{"id":134213,"date":"2023-09-21T00:00:15","date_gmt":"2023-09-21T04:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/?p=134213"},"modified":"2023-09-21T13:21:31","modified_gmt":"2023-09-21T17:21:31","slug":"bryn-mawr-college-rolls-out-59-point-plan-to-combat-privilege-oppression-perpetuated-at-the-college","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/bryn-mawr-college-rolls-out-59-point-plan-to-combat-privilege-oppression-perpetuated-at-the-college\/","title":{"rendered":"Bryn Mawr College rolls out 59-point plan to combat \u2018privilege, oppression perpetuated at the college\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

New mandatory \u2018Power, Inequity and Justice\u2019 class part of institutional DEI overhaul<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Bryn Mawr College has re-energized its effort to promote diversity, equity and inclusion on campus, rolling out a 59-point action plan for the 2023-24 school year that encompasses every aspect of campus life, from curriculum to policies to financial aid.<\/p>\n

Bryn Mawr College, a private all-female institution just outside Philadelphia, states<\/a> on its website it needs to implement the plan to get a handle on \u201cunderstanding of the processes by which power, privilege, and oppression are perpetuated at the College,” where annual tuition<\/a> costs $61,190, plus $18,690 for housing and meal plans.<\/p>\n

Bryn Mawr officials have ignored repeated requests for comment from The College Fix<\/em> to ask them about the \u201cprivilege and oppression \u2026 perpetuated at the College\u201d and their 59-point action plan to address it.<\/p>\n

The action plan<\/a> is broken down into 15 different subsections, which include: deepening DEIA awareness and practice, addressing institutional policies and practices, increasing access and strengthening financial aid, and remembering and reclaiming.<\/p>\n

Under the category called course and curricular design and implementation, the college has launched a new mandatory \u201cPower, Inequity, and Justice\u201d class requirement for students. The requirement was approved in May 2022 and implemented<\/a> on campus this fall.<\/p>\n

The course seeks to advance \u201can understanding of the ways that power dynamics and hierarchies shape the production of knowledge and access to opportunity, as well as engagement with histories and futures of social transformation and justice,\u201d the curriculum committee wrote<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Asked to weigh in on the requirement, one higher education watchdog questioned whether the promotion of DEI over other areas of academic study is justifiable.<\/p>\n

\u201cPower, inequity, and justice are worthy topics of study, but it is troubling that Bryn Mawr has prioritized making this course a requirement when its students do not need to take basic courses in economics or U.S. history or government,\u201d said Steve McGuire with the Campus Freedom division at the American Council of Trustees and Alumni.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy all means, students should investigate these topics, but they should do so in the context of a well-rounded liberal education that helps students to think about them from a variety of historical, comparative, and philosophical perspectives,\u201d he added in an email to The College Fix.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cLooking at Bryn Mawr\u2019s approach in its extensive action steps, I\u2019d be concerned that only a narrow range of questions will be asked, and answers given, in the courses that meet this requirement.\u201d<\/p>\n

Right now The College Fix<\/em> has a back-to-school campaign to help us continue to support our amazing student journalists. A donation today<\/a><\/span> will be matched thanks to a generous limited-time matching gift opportunity from a friend of The Fix<\/em>! CLICK HERE<\/a><\/span> for more details — and thank you!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Additional action plans under way at the college, its website states, include a campuswide \u201cpolicy audit in which each department examines its policies and practices, identifies areas that could negatively impact student success and belonging, and propose appropriate revisions.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research will also use what is being called an \u201cequity lens\u201d to review its practices and policies.<\/p>\n

Also on tap, the Dean of the Undergraduate College will \u201cexplore the creation of a Social Justice Fellow in Residence program that would bring a social justice advocate to campus to collaborate with administrators, faculty, staff, and students.\u201d<\/p>\n

The provost will also \u201cassess practices and policies to ensure that faculty equity and inclusion work is valued and supported,\u201d including providing financial support for DEI faculty initiatives and lightening the course load among faculty who engage in specific DEI work at the college.<\/p>\n

The liberal arts school \u201csharpened\u201d its focus on DEI in 2015, and student-led strikes in 2020 further inspired initiatives for changes in this area. These strikes, which took place in the wake of George Floyd\u2019s death in 2020, were aimed at promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion at an institutional level and lasted for approximately two weeks in November.<\/p>\n

According to the \u201cStrike Conclusion Statement<\/a>,\u201d the protests were \u201ca response to the legacy of trauma and anguish and the historic lack of sympathy, true proactivity, and response from the College.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom the beginning,\u201d it reads, \u201cBlack students have always pushed the College forward not out of want but out of existential need, continuous deliberation, tedious diligence, and painful patience. We continuously bear not only that burden but the burden of guarding and ensuring our own survival, person, and humanity in college and the broader systems we find ourselves within, outside of academia.\u201d<\/p>\n

Notably, the statement also emphasized that \u201cDespite the end of this strike, the strike is a state of being, a continuous movement for vigilance, activity, and empowerment to believe in oneself, to believe in each other, and to work towards disrupting these systems that perpetuate violence and inequities and creating anew with possibilities, potentiality, and place.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the strike, Bryn Mawr developed \u201ca proactive, work-in-progress approach to frame higher-level goals and aspirations and actions to support these goals.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 2023-24 action plan follows up on additional changes<\/a> instituted during the 2021-22 academic year, such as transparency on scholarship taxes for international students, a dean and adequate advising for undocumented students, and a \u201creparations fund\u201d for black and indigenous students.<\/p>\n

Many of these goals center around promoting a \u201cmore complete and nuanced\u201d understanding of how power, privilege, and oppression are a part of and perpetuated by the college, and the college believes that this in turn will create an environment where all students feel a sense of both thriving and belonging.<\/p>\n

These efforts to promote inclusivity may, however, \u201clikely have the opposite effect for heterodox faculty and students,\u201d McGuire told The College Fix<\/em> via email.<\/p>\n

\u201cRather than trying to open their campus to greater viewpoint and intellectual diversity, Bryn Mawr could be creating an even worse ideological silo in which heterodox thinkers and dissenters self-censor if they join the campus community at all,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cit is important to be a welcoming community that does not discriminate against people from different backgrounds,\u201d he added. \u201cIt is unfortunate, however, to see so little emphasis on viewpoint and intellectual diversity in this plan, since those forms of diversity are critical to the free and open pursuit of truth that is central to a college education.\u201d<\/p>\n

MORE: Bryn Mawr College caves, officially removes past president\u2019s name from library<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

IMAGE: Bo Ben \/ Shutterstock<\/p>\n

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