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COR Goals: Curiosity and Questioning, Global Perspective, Communication Skills, and Critical Thinking

Activity/Discussion Questions: Have students read in class two brief documents: the Jet Magazine discussion of the yearbook burning and the first full paragraph of Mary Carroll Robertson’s first interview with L’Tanya Richmond, in which she describes the immediate transfer of her roommate. Prepare for a class discussion by asking them to do an informal writing on the following questions: Do you think the yearbook editors intended to exclude Carroll because of her race? Do you think her first-year roommate transferred because of her race? What evidence do you have?  Put yourself in Carroll’s shoes. How might dealing with these two events have been different if the white students had been more explicit about their anti-Black racism? If time allows, students may find the discussion more illuminating if they have first read one of the secondary sources about campus climate.

COR Goals: Curiosity and Questioning, Global Perspective, Communication Skills, and Critical Thinking

Activity/Discussion Questions: A persistent theme in American life is the assumption of many white Americans that certain ostensibly common spaces or roles actually ought to be reserved for whites (sometimes this is referred to as “white normativity”). Mary Carroll encountered many situations in which she upended white ���ϲ����� students’ assumptions that certain spaces or roles ought to be reserved for whites: her dorm room, the Homecoming Court, the yearbook, her classes, Greek Life, etc. Take the sensational event of the Homecoming and yearbook slights off of the table. Instead, have students read L’Tanya Richmond’s interviews with Carroll for homework and to identify ways in which ���ϲ����� faculty or students communicated that certain aspects of the ���ϲ����� experience were whites only. Work in groups to outline specific gatekeeping strategies whites used–as well as strategies to bring greater equity and inclusion.

COR Goals: Curiosity and Questioning, Global Perspective, Communication Skills, Critical Thinking, Problem Solving

Activity/Discussion Questions: Please read in class Robin Adams Cheeley’s op-ed, “Yes ���ϲ�����, you can fix this” about Homecoming 2019. Emphasize that people of goodwill responded to Mary Carroll Robertson’s presence on campus with real generosity. Working in groups, conduct a postmortem of the event. What did ���ϲ����� do well? What were opportunities to do better? Where do we go from here? Are there additional steps ���ϲ����� ought to take to commemorate this series of events or to make things write (i.e., what would it look like to “fix” this?)? Have groups submit recommendations in the form of a memo to the Committee on ���ϲ����� History and Memory.

COR Goals: Research Skills, Broad Base of Knowledge, Communication Skills

Assignment: Mary Carroll’s is a story of both resilience and systemic racism. The secondary literature is clear about the cost of microaggressions on Black student health and success. This exercise is about teaching students to recognize Black resilience and to map concepts from the secondary literature onto specific situations. Please have them read all of the primary and secondary material; to identify coping strategies upon which Black students rely; and to find examples of Carroll implementing those strategies. This is not conceived as a formal research paper.

COR Goals: Curiosity and Questioning, Research Skills, Broad Base of Knowledge, Global Perspective, Communication Skills, Critical Thinking, Problem Solving

Assignment: Students ought to read all of the primary sources as well as some of the secondary literature on microaggressions (either the Solorzano, Ceja,and Yossoor article or instructor-provided) for this assignment requiring close observation of the contemporary campus. This is a sensitive assignment and one that might both engender unproductive conversations and produce a disproportionate burden for students of color if interviews are permitted. Instead, find a disciplinary-appropriate way for students to explore contested racial conventions and identify contemporary microaggressions: by keeping a journal of “field observations,” for instance; reading and noting the racial politics of the last five years of the student yearbook; reviewing microaggressions documented within ; etc.  Output could take the form of the field notes or of a paper contrasting and comparing the experience of Black students in Mary Carroll’s generation to those of today.

COR Goals: Curiosity and Questioning, Research Skills, Broad Base of Knowledge, Global Perspective, Communication Skills, Critical Thinking, Problem Solving

Assignment: ���ϲ����� has undertaken many initiatives to improve the climate for Black students in the 2000s, including the work of the Presidential Task Force on Black Student, Faculty, and Staff Experiences (cf. the spring 2019 report). More recently, the ���ϲ����� Black Alumni Network has recommended additional steps. Evaluate these recommendations. Would they solve the problems Mary Carroll encountered?  The problems described in the literature? What is missing?