The UNC Board of Trustees University Affairs Committee met on March 27 at the Carolina Inn, where the members listened to suggestions of policy changes related to UNC’s strategic plan, diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and Honor Court proceedings, and voted on new faculty salary ranges.
What’s new?
- UNC professors Emily Putnam-Hornstein and Mark McