Over the years, I have told our students that I want them to graduate from Fordham bothered by injustice. That word, injustice, has taken on more weight in the last several years, as many Americans have—too belatedly—come to realize how pervasive injustice is when it comes to issues of race in this country.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. knew it  and he preached and wrote about it with painful clarity, perhaps nowhere so pointedly as in his Letter from a Birmingham Jail:

“… when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six year old daughter why she can’t go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky…”

This was not about Justice with a capital J, nor a lofty philosophical argument (though Dr. King could make those like no one else), but a moment of shared pain between a father and daughter. It was not an occasion for analysis, but an invitation to empathy.

I believe that the ability to sit with another’s pain is what makes us fully human. To recognize that pain is to be moved to action. The struggle for full equality in our country for Black people is far from over, and perhaps has even been set back by the pandemic, which has disproportionately affected people of color. Likewise, while Fordham has made strides in combating racism and moving toward true equity and justice (thanks to many of you reading this letter), we still have much work to do.

I promise you that that work goes on. It may seem sometimes to be overshadowed by other events in the life of the University, but our resolve to live up to Fordham’s Jesuit calling to be people for others remains strong. We may best honor Dr. King by continuing his work, and by emulating his devotion to the cause of racial justice.

May God bless you all, this day and every day.

Sincerely,
Joseph M. McShane, S.J.

The April 29 event was the deans’ second forum for alumni on their commitment to furthering the University’s action plan for addressing racism and educating for justice. Fordham announced the plan in June 2020 after nationwide protests against police brutality and racial injustice prompted members of the Fordham community to describe their own experiences of discrimination on campus.

“We’re asking hard questions, addressing proposals that have come forward, and moving forward indeed with hope and confidence into a future … that is marked by greater inclusivity, greater diversity, and greater commitment shared to building a much more just world as we educate for justice and seek to eradicate racism,” said Joseph M. McShane, S.J., president of Fordham, in opening remarks.

Father McShane and the four deans were joined by moderator Valerie Irick Rainford, FCRH ’86, a Fordham trustee who is spearheading anti-racism training efforts within the University, and Rafael Zapata, Fordham’s chief diversity officer.

The panelists spoke of changes underway in the curriculum, recruitment of faculty and students, new programs, and other efforts to embed anti-racism in the University and effect permanent change.

“For students to come here from different backgrounds, it is vitally important that they feel that this institution represents them, that they do not feel like … they are here on sort of sufferance, that they feel that their communities are a part and parcel of what makes Fordham tick, what makes Fordham an excellent place,” said Tyler Stovall, Ph.D., dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.

Faculty Diversity, Community Connections

Stovall emphasized the importance of forging links between the University and the diverse, vibrant communities surrounding the Rose Hill and Lincoln Center campuses. Zapata noted current efforts like a collaboration with the Bronx Book Festival and a speaker series focused on Bronx writers facilitated by faculty. “We are an institution of this wonderful borough, and I think that’s something we need to talk about a little bit more,” he said.

In efforts to diversify the faculty, Eva Badowska, Ph.D., dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and associate vice president for arts and sciences, said 50% of the arts and sciences faculty members recruited to begin this academic year are people of color. In addition, Fordham announced the creation of the Margaret Peil Distinguished Chair in African and African American Studies and is currently recruiting for a newly created postdoctoral fellowship in critical race studies in the sociology and anthropology department, as well as a new position in the English department—a rhetoric specialist—to support the faculty’s work on revising the composition program toward anti-racist learning objectives and pedagogy.

Arts and Sciences also announced the creation of a new affiliate program in African and African American studies to elevate that department’s visibility and foster an interdisciplinary approach to anti-racism, Badowska said. Fifteen faculty members across departments have committed to joining the initiative.

On the point of hiring diverse faculty, Rainford noted that “once you hire those individuals, I think it’s also about inclusion and access.”

Stovall said a newly formed group of Fordham faculty members of color would be meeting soon to discuss diversity among faculty and at the University generally. “I think these leaders are going to have an awful lot to say, and it’s going to be up to us to listen,” he said.

He pointed out the importance of integration, “one of the terms we tend not to talk about.”

“Ultimately, what we are all about in this endeavor is producing an integrated educational experience and ultimately an integrated society,” he said. “Study after study has shown, in despite of people’s fears of integration, that actually integrated education benefits not just students of color but all students, and makes them stronger students.”

“This is a major pathway towards the ultimate goal of Fordham University,” he said.

Zapata said his office is offering a grant program titled Teaching Race Across the Curriculum to help academic departments integrate questions of race within their courses, particularly those that all students take.

“Students want to see themselves in the people that teach them, that they encounter throughout [the University], but they also want to see themselves in the curriculum. They’ve talked a lot about that,” he said.

