Created 5 June 2020 11:06
For Immediate Release
The Confederation of University Faculty Associations of BC (CUFA BC) stands in solidarity with the Black and Indigenous communities of our university campuses, as well as with broader communities both local and global.
CUFA BC condemns racism in all forms, including racism against Black, Indigenous, and people of colour (BIPOC) and anti-Asian racism in our own province in the wake of COVID-19. We further condemn police brutality, which is especially destabilizing at a time when our communities are rallying for an end to racism and violence.
CUFA BC acknowledges the oppressive force of systemic racism that perpetuates injustices like the killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police.
We acknowledge that racism exists in Canada and that racism kills people through direct actions and indirect systems of inequality, poverty, criminalization, and denied access to basic, essential resources and services.
We also acknowledge the less fatal forms of racism that result in the underrepresentation of Black, Indigenous, and Asian people (among others) within positions of leadership in our community and on our campuses and their concomitant overrepresentation in precarious employment and experiences of discrimination.
White supremacist ideation is pernicious and increasing, and it disproportionately targets women and Black, Indigenous, and Asian people. This ideology is anathema to the university mission, which calls for openness and inclusion, ideas instead of fists. As bearers of that mission, we at the universities should scrutinize our own practices and work toward solutions to end violence and racism and other forms of inequality and oppression—in society and on our own campuses.
CUFA BC calls for an end to racism and commits to fighting racism within the academic community. We further call on stalwarts of the academic community—faculty members, administrators, and students—to stand up against racism on campus and to commit to fighting systemic inequalities in society.
With this call in mind, CUFA BC offers the following recommendations:
- Incorporate relevant content in your curriculum from Black and Indigenous sources (great recommendations on #BlackLivesMatter can be found here: https://think.taylorandfrancis.com/pgi-black-lives-matter)
- Encourage safe space for meaningful dialogue in departments, classrooms, committees, and senates;
- Employ hiring practices that countervail biases and incorporate these same practices in tenure and promotion processes;
- Foster research programmes aimed at dismantling systems of racism, discrimination, criminalization of poverty, state-sanctioned brutality;
- Give space and opportunities for the voices of members of marginalized communities;
- Join us in donating to anti-racist organizations (some resources can be found here https://crescendowork.com/workplace-inclusion-blog/2020/5/30/anti-racist-organizations-canada-support-donate and here https://604now.com/black-organizations-anti-racist-groups-support-bc)
CUFA BC represents over 5,500 faculty members and librarians at the five research intensive universities in British Columbia (University of British Columbia, Simon Fraser University, University of Victoria, Royal Roads University and University of Northern British Columbia).