{"id":23789,"date":"2020-06-25T14:19:07","date_gmt":"2020-06-25T18:19:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/?p=23789"},"modified":"2020-06-25T14:19:07","modified_gmt":"2020-06-25T18:19:07","slug":"boston-university-leads-day-long-discussion-about-racism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/2020\/06\/25\/boston-university-leads-day-long-discussion-about-racism\/","title":{"rendered":"Boston University Leads Day-Long Discussion About Racism"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"100%\" height=\"300\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"no\" allow=\"autoplay\" src=\"https:\/\/w.soundcloud.com\/player\/?url=https%3A\/\/api.soundcloud.com\/tracks\/846835729&amp;color=%23ff5500&amp;auto_play=false&amp;hide_related=false&amp;show_comments=true&amp;show_user=true&amp;show_reposts=false&amp;show_teaser=true&amp;visual=true\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<div style=\"font-size: 10px; color: #cccccc; line-break: anywhere; word-break: normal; overflow: hidden; white-space: nowrap; text-overflow: ellipsis; font-family: Interstate,Lucida Grande,Lucida Sans Unicode,Lucida Sans,Garuda,Verdana,Tahoma,sans-serif; font-weight: 100;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/wtbu\" title=\"wtbu\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: #cccccc; text-decoration: none;\" rel=\"noopener\">wtbu<\/a> \u00b7 <a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/wtbu\/boston-university-leads-day-long-discussion-about-racism\" title=\"Boston University Leads Day-Long Discussion About Racism\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: #cccccc; text-decoration: none;\" rel=\"noopener\">Boston University Leads Day-Long Discussion About Racism<\/a><\/div>\n<p><b>Boston University Leads Day-Long Discussion About Racism<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">by Grace Ferguson<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Boston University held its Day of Collective Engagement on Wednesday. The university led the 8-hour virtual event to talk about racism and respond to the Black Lives Matter movement.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In his opening remarks, BU President Robert Brown said that having a conversation is an important first step to confronting racism\u2014and there were many conversations throughout the day. BU faculty and staff-led discussions about the history of racism, allyship, inclusive curriculums, and more.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The event featured a town hall where BU President Robert Brown and Provost Jean Morrison answered questions from the community. But as for specific plans, there were no surprise announcements. Brown and Morrison did hint that there could be an announcement on Thursday. But the details were hazy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">At the town hall, Brown addressed the university\u2019s financial commitment to being antiracist. BU\u2019s Black student union, Umoja, and the BU Student Government have raised over $141,000 to donate to antiracist organizations. The students have asked BU to match their donation, but the university has not done so.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Brown said the university plans to use its money on internal initiatives. He mentioned that he and Morrison have both personally donated to the fundraiser. Brown donated $2,000, and Morrison donated $1,000<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Community members also asked if BU would divest from for-profit prisons. Brown did not know whether BU held those kinds of investments. The president said that had not come up in front of BU\u2019s responsible investing committee, but \u201cit will as a result of today,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Brown pointed to the rising number of minority students at BU. In 2008, 13 percent of students were racial or ethnic minorities, but last year, 29 percent of students fell into that category.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Brown also referred to university-wide initiatives that he said benefit students of color. For example, under the AffordableBU program, the university has pledged to meet 100% of students\u2019 financial need.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Also, this spring, BU stopped requiring the SAT and ACT for admission. That decision was because of COVID-19, but Brown said the university has been considering going test-optional since January.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">BU has already taken some steps to address racism and police brutality. The university has hired Ibram X. Kendi, a leading scholar on racism who will found BU\u2019s Center for Antiracist Research. And on Tuesday, the university announced that it would form a Community Safety Advisory Group. The new committee will make recommendations for the Boston University Police Department.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Brown heavily implied on Wednesday that this is just the beginning of the university\u2019s antiracist efforts.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThere will be measurable progress, I assure you, and we will be transparent about it,\u201d Brown said.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>wtbu \u00b7 Boston University Leads Day-Long Discussion About Racism Boston University Leads Day-Long Discussion About Racism by Grace Ferguson Boston University held its Day of Collective Engagement on Wednesday. The university led the 8-hour virtual event to talk about racism and respond to the Black Lives Matter movement. In his opening remarks, BU President Robert [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17683,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1597,14],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23789"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17683"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23789"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23789\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23790,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23789\/revisions\/23790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}