We have seen how UNC has been negatively affected and understand why some feel the Department of African and Afro-American Studies is no longer credible.
But eliminating an entire department due to fraud propagated by two individuals no longer at the University is a ridiculous and troublesome proposal.
Some students and faculty I have spoken with feel the discussion of removing the department is due to its subject matter. They say some see this incident as a convenient way to remove the program altogether.
One has to ask: If this scandal had been in the math or chemistry department, would anyone cry for their removal?
The department’s long history, marked by its 40th anniversary celebration two years ago, began with a struggle for its creation. It is one all students ought to know regardless of their major.
In 1968, the Black Student Movement delivered a list of 23 demands to Chancellor J. Carlyle Sitterson, which included the creation of the Department of African and Afro-American Studies, with the hope it would one day become a major.
The department was created to design a major curriculum examining the experiences of Afro-Americans and the cultures of Africa.
If the program were removed, we would all lose a large piece of what makes UNC a diverse institution.
Administrators should focus instead on preventing future instances of academic fraud in any department to ensure that a scandal of this nature never occurs again.
