Latin America, La Serna repudiated by mainstream historians, turned his attention to making Carolina many conversations with faculty of color. that the Civil War was not about slavery a more inclusive campus. It’s “physically “I probably ran myself ragged the first and that has documented exhausting, emotionally five, six years I was here,” said Erika K. alliances with white-suprem- For BIPOC scholars, draining” work, he said, that Wilson, an associate professor of law.
GRANT HALVERSON ’93 GRANT HALVERSON acist groups. The Chapel Hill at Carolina and doesn’t always pay concrete Because Black faculty have no room to be Jim Johnson talks about “race fatigue”: the experience of repeatedly serving on personnel committees only to see Black scholars funneled into campus was told to make up to elsewhere, the dividends. “Everybody agrees “anything less than excellent,” she said, “I non-tenure-track positions or a Black colleague’s research dismissed as “ghetto sociology.” $2.5 million available for costs extra workload with these things in principle. was waking up at 4 in the morning to get associated with moving and takes away time But in practice, it’s a lot easier some time to write, to prepare for class, the sale and turned the profits over to the it after Black anthropologist Zora Neale ington’s biracial government in an 1898 displaying the monument. from scholarly to say, ‘Here’s why we can’t do and trying to make 24 hours be 30 hours treasurer of the Board of Trustees,” notes Hurston.) Last year, four more buildings massacre. The University decided in 2018 BIPOC faculty call the set- writing, making that.’ ” in a day.” the University Archives at Wilson Library. had their names removed. Three more are to designate the stadium’s name for his tlement with the SCV, which a it harder to earn In 2017, for example, La Johnson, the business professor, de- Some students brought enslaved servants awaiting decisions by Chancellor Kevin son, William R. Kenan Jr. (class of 1894), judge later voided, a demoral- tenure. And Serna and some colleagues be- scribed Wilson’s schedule as “the norm.” to class. Guskiewicz and then the trustees. Dozens who provided most of the money to build izing blow. gan talking about the growing Until the pandemic, he arrived at his office Carolina’s tenured That history can feel close. “My grand- the stadium and had dedicated it to his “That $2.5 million deal was number of Indigenous studies at 6 every morning, part of a decadeslong faculty are less mother was born in 1928. She’s still alive,” Provost Robert parents in 1927. an atrocity,” said Sharon P. scholars who have raised Car- strategy to maintain the competitive edge said Ronald Williams II, an assistant Blouin: “It’s not until “The commemorative landscape is not Holland, chair of the depart- diverse than the olina’s profile in the field. “If that Black academics need. “You have to professor of African, African American we actually get at neutral here,” said historian Malinda May- ment of American studies. University’s overall we could find a way to create be prepared to stay up all night to kick and diaspora studies. “She could not vote the root [that] we nor Lowery ’02 (MA, ’05 PhD), director of “Why in the world would you faculty. a cluster hire and bring in somebody’s butt tomorrow morning,” he for many years. She’s a Black woman born can really begin to the University’s Center for the Study of the think that a Black faculty two or three people who work said. “You can never take a day off.” reverse-engineer into poverty in the American South. So I’m American South. “You have a belief on the member would not be pissed off about on different areas of Indigenous studies, Even that might not be enough. John- this institution to very much connected to a family of people eliminate all traces of part of the decision-makers that that com- that?” we could actually be the leader in the son talks about “race fatigue”: the experi- whose lives and livelihoods were defined structural systemic memorative landscape is wallpaper, that Blouin notes that University lead- world,” he said. “Cluster hiring” involves ence of repeatedly serving on personnel by the material and psychological legacy of racism.” it doesn’t truly reflect anything about who ers had no say in the settlement. It was recruiting multiple scholars to work on a committees only to see Black scholars UNC ESHELMAN SCHOOL OF PHARMACY American slavery.” we are now. And I think what students and approved by the UNC System Board of shared research interest, often in different funneled into non-tenure-track positions Many campus buildings memorialize faculty have been saying is that these are Governors, political appointees who gov- departments. or a Black colleague’s research dismissed slaveholders and white supremacists. In of others are up for similar consideration. not tokens of memory. … Those points on ern the system’s 17 institutions. “I think The professors met with campus as “ghetto sociology.” 