Expanding Scholarship and Internship Opportunities

Laura Auricchio, Ph.D., dean of Fordham College at Lincoln Center, pointed to the Office of Undergraduate Admission’s “above-and-beyond” efforts to increase diversity among incoming students. Changes this year include an effort “to appreciate and value a wider range of student experiences in the admissions process,” she said, as well as new events for prospective students of color who would be part of the fall 2021 entering class.

Also important, Auricchio said, is the recently created Trustee Diversity Scholarship Fund, which grew out of a scholarship fund that Rainford founded. “Before we could even announce it, we were starting to get donations,” Rainford said.

A new Cultural Engagement Internships program, funded by Fordham College at Lincoln Center and Fordham College at Rose Hill, has created paid internships that place students with New York nonprofits and cultural organizations that mostly serve communities of color or advance the work of anti-racism. “This opens up the internship opportunities to students who might not otherwise be able to afford” to take unpaid internships, Auricchio said.

And diversity in the yearlong Matteo Ricci Seminar for high-achieving students on both campuses has grown by opening it up to all students who want to apply, rather than relying on a select pool of students recommended by faculty, she said; she also cited the importance of bringing on Assistant Dean Mica McKnight, a woman of color, as co-leader for the Fordham College at Lincoln Center program.

Supporting Students

In other efforts on the undergraduate level, Maura Mast, Ph.D., dean of Fordham College at Rose Hill, said administrators on both campuses are developing a program to support first-generation students—61% of whom are students of color—and their families as the students navigate college life. At Rose Hill, the college is expanding access to undergraduate research opportunities by developing a one-credit course on the ins and outs of conducting research, such as developing a proposal and finding a mentor, Mast said.

“It’s … so important that we intentionally support students as they are and who they are, when they get to Fordham and when they’re at Fordham—that we are transparent and effective in this work,” she said.

In a culmination of longstanding efforts to increase diversity in the college’s Honors Program, 60% of students offered admission this year are either BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, or people of color) or first-generation students, Mast said.

The University has also secured a planning grant from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute to join a national learning community aimed at building capacity for developing inclusive, equitable, anti-racist approaches to STEM education—in first-year “gateway” courses, in particular—to support students who are underrepresented in these fields, she said.

The panelists took questions, including one about why the University doesn’t have an Asian American studies program with a major and minor offered. Badowska said she had met with members of the faculty—which would have to propose any new program, according to University statutes—about surveying the existing classes and resources to see what might be offered immediately while they work on developing a program.

“It is the curriculum that reveals who we are, and it is our academic programs that say we’re an anti-racist university or we are not an anti-racist university,” she said. “So that’s one of the reasons why an Asian American studies program is so critical for us to develop at this moment.”

Eradicating Racism

In response to another question—“Do you really believe that racism can be eradicated at Fordham?”—Rainford spoke of a long-term effort.

“There are some that still believe that racism doesn’t exist,” said Rainford, who is Black. “But the fact of the matter is, it’s in the fabric of everything in the country.”

“It will take time and effort, and we will not eradicate racism in our lifetime, but we certainly can help advance racial equity,” such as through the efforts the deans described, she said.

Zapata responded, “It’s going to take courage, the courage to … listen to the experiences of people who don’t always feel they have a chance to voice their experiences.”

Stovall said, “We currently live in a world where scientists are literally talking about creating human immortality in less than a century. So in that kind of world, I think all sorts of things are possible, including eradicating racism.”

Hurdles to Surmount

Asked about obstacles the University faces, Mast mentioned funding—for staffing, on-campus housing, and financial aid, for instance.

Badowska spoke of the challenges that would be inherent in changing the University’s culture to a point where everyone in the arts and sciences community would possess the five competencies that the deans have proposed:

• Knowledge about racism, white privilege, and related topics;
• Self-knowledge and a commitment to self-work and continuous learning in these areas;
• Commitment to disrupting microaggressions and racist dynamics in the classroom, the workplace, and beyond;
• Commitment to systemic change through examining policies and practices to make sure they support racial equity; and
• Reimagined community and allyship, or a capacity to form equitable partnerships and alliances across racial lines.

“We know that we have a long road before we can say that everyone has these five capacities, but we’ve identified them,” she said.

The event drew 64 attendees, nearly all of whom stayed nearly a half-hour beyond the event’s one-hour allotted time.

“That, I think, shows the great hunger and thirst that the people of Fordham have for this great work that we’re about together,” Father McShane said. “One of the things we have to remind ourselves is that this is a beginning, and that’s an important observation and an important thing for us to own. We have a long journey ahead of us, but we are up for it and will keep at it.”

