Multiple student and faculty-led groups at UNC held a press conference Wednesday afternoon to discuss next steps for the university’s Black community and to present demands to campus leadership following the Nikole Hannah-Jones tenure controversy.
Gathered in the Sonja Haynes Stone Center for Black Culture and History on UNC’s campus, leaders from The Black Student Movement, the Carolina Black Caucus and the Black Graduate and Professional Student Association stood hand in hand to publicly announce a list of 13 demands.
BSM will be joining with the CBC and the BGPSA tomorrow, July 7th at 12pm for a joint press conference. We will be discussing the Nikole Hannah-Jones’ decision and the future of UNC’s Black Community. The press conference will be held at the Sonja Haynes Center ✊🏿✊🏽✊🏾 pic.twitter.com/Fn06pHQhFz
— The Black Student Movement (@unc_bsm) July 6, 2021
Crafted by The Black Student Movement, these demands focus on safety, equity and creating a “safe space” for Black students on campus.
The most prominent demands include the addition of anti-racist alerts in the Alert Carolina system, with the goal of better warning students when “dangerous white supremacists” are on campus, as well as implementing a new recruitment strategy to create a more diverse faculty base that is representative of the student body.
President of The Black Student Movement Taliajah “Teddy” Vann said she cannot advocate for any Black students or faculty to join the Carolina community until these demands are met.
“We’re trying to create a Carolina community that is safe for these students, because I’ve said this numerous times, it currently is not,” Vann said. “So, there’s no way that I, as a Black student, and as a Black woman, could ask anybody to send their child here. I cannot ask you to send your Black child to Carolina when there’s really no way for me to know if your child is going to be okay when they leave. There’s no way for me to know if your child is going to survive four years at UNC and it really is that serious.”
During the press conference, members of The Black Student Movement also denounced the appointment of Rasheem Holland, who was recently announced as the university’s interim police chief. Vann cited Holland’s “assault of multiple Black students,” who were protesting at the Board of Trustees meeting last week, as cause for his removal.
“Even today, UNC reaffirmed its historical commitment to not being a safe place for our community as they approve the appointment of officer Holland as interim chief of UNC PD,” Vann said. “The decision to allow officer Holland to remain in this role further proves that this university holds no regard or remorse for the violence it inflicts on Black students and community members. Rasheem Holland’s appointment to this position is a threat to the safety of, and is an affront to, the Black community whom he brutalized. We demand his removal and dismissal from the UNC police department and a complete independent investigation into his misconduct.”
Vice President of The Black Student Movement, Julia Clark, was one of the demonstrators involved in the altercation with Holland. She said Holland punched her in the face, knocking her mask completely off, during the trustees’ meeting June 30.
“What I will say is that I hope for a day where Black people and Black students are not applauded for how they can take a hit or how many hits they can endure,” Clark said. “But instead that we are awarded safety on a campus that we built. That is what we are asking for. No one is complaining, nobody is singling him out. We are merely asking for him to be held responsible for him brutalizing Black students, myself included, at a non-violent demonstration.”
At 40 seconds there is actual footage of UNCPD Officer Holland punching me in the face and knocking off my mask completely.
This is how our university treats Black students. We were completely unarmed asking for the bare minimum. Transparency. I am exhausted and traumatized. https://t.co/gDsbbCxKCh
— Julia Clark🇧🇷 (@jc_1303) June 30, 2021
Other demands for university leadership include creating a permanent memorial for James Cates – a lifelong, Black Chapel Hill resident who was stabbed on UNC’s campus in 1970. Also, requiring grade appeal information on all syllabi with the hopes of providing Black students with more accessible channels for reporting misconduct in class and mistreatment by professors.
During the press conference, student leaders said all these demands are “actionable” and can be accomplished in the next 6 months with cooperation from the university.
UNC Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz issued a statement on Wednesday following the Black Student Movement’s press conference. He said he plans to take several steps to review their requests, including conducting an external review of officers’ body camera footage from the June 30 altercation.
“I am grateful for the continued advocacy of the Black Student Movement, the Carolina Black Caucus and the Black Graduate and Professional Student Association,” wrote Guskiewicz. “Their voices have been vital throughout the history of Carolina. I have reviewed the requested actions they presented, and I am tasking my leadership team to create a Campus Climate Plan to address the concerns shared by our students, faculty and staff. I have asked Dr. Rumay Alexander, chair of the Faculty Council’s Diversity and Community Committee, and Amy Johnson, vice chancellor for student affairs, to help lead this process until Leah Cox, Carolina’s new vice provost for equity and inclusion and chief diversity officer, who starts July 19, is fully oriented to our campus. ”
Black Student Movement leaders have plans to meet with two members of the UNC Board of Trustees, including Vice Chair Gene Davis Jr., Thursday to discuss these demands in more depth.
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Utterly delusional.