2015, Saunders Hall, named for Ku Klux The “Memorial” in Kenan Memorial the landscape provide us with orientation we were all violated to some degree by that leaders in 2018. “And we were told, ‘That Others have described a similar futility. Klan leader William L. Saunders (class of Stadium has been removed, its original in how we conduct ourselves on a day-to- decision,” he said. sounds great. We support that.’ ” But “Whenever I would go to these meetings 1854), was renamed Carolina Hall after namesake, William Rand Kenan Sr. (class day level.” At the time, then-Interim Chancellor the moral support did not translate into where faculty would voice their concerns, years of student agitation. (The Board of of 1864), having commanded a paramili- Until two years ago, the centerpiece Guskiewicz wrote a letter to the Board of funding. I left with the feeling that it was always Trustees rejected students’ call to rename tary force that helped overthrow Wilm- of Carolina’s commemorative landscape Governors noting the “concerns and oppo- The exhaustion theme permeates an excuse,” said Enrique W. Neblett Jr., a
42 CAROLINA JANUARY/FEBRUARY ’21 43 ALUMNI REVIEW Carolina’s tenured faculty are less di- verse than the University’s overall faculty. Based on 2018 numbers, whites represent 72.4 percent of all faculty and 78.4 percent of tenured professors. As noted earlier, Blacks represent 5.1 percent of all faculty; they account for 4.6 percent of tenured professors. The trend is similar for other faculty of color, who overall have made modest gains during the past decade. Sibby Anderson-Thompkins ’87 (’90 MA), the University’s interim chief diver- sity officer, acknowledged that this extra work benefits Carolina while leaving BI- POC professors “vulnerable when they’re going up for tenure.” She said the Universi- ty leadership wants to correct this. “We are looking at ensuring that research that is done on diversity-related issues is also valued in the same ways that other types of research are valued,” said Anderson-Thompkins. “These are key areas that we think will support the rec- ommendations coming from the faculty of color: looking at our tenure-promotion policies; ensuring that the contributions of faculty of color are weighted in the same ways that other types of service or
leadership has been valued; ensuring that UNC/JON GARDINER ’98 research related to these areas are valued; Interim Chief Diversity Officer Sibby Anderson-Thompkins ’87 (’90 MA): “These faculty have given so much. They’re tired of saying the same and that, ultimately, if faculty are taking thing over and over. They’ve been waiting for change. And I think we have to acknowledge that we’ve let them down and that there’s been a on additional work, it is with compensa- betrayal.” Anderson-Thompkins also is special adviser to the provost and chancellor for equity and inclusion. tion.” and move forward together as a commu- nity in which UNC is situated.” Its leaders rality, and strength without sight.” ‘Fierce urgency of now’ nity.” The University, he said, must “build quoted Martin Luther King Jr. from 1967, The work ahead for UNC, the commis- Carolina’s leaders have pledged to our community together — diversity and as he sought to rally people of conscience sion noted, “will be painful and unsettling; address race more forthrightly. The inclusion must be a priority, and we must against the entangled evils of racism, it will require unflinching honesty in University’s top leaders focused on the ensure that every person on our campus poverty and militarism. King, they said, acknowledging long-silenced truths. But issue during their last two annual retreats, feels safe, welcome and included.” “urged the nation to confront the ‘fierce what other way is there to redress inequi- and for the 2019 retreat they all read After George Floyd’s killing, the urgency of now.’ ” ty and to fulfill our responsibility as the Toxic Ivory Towers. Individual schools commission condemned “the deeper “We must move past indecision to ‘people’s university’? ” have launched initiatives, too. In June, for structures of white supremacy and racial action,” King had warned. “If we do not At the center of these efforts is Ander- example, the law school earmarked $1 mil- injustice that set the conditions for such act, we shall surely be dragged down into son-Thompkins, who also is the special lion to improve diversity, and in Septem- acts of violence. We recognize that those the long, dark and shameful corridors of adviser to the provost and chancellor for GRANT HALVERSON ’93 GRANT HALVERSON ber it announced the hires of two Black same structures perpetuate inequities on time reserved for those