With these words, Joseph M. McShane, S.J., president of Fordham, introduced an online discussion with Fordham’s deans of the arts of sciences on Tuesday evening, Oct. 13. The event, titled “Eradicating Racism in Arts and Sciences at Fordham University,” was moderated by Valerie Rainford, FCRH ’86, a member of the University’s Board of Trustees and the founder and CEO of Elloree Talent Strategies.

“The purpose of today’s session is to open a dialogue with the Fordham community,” said Rainford, a former managing director and head of Advancing Black Leaders strategy at JPMorgan Chase. A Fordham graduate, she began working with the deans this past summer to address issues of racism and inequity, and she is spearheading anti-racism trainings within the University as part of Fordham’s action plan for addressing racism. “We see this as a series of conversations, and today is just the start.”

Eva Badowska, Ph.D., dean of the faculty of arts and sciences and associate vice president for arts and sciences, said the four deans’ efforts unite undergraduate and graduate programs at the University. “We as a leadership team in arts and sciences have committed ourselves to the work of anti-racism,” she said.

During the event, the deans addressed several questions that had been submitted in advance, including one from someone who asked why such a discussion was necessary at Fordham.

Laura Auricchio, Ph.D., dean of Fordham College at Lincoln Center, responded by noting that this past spring, after the May 25 killing of George Floyd galvanized nationwide protests against racial injustice, Fordham “started hearing an outpouring of testimonials” from students and alumni of color who described their experiences of discrimination on campus. She cited two Instagram accounts, in particular: Black at Fordham and Let’s Talk About It Fordham.

“Hundreds of stories were told on these Instagram accounts, and my fellow deans and I read every single one of them,” Auricchio said. “These social media posts were a wake-up call. They prompted us to start having conversations that we might never have had before … with an ear to learning where there might be opportunity for change.”

Tyler Stovall, Ph.D., became dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in July, and said that anti-racism work “was part of my introduction to Fordham University.”

“I was literally hired the same week that George Floyd was murdered,” Stovall said. “For me, being an African American dean at Fordham has called up both opportunities and responsibilities. It has meant that I have to think about what other members of the African American community are experiencing and the ways in which my position can be an asset to that community and, through that community, an asset to Fordham as a whole.”

Maura Mast, Ph.D., dean of Fordham College at Rose Hill, noted that Stovall, in the deans’ first training session together, had challenged his colleagues: “He said, ‘Why now? Why are you committed to this now? And how do I know that you’re going to carry through that commitment?’”

“It was an opportunity to be humble,” Mast said.

She told the audience that she and her fellow deans have heard from Fordham’s students that they want Fordham to commit to combating anti-Blackness and racism at the University. To that end, deans and faculty have engaged in brainstorming sessions and role-playing activities “to discern, perceive, and disrupt racism,” she said, using a phrase that Badowska coined to describe the deans’ approach to the problem.

“We’re reckoning with ourselves, with our history of being indoctrinated with racism,” Mast said. “We need to educate ourselves so we can educate others.”

As part of that reckoning, the four deans and their staffs have undertaken a joint self-education, working with two consultants, Kathy Obear, Ed.D., and Michelle Loyd-Paige, Ph.D. The deans noted that Rainford has been instrumental in pushing them to engage in this process in a way that will benefit the Fordham arts and sciences community as a whole.

Several people in the audience wanted to know how anti-racism would be reflected in the University’s curriculum, and Badowska described some of those efforts.

“There is an initiative to really review and explore the existing core curriculum,” she said, noting that while that process will take some time, departments are already exploring pilot-level curriculum initiatives with the assistance of Rafael Zapata, Fordham’s chief diversity officer, special assistant to the president for diversity, and associate vice president for academic affairs. And since faculty are central to any curricular initiatives, she also described broad efforts to recruit and retain diverse faculty, stating that of 26 arts and sciences faculty members hired this year, 46% reported their race as non-white.

The deans, in recent communications to arts and sciences faculty, also highlighted initiatives like the formation of the Deans’ Anti-Racism Advisory Committee, and efforts to develop and implement anti-racism trainings for faculty and first-year students.

Throughout the conversation, the panelists made clear that while work has already started to bring anti-racism to the forefront of Fordham’s arts and sciences education, there is much more to be done, and that these must be ongoing conversations with and among all members of the Fordham community, including alumni.

“We are learning now from one another in ways that are very important, and sometimes very hard, very uncomfortable,” Father McShane said at the close of the discussion. “But they are necessary for us. This endeavor is mission-central, mission-critical, mission-essential.”

Thursday, Oct. 29
10 a.m.-4 p.m.
Various locations

The teach-in will be divided into five sections and will be led by members of the psychology, theology, sociology, and English departments, as well as the Graduate School of Education, the Office of Multicultural Affairs, and Campus Ministry.

