As a senior about to graduate, I am deeply saddened by the responses on Wesleying to the Wespeak on faculty of color at Wesleyan (“Diversify the Faculty of ‘Diversity University!’” May 1, 2009, Vol. CXLV, No. 20). After four years of struggling to understand power dynamics in the United States, I find that in one of our country’s most esteemed liberal universities, the future leaders of our country and our world are shockingly bigoted. Many of the people who commented on Wesleying seem to have missed the fundamental critique of our society as foundationally racist. If we are not careful (as we have not been here at Wesleyan, evidenced by the shockingly small number of faculty of color) we will continually replicate the same hegemonies we aim to deconstruct in our theoretical abstract conversations in the classroom. One person wrote on Wesleying that they would rather have a heart surgeon who got a 4.0 in med school rather than one who was chosen to diversify the staff at a given hospital. This is exactly the kind of one-dimensional thinking that I thought students here wished to move beyond. The idea that the only value we can place on someone is in their GPA is absurd, and the thought that the doctor of color in the hospital would automatically NOT be the one with a 4.0 GPA is blatantly racist. 

Professor Price’s tenure is only one example of the hiring practices of this university, and was a historic moment that was seized upon as an opportunity to voice student concerns. Whether or not you believe her to be a good professor, the University’s failure to grant her tenure is a part of a trend that cannot be ignored. I believe that we must examine ourselves and our priorities in creating a community here at Wes that is both academically rigorous and intellectually responsible.