Diversity, Equity and Belonging

Our commitment to diversity and inclusion goes hand in hand with our commitment to equity and social justice. In the College of Arts and Sciences, we value diversity in all forms, including but not limited to race, ethnicity, Indigeneity, gender and gender expression, sexual orientation, language, culture, religion, mental and physical ability, age, socio-economic status, parenting status, citizenship status, and immigration status. Openness, dignity, intellectual curiosity, and inclusiveness are crucial to learning. They are the root of true knowledge and lie at the heart of our academic mission.

The success of our efforts to recruit, retain and support peoples historically under-represented in U.S. universities demand that we rectify the inequalities long perpetuated in higher education. We know that our commitment to diversity must be a commitment to accountability and to action. Through informed investments we are working to ensure that our institutional culture, policies and infrastructure foster an inclusive environment. We know we cannot survive as a public institution without these investments. Our goal is to ensure the full participation and wellbeing of all members of the CAS community. Now more than ever, we must support each other.

We gratefully acknowledge the enormous contribution that diversity makes to our university. We believe that the ability to solve complex human problems depends on including and honoring the perspectives of diverse persons. Homogenous academic settings breed complacency and ignorance. Diversity expands our scholarly horizons and sparks intellectual growth. Diversity exposes us to new ideas and intellectual traditions and enhances our ability to think in complex ways that are critical to our collective future.

In the College, we are committed to creating and sustaining a learning environment that truly honors the contributions that diversity makes to our strength. We understand that supporting diversity and inclusion in CAS not only benefits our university, but benefits all of the peoples and communities our institution was created to serve.

The College of Arts and Sciences is heartbroken by news of the discovery of the remains of 215 Indigenous children at the site of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School in British Columbia, Canada. We offer our deepest condolences to the Tk'emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation and to all Indigenous nations, communities and families across North America now mourning this most recent confirmation of the atrocities committed against their children within the Indian boarding/residential school system which operated in Canada and the U.S. for well over a century.

The uncovering of this mass grave, which held the remains of children as young as three, serves as an agonizing reminder of the cruelty of Canadian and U.S. Indian policies enacted upon the youngest and most vulnerable citizens of Indigenous nations. From the early 19^th to the late 20^th centuries, more than 350 government funded and church led Indian boarding schools operated in the United States, while 139 such schools operated in Canada. These institutions promoted assimilation, Christian conversion and placed severe prohibitions on Indigenous culture. English-only policies were strictly and often violently enforced. As places of profound dehumanization with mortality rates reaching as high as sixty percent, these schools and their legacies have inflicted untold suffering on Indigenous families, communities and nations. Today, Indigenous peoples continue to endure the intergenerational impacts of the Indian boarding school system.

The recent findings at Kamloops have ignited a wave of grief across Indigenous North America. In this moment we are reminded yet again of the importance of working collectively towards a time when it will no longer take a peoples renewed anguish over state violence for their calls for justice and accountability to be heard. As the academic year draws to a close, we invite you to appreciate more deeply all that it has taken for each Indigenous student of our university just to be here, given the thousands of Native children who did not survive their schooling.

Related news links:

• nytimes.com/2021/05/28/world/canada/kamloops-mass-grave-residential-schools.html
• washingtonpost.com/world/2021/05/29/residential-school-grave/
• cnn.com/2021/05/31/americas/canadians-mourn-mass-grave-childrens-remains/index.html
• news.yahoo.com/canada-residential-schools-justin-trudeau-jagmeet-singh-214358063.html
• reuters.com/world/americas/remains-215-children-found-former-indigenous-school-site-canada-2021-05-28/

Dear Faculty, staff and students, 

The College of Arts and Sciences stands with the victims, families, and communities in Atlanta and with the broader Asian and Asian American communities now coming to grips with the recent mass shooting that has taken the lives of eight people, including six Asian women. As we offer our heartfelt condolences to the families and communities affected, we are compelled to speak out and act against the racism, misogyny, and xenophobia that motivated this latest atrocity. As we learn more of this tragedy, our concerns turn immediately to our students, staff, faculty and to all members of Asian communities on our campus.
 
Our ability to act in solidarity and to provide more effective support requires that we recognize a number of fundamental factors that have shaped the current circumstances. First, we must recognize that this was not an isolated event, but part of a long and ongoing history of anti-Asian racism and violence in the Unites States. Second, we must understand how this violence is rooted at the dangerous intersections of racism, sexism, colonialism, and xenophobia, rendering all peoples of Asian descent and their communities as targeted and vulnerable. And, third, we acknowledge that since the beginning of the pandemic, we have seen a spike in violence against Asians and Asian Americans across the country.

In condemning this violence, it is the responsibility of everyone in the College to work together to make our community - and nation – more inclusive. We must intensify our efforts to normalize the understanding that everyone belongs. These painful times serve as a stark reminder that equitable and safe environments are not accessible to all. We must continue to strive to make this a reality through our actions and investments. Our commitments to equity and belonging must include commitments to ensuring everyone’s safety and well-being.

Dear Faculty, staff and students, 

The College of Arts and Sciences condemns the brutal killing of George Floyd. His death is the latest in a wave of police and civilian violence, rooted in anti-Black racism, that has also taken the lives Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor and Tony McDade in recent weeks alone. These latest tragedies have catalyzed a collective reckoning with the long and ongoing histories of racial discrimination and injustice in this country. They have exposed a flagrant devaluing of Black lives increasingly emboldened in the present. 

While we express our solidarity with the current protests and calls for justice, we recognize that it should not take a crisis of this magnitude to draw our attention to the complexities of systemic and structural racism, anti-Black racism and colonialism that continue to shape the lives of Black Americans. As we are moved to strengthen our commitment to change, we are challenged to confront the ways in which we have failed to alter the conditions that have made the Black Lives Matter movement necessary. 

If we hope to truly stand in solidarity with African American students, staff, and faculty on this campus, we must do more. Our heartache in the current moment must translate into actions that center the aspirations of the Black communities at UB in all efforts to build a more accountable and inclusive institutional culture.

We decry the uses of excessive force against citizens protesting police brutality, anti-Blackness, systemic discrimination, and the erosion of civil liberties in this country. We renounce all efforts to criminalize and silence the crucial work of transformation that is underway in the streets of the cities and communities across this nation. Through this work emerges new possibilities that we will draw upon in moving towards a more just and equitable future.