CSS Statement in Support of Nikole Hannah-Jones

June 29, 2021

To: Mr. Stevens and the UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees
From: The Chancellor’s Science Scholars Program

Dear Mr. Stevens and Trustees:

We, the undersigned members of the UNC Chancellor’s Science Scholars (CSS) program, are writing to adamantly urge you to move forward with approving the tenure recommendation of Ms. Nikole Hannah-Jones as soon as humanly possible. We strongly support the UNC administration’s recommendations that have now been passed to the BOT twice. We stand with the numerous entities across this campus who strongly condemn the apparent stonewalling of Ms. Hannah-Jones’ tenure decision and the ensuing silence by the BOT. These actions are directly harmful to the mission of CSS and the University that you each pledged to support. As disappointing and frustrating as this situation is, it is a good reminder of why CSS exists and the types of systemic issues we were designed to disrupt.

The CSS program was founded in 2013 to address a desperate need for UNC to produce more scientists so that we could do our part to help this nation keep pace with the unyielding demand for STEM talent at all levels. As the national demographics have changed dramatically over the past few decades, the educational system has not kept pace with being able to prepare the most diverse generations of college students the nation has ever seen. University leadership who recognized this as a grand challenge decided to put tremendous resources into replicating a wildly successful model for educating students from underrepresented backgrounds, namely the Meyerhoff Scholars program at the University of Maryland – Baltimore County. The purpose was to create a program that could help develop the next generation of STEM leadership from a diverse pool of talented undergraduates. These talented students would receive mentoring and a wide range of support resources to ensure that they did not slip through the cracks like so many who came before them, ultimately allowing them to matriculate into the best graduate programs in the world and become successful faculty or leaders in industry.

In the subsequent years, we have seen extraordinary success, some of which our executive director Dr. Thomas Freeman had the pleasure to share directly with you a few short years ago. The Board expressed enthusiastic support and lauded our work as a shining example of a program that touches on every aspect of the University’s mission. Moreover, we are currently on pace to have some of our first graduates fulfill their role in accomplishing our mission as they are completing advanced degrees and beginning to enter the workforce. Some of these outstanding scholars will soon be seeking tenure-track faculty positions, hence why your treatment of Ms. Hannah-Jones is of dire consequence to our work. What you are doing now will shape the perception of current and future generations of scholars – from incoming undergraduates up to faculty – as they try to decide if UNC is worthy of their talents.

While working with undergraduates is our primary function, we are also engaged in many efforts to implement cultural change at this university because it is for ALL the people of this state, and it needs to be as inclusive and equitable as possible. Inclusion and equity, essential values declared in UNC’s strategic plan framework and sanctioned by the BOT, are necessarily coupled with specific actions, which include hiring high profile, highly qualified faculty like Ms. Hannah-Jones to our tenured ranks. Someone like her serves as a beacon and sends a clear message to our scholars that someday, when they are ready, they could come back here and be embraced and celebrated amongst our faculty regardless of their skin color or that a small number of powerful people may deem their work controversial. Your actions, however, have demonstrated that this is clearly not the case. Instead, you have sent the message that you do not respect the extraordinary efforts that faculty put into the tenure decisions put forth by the Appointments Promotion and Tenure Committee, and that scholars of color whose work you may find objectionable will not have the privilege of academic freedom that has existed on this campus for well over a century.

Systemic racism does not materialize out of thin air, rather it begins with the actions of racist people. We choose to believe that this is not who the BOT wants to be and not the embarrassing message that it wishes to send to the entire world. We choose to believe that this Board can do the right thing for the good of the institution that you have been entrusted to serve and not abandon the values that you sanctioned. We choose to believe that this Board does not intend to tear down the core principles that make a great research university capable of leading the state and the nation into the future. We demand that you uphold your moral and ethical obligations and abandon whatever political machinations have led us to this shameful situation. We demand that you immediately grant tenure to Ms. Hannah-Jones along with all the privileges that accompany that status.

Respectfully,