Can we build on our campuses the just communities we want to see in the world?
Eileen Wilson-Oyclaran, Ph.D.
President, Kalamazoo College
April 6, 2009
Featured Speaker
2009 State of Michigan Equity in the Classroom Conference
Thank you for that very kind introduction. I am honored to be with you this morning as you begin your considerations of Building Community, Creating Inclusion and Sustaining Success, and I salute you for your work – in the area of educational equity and social justice.
I have chosen as the title of my remarks, "Can we build on our campuses the just communities we want to see in the world?" a very poor adaptation from Gandhi without a doubt, and yet, an important issue for us to consider.
In the essay, Trustworthy Leadership: Can We Be the Leaders We Need Our Students to Become?, Diana Chapman Walsh, former President of Wellesley College, argues that we need graduates:
"to become active participants in the world, potent advocates for human rights, confident leaders willing to take risk in pursuit of intellectual honesty, of freedom to disagree, of justice and fairness, global citizenship, and mutual responsibility." 1
I would argue that these outcomes cannot be realized unless we model for our students the lives we hope they will lead when they graduate, and unless we model, on our campuses, the kinds of communities we want them to create in the larger society. Communities characterized by justice and fairness; communities in which every individual has an opportunity to contribute to their fullest and to develop their full potential.
My own notion of such a just community is informed by what Dr. ML King, Jr. has described as The Beloved Community; an environment in which individuals and groups live in an inclusive spirit of sister and brotherhood, and all forms of discrimination have been eradicated. Such communities are by no means conflict free. However, the interpersonal conflicts, and the inter and intra group conflicts that are an inevitable part of life in community are addressed through peaceful conflict-resolution. Those who are adversaries work to achieve a level of reconciliation that enables them to interact, if not cooperate, in a spirit of mutual respect. Equally important, power is not abused, instead, it is used constructively.
The idea that our campuses could function as beloved communities may see impossible if not naïve. However, Dr. Kin saw such communities as achievable. Moreover, Albert Einstein admonishes us, "All meaningful and lasting change first starts in your imagination and then works its way out." So it is important that we imagine such communities, and consider the components as well as the work required to realize them on our campuses.
To do this we need to focus on two issues: equity and inclusion. Although the separation may be a bit artificial, I want to use the term "equity" to focus on the student learning experience as it occurs in the classroom and in experiential learning contexts, and then term “inclusion” to refer to the experience that students have within the campus community. Both equity and inclusion are essential features of a just educational community. In equitable educational communities all students regardless of economic background, ethnicity, gender, physical ability, race, or sexual orientation have both the opportunity and the support required to achieve their fullest potential. In an inclusive community all students are fully recognized and valued. Their experiences are deemed worthy of critical examination and their voice and perspectives are sought and valued.
In her monograph, Equality as a Fact, Equality as a Result: A Matter of Institutional Accountability, Estella Mara Bensimon observes:
"Much of the data show that despite numerical growth in higher education participation among underrepresented students, African American, Hispanic, Native American, and other minority groups continue to experience significant inequality in higher education." 2
In an effort to explain this phenomenon, she draws on a distinction between what she labels as the "diversity" agenda and the "equity" agenda. The diversity agenda focuses on improving campus climate, providing academic support, and assisting the campus community to live more effectively in a diverse society. The equity agenda, conversely, focuses on “the institution’s track record for producing successful outcomes for underrepresented students.”
Bensimon acknowledges that the diversity agenda has given rise to some positive results including the broadening of the curriculum to include the experience of women and people of color; however, she also argues that the:
"underlying assumption of the diversity movement is that contact across racial and ethnic lines is desirable, with a goal of creating a race neutral environment." 3
She further argues that critical examination indicates that it is white students who benefit most from diversity efforts because students of color ipso facto must learn to function in diverse societies if they are to survive.
This perspective leads her to question the validity and relevance of the diversity agenda in the promotion and realization of equality in higher education. Instead, she urges the higher education community to adopt an equity agenda in which institutions hold themselves accountable for the performance of every student, and on agreed upon measures quantifiable parity across identified categories of students becomes the criteria for determining success.