http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/...ignal-for-other-schools-experts-say/75555988/
The ouster of two top University of Missouri administrators after protests over racism is a wake-up call for campuses nationwide and signals a new sense of racial consciousness, politics and race experts said.
The abrupt resignations Monday of University of Missouri System President Tim Wolfe and the chancellor of the flagship campus R. Bowen Loftin showed the power of the growing tide of social activism among people who felt the school leaders did not respond aggressively enough to racist incidents on campus. Experts say campuses can expect more social activism if they fail to take specific actions to rid schools of hostility toward students of color.
"The University of Missouri is a signal for other universities to take notice that it's no longer business as usual as far as the handling diversity," said Keisha Bentley-Edwards, a professor at the University of Texas-Austin who who studies the racialized experience of young people.
"It's no longer just having a large representation of students of color, but also prioritizing their success at the school and the social climate at their school as one of acceptance," she said.
Members of the black student protest group, Concerned Student 1950, raise their arms while addressing a crowd following the announcement that University of Missouri System President Tim Wolfe would resign
Schools must set rules and penalties for racial discrimination, assess recruitment and retention of students and faculty from diverse backgrounds, and respond swiftly to incidents of discrimination, she and other experts said.
Bentley-Edwards points to the Black Lives Matter movement as a major catalyst for the increase in activism, saying it has inspired a generation of post-Civil Rights movement youth from varying socioeconomic backgrounds to band together against racism and oppression.
The movement developed in Ferguson, Mo., during protests that followed the shooting death of Michael Brown, an unarmed black 18-year-old, by Darren Wilson, a white police officer.
The ouster of two top University of Missouri administrators after protests over racism is a wake-up call for campuses nationwide and signals a new sense of racial consciousness, politics and race experts said.
The abrupt resignations Monday of University of Missouri System President Tim Wolfe and the chancellor of the flagship campus R. Bowen Loftin showed the power of the growing tide of social activism among people who felt the school leaders did not respond aggressively enough to racist incidents on campus. Experts say campuses can expect more social activism if they fail to take specific actions to rid schools of hostility toward students of color.
"The University of Missouri is a signal for other universities to take notice that it's no longer business as usual as far as the handling diversity," said Keisha Bentley-Edwards, a professor at the University of Texas-Austin who who studies the racialized experience of young people.
"It's no longer just having a large representation of students of color, but also prioritizing their success at the school and the social climate at their school as one of acceptance," she said.
Members of the black student protest group, Concerned Student 1950, raise their arms while addressing a crowd following the announcement that University of Missouri System President Tim Wolfe would resign
Schools must set rules and penalties for racial discrimination, assess recruitment and retention of students and faculty from diverse backgrounds, and respond swiftly to incidents of discrimination, she and other experts said.
Bentley-Edwards points to the Black Lives Matter movement as a major catalyst for the increase in activism, saying it has inspired a generation of post-Civil Rights movement youth from varying socioeconomic backgrounds to band together against racism and oppression.
The movement developed in Ferguson, Mo., during protests that followed the shooting death of Michael Brown, an unarmed black 18-year-old, by Darren Wilson, a white police officer.