who possess power equity and inclusion. Erika K. Wilson: Because Black faculty have no room to be “anything less than excellent … I professors, Ifeoma Ajunwa and Osamudia our campus and in the broader commu- without compassion, might without mo- She grew up in Pitt County, two hours probably ran myself ragged the first five, six years I was here.” James. east of Chapel Hill, with a father and In January 2020, after his chancel- grandfather who served as principals of former UNC professor of psychology and sity of Michigan, he added, was its national lor appointment was made permanent, FACULTY WHO ARE WHITE 72.4% the same all-Black school. Two older sib- neuroscience who is considered one of the leadership on diversity issues. Guskiewicz convened a 15-member lings desegregated the local public schools. leading U.S. scholars in the area of racism For BIPOC scholars, at Carolina and commission to reckon with the Univer- TENURED FACULTY WHO ARE WHITE 78.4% Arriving at Carolina as an undergraduate and health. “The impression was, well, if elsewhere, the extra workload takes away sity’s history of complicity with slavery in 1983, she immediately hopped on a you look at our peer institutions, we’re do- time from scholarly writing, making it and white supremacy. Guskiewicz said D.C.-bound bus to commemorate the 20th ing quite well.” Neblett, who is Black, said harder to earn tenure. “The fact that we’re the commission “will include academic FACULTY WHO ARE BLACK 5.1% anniversary of the March on Washington. he left UNC in 2019 primarily because his doing a lot of service and mentoring and initiatives to strengthen our research and “That set me on a course,” she said, “to wife’s soft-money position had ended. One student support is not taken into account,” teaching, help us to study our past and TENURED FACULTY WHO ARE BLACK 4.6% advocate for social justice and to fight for reason the couple took jobs at the Univer- Caldwell said. learn from that past, build from that past African American students.” She later SOURCE: UNC OFFICE OF INSTITUTIONAL RESEARCH AND ASSESSMENT
44 CAROLINA JANUARY/FEBRUARY ’21 45 ALUMNI REVIEW became president of Carolina’s Black tion she didn’t see coming at UNC. She is and expertise within their school, it really confront, we really who designed [the Anderson-Thompkins noted one step Student Movement. She marched against now a professor of Asian American studies elevates the work,” said Anderson-Thomp- have so, so much Roadmap]?” in that direction. She has secured autho- South African apartheid and fought for the and director of the Center for Humanities kins. Among the council’s plans is to gath- work to do.” Since The criticism rization, and started searching, for a new creation of what’s now the Sonja Haynes and the Arts at the University of Colorado. er data on faculty compensation, retention 2019, Rhodes has stung Rhodes. director of education, engagement and Stone Center for Black Culture and His- She left after not getting a finalist inter- and promotion, and then to use that data. launched initiatives “When I heard that belonging. “We are in a rebuilding stage,” tory. view for the directorship of the Institute “We are now trying to focus on real policy including “Reck- people felt left out, she said. In 2007, Anderson-Thompkins for the Arts and Humanities, where she change, systemic change, deep structural oning,” an educa- that pained me,” Another structure is curriculum. Here, returned to UNC as an administrator. was associate director. change,” she said. tional program the dean said. She UNC can address its own history, and For eight years, she has run the Carolina “The institute’s been around for over Anderson-Thompkins has suggested focused on history, said she had been the nation’s history, while also preparing UNC/JOHNNY ANDREWS ’97 ANDREWS UNC/JOHNNY Postdoctoral Program for Faculty Diver- 30 years and has only ever had white male embedding a “racial equity lens,” which racial justice and looking into similar students to live in a country projected to sity, the nationally acclaimed program directors,” she said. She said she “talked examines whether policy changes widen reconciliation. The Arts and Sciences Dean Terry Ellen Rhodes hires even before become “majority minority” in 2045. Ron- ’78: “I think we’ve done some good things that helped launch La Serna’s career. She to various mentors who have told me they or narrow disparities, “across the Univer- roadmap helped in the College and the University. But good the roadmap and ald Williams II suggests “decolonizing” saw how many knowledge- don’t see a path towards lead- sity.” Her own experience suggests that convince her “that grief. When you talk about Silent Sam, and had consulted, the curriculum by requiring all students able, committed colleagues “These are key ership for me at