In addition to “History and Groundwork,” the topics addressed will be “Intersections of Identity & Identity Beyond Black and White,” “Religion and the Movements for Racial Justice,” “Microaggressions,” and “Becoming an Anti-Racist Institution.” Members of the Fordham community can visit the page for more information and to register.

Jeannine Hill Fletcher, PhD, an associate professor of theology who will participate in the first and last sessions of the day, said the teach-in originated with meetings between faculty and staff members who’d attended training at the People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond, which describes itself as an international collective of anti-racist, multicultural community organizers and educators dedicated to social transformation.

At Fordham, the group began meeting three years ago as the Undoing Racism Collective, said Hill Fletcher. In February 2014, in response to an invitation by Fordham President Joseph M. McShane, SJ, to have a university-wide dialogue on racism, it held its first open meeting.

Hill Fletcher said that the idea for the teach-in predated a recent campus incident where racist and anti-Semitic graffiti was discovered in a dorm on campus; the incident, however, illustrates the value of promoting racial justice through a campus-focused event, she said.

“A teach-in became pressing last year with the national events (such as) the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Gardner, and the reality that, 50 years after Martin Luther King, we’re still not following though on the promises of the civil rights movement,” she said.

Hill Fletcher said organizers hope to offer shared language, history, and analysis that comes out of scholarship around issues of race to create a shared space where all feel comfortable speaking freely about a contentious topic. And it’s not just for students.

“At the same time we want to ask, how does Fordham as an anti-racist institution have an impact on all staff, faculty, and administration members?” she said.

“What are the ways in which Fordham moves us toward a fully inclusive world, through its policies, and its programming, the education it provides, and to whom it provides?”

Can racial injustice in America be overcome by fostering more empathy in our culture? Perhaps, but there’s a lot more to it than that, panelists said at a Fordham event on Feb. 24.

“All of the efforts of generations of civil rights activists to transform the American conscience cannot succeed without empathy,” said theologian Rubén Rosario Rodríguez, one of the panelists. While empathy is not sufficient by itself, he said, “empathy is not something we’ve tried hard enough. Empathy is something that needs to be nurtured over time, and it cannot be legislated.”

The event, titled “Is Empathy Enough? Racial Justice and the Moral Imagination in the 21st Century,” posed questions about why racial injustice persists 50 years after the passage of the landmark Civil Rights Act.

The talk was held at Pope Auditorium at the Lincoln Center campus. It was co-sponsored by the Fordham Center on Religion and Culture and the Fordham theatre program and moderated by Aimee Meredith Cox, Ph.D., assistant professor in the Department of African and African American Studies.

The forum was tied in with the theatre program’s mainstage production of a play by Jackie Sibblies Drury,We Are Proud to Present a Presentation About the Herero of Namibia, Formerly Known as South West Africa, From the German Sudwestafrika, Between the Years 1884-1915.

Before the panel discussion, student-actors presented a scene from the play in which characters argue about crossing racial lines in portraying a character. One of the panelists took up the topic of discrimination in the theatre, saying empathy isn’t enough to keep theatre producers from routinely bypassing Asian actors.

“I talk all the time with really well-intentioned theatre makers who do have the empathy, and yet nothing much gets done about it. It’s not met with action,” said panelist Pun Bandhu, an award-winning actor and founding member of the Asian American Performers Action Coalition (AAPAC).

Asians are given a minuscule share of the available theatre roles in New York City, according to AAPAC’s numbers. Bandhu drew a comparison with the corporate world—“To make diversity a real core value of a corporation, that’s when things actually happen.” Also needed are consciousness-raising efforts and activism of the sort practiced by AAPAC, he said.

In describing the need to nurture empathy rather than try to legislate it, Rodríguez invoked Jesus Christ’s gentle persuasion through evangelization.

Students from the theater program perform a scene from “We Are Proud to Present…”

“Jesus understood that coercion does not lead to moral transformation,” said Rodríguez, author of Racism and God-Talk: A Latino/a Perspective (NYU Press, 2008). “That is why he preached in parables. These parables are wonderful, open-ended stories that leave the audience thinking— much like the play that we saw a scene from today. The interpretation is up to us. We get involved in the narrative. It becomes our story.”

Panelist Ariela Gross—historian, legal scholar, and author of What Blood Won’t Tell: A History of Race on Trial (Harvard University Press, 2010)—spoke about the role of history in cultivating empathy.

“As a historian, I believe empathy is possible, that historiography, the writing of history, helps to make empathy possible,” she said. “I agree very much with my fellow panelists that it’s about storytelling. As we tell stories about the past and about the present, we imagine other futures. We have to stretch ourselves to imagine worlds and consciousnesses that are very different from our own.”