UNC-Chapel lens remains elusive. She originally was a priority for us [is] just our past and what we have to confront, sometimes infor- to study African American, Asian Ameri- were working against racism. areas that we think Hill, and that if I wanted to omitted from the team planning for the to do something we really have so, so much work to do.” mally, with BIPOC can, Latinx and Native American history. “However, their work wasn’t will support the pursue leadership opportuni- fall 2020 return to campus. In a July letter, about the hiring.” faculty. She de- These do not have to be full-credit courses, really connected to leadership recommendations ties, I would have to leave.” she and council co-chair Gretchen Bella- Rhodes’ first efforts to implement some scribed her choices as tricky: She wants to he said. and the accountability needed coming from She believes one obsta- my rebuked the University for excluding of the proposals show how fraught these be inclusive but also must balance budgets, Adding such a mandate wouldn’t just from leadership.” cle to advancement was her them and for not considering how the conversations can be. enrollments and hiring requests across 45 produce better-informed students, Wil- the faculty of Without accountability, outspokenness about racism most vulnerable faculty, students and staff When Rhodes read the document, she departments. “I know the cry is ‘a seat at liams said. It also would draw more BIPOC she said, “we really haven’t color: looking at Carolina. “I don’t have any would be affected by returning to in-per- “jumped right away” on one of its propos- the table,’ ” she said. “And I do understand professors. “There’s only so many Ph.D.s been able to move the needle.” at our tenure- hard evidence, but I’m pretty son instruction during a pandemic. als. She announced plans to hire a cluster that — when that can make sense.” in mathematics you’re going to produce BIPOC faculty, locked out of promotion policies; good at doing textual expli- “What we have said has gone whol- of six professors, in different departments, To Caldwell, the cluster-hire process each year,” he said. certain professional networks, ensuring that the cation and interpretation. ly ignored,” they wrote. “Simply put, who study two broad fields. The first is illustrates what she calls UNC’s top-down Yet another structure is a university’s have watched their white col- contributions of And it’s really hard for me to there has been a failure in the process of Black and Indigenous families and com- governance model. She and many col- hiring policy. It might not have been writ- leagues enjoy “an express lane faculty of color think that there’s a different determining the best path forward for the munities. The second is health, wellness leagues favor more shared governance. ten to discriminate. But it can still have to promotions and opportuni- are weighted in interpretation.” University because there was no consid- and health equity in communities of color. “It’s not just that we need faculty of color unintended consequences. ties.” The University Office for the same ways As a Black woman watch- eration of the equity lens until the last The searches are still in progress. at the same old table, doing the same old “When a Black faculty member, you’re Diversity and Inclusion, for that other types ing these fits and starts, and minute, indicating such a point of view is “We need to make sure we’re moving thing,” she said. “We need a new table.” trying to recruit them, and they say, ‘I which she works, lost posi- as a faculty member, Ander- an afterthought.” the needle more quickly than we have need help with a down payment for a of service or tions. The interim job she’s son-Thompkins understands Anderson-Thompkins notes that Pro- been,” Rhodes said. Not only will the hires Altering structure house,’ and you say, ‘We don’t do that,’ now filling was vacant for a leadership has been the frustration of BIPOC vost Blouin and the team had requested advance racial equity, she said, but they The phrase “structural racism” can be that’s an equity question,” Williams said. year. valued; ensuring professors. “These faculty her feedback. also will respond to the academic needs of intimidating, so it helps to break it down. “If I were not a descendant of people who The postdoctoral program that research have given so much,” she said. Blouin said the University’s leaders various departments. Think of an actual structure like a house. were denied entry into the American mid- Anderson-Thompkins runs, related to these “They’re tired of saying the learned from the criticism. He added An- Caldwell, the roadmap’s original It can be built. It can be restored, modern- dle class, systematically, by discrimination which has brought 64 scholars areas are valued; same thing over and over. derson-Thompkins to the planning team. author, was surprised to learn from her ized or expanded. When it no longer serves in the sale and rental of housing, I might onto the faculty over its 36- and that, ultimately, They’ve been waiting for And in September, Guskiewicz named a colleagues about the planned hires. To her, its function, or if it’s dangerous beyond not need help with the down payment for a year history, has seen 21 of if faculty are taking change. And I think we have committee of faculty, students, staff and white administrators were moving too repair, it can be demolished. Even if it house in Chapel Hill. But if I’m white and them leave for other oppor- on additional to acknowledge that we’ve let local residents to advise on spring 2021 quickly and without the type of collabora- looks solid, it’s wise to hire an inspector affluent, then I have parents who might be tunities, she said. Three have work, it is with them down and that there’s planning. tion she had envisioned. occasionally to make sure there are no able to help me with that.” left in the past two years. been a betrayal.” “It’s a little odd that people would see lurking hazards. Examining every structure in an compensation.” Overall, 29 tenured and Still, Anderson-Thomp- The ambitious roadmap this Roadmap for Racial Equity, and then Likewise, a university’s bureaucratic, institution as large as UNC is an ambitious — Sibby Anderson- tenure-track faculty left to kins said she sees a growing One of the key goals of last June’s Racial just start acting on it without talking to governance and personnel structures can undertaking. But aside from the moral Thompkins ’87 take jobs at other universi- (’90 MA) commitment from senior Roadmap is a diversified faculty with the people who designed it,” she said. be inspected, modernized or replaced. One imperative, there’s also the marketplace. ties between 2018 and 2020, leadership. One example is deeper expertise in racial equity and social “Cluster hires need to be really well-con- way to inspect these structures is through With all of higher education reckoning according to Executive Vice Carolina’s Diversity, Equity justice. The document proposed 30 new ceptualized to be successful, because that equity lens: Do they close or widen with racism, Carolina must compete hard- Provost Ronald Strauss. Black and Latinx and Inclusion Council, which kicked off in tenure-track positions, plus a substantial cluster hires can fail.” Caldwell wanted to disparities? er than ever for educators of color. That professors, who make up 9.7 percent of May with leaders from various schools and funding increase for the postdoctoral pro- see the process slowed down. She wanted A key structure is the University Office means designing an institution where that faculty group, accounted for 20.7 per- offices; Tanea Pettis ’95, the GAA’s assis- gram and a revamped process of selecting BIPOC faculty to help decide which de- for Diversity and Inclusion, which is people want to come and stay. cent of the departures. Strauss said faculty tant director of enrichment programs, is distinguished professors. partments got the hires. She wanted to see smaller than in the past. “Whenever there Williams thinks this is possible, given leave for a variety of reasons: lucrative a council member representing the GAA. Campus leaders called the roadmap a efforts to improve the racial climate so the are gaps institutionally, people who care enough resources and will. “I believe that offers, UNC’s pay scale, family situations Anderson-Thompkins co-chairs the coun- spur to action. “I think we’ve done some new hires will feel happy and supported tend to step up,” Caldwell said. “But we this University, we can be a leader if we and sometimes the racial climate. cil. Caldwell represents BIPOC faculty. good things in the College and the Uni- and stay. also have become very burned out.” The want to be,” he said. “We can be No. 1 in And even some of those who disliked “By designating someone on the senior versity,” said Terry Ellen Rhodes ’78, dean Caldwell believes the dean was well-in- roadmap calls for “robust funding and racial equity — if we want to be.” the racial atmosphere had additional leadership team who’s sitting in on those of the College of Arts and Sciences. “But tentioned in moving quickly. Still, she staffing” of the administration’s efforts,- in circumstances. meetings, who’s compensated for this, good grief. When you talk about Silent asked, “What does that say about the level cluding two faculty fellowships that focus Barry Yeoman is a freelance writer based in Jennifer Ho left for a leadership posi- and who has demonstrated knowledge Sam, and just our past and what we have to of disrespect and disregard for the people on equity and inclusion. Durham.
46 CAROLINA JANUARY/FEBRUARY ’21 47 ALUMNI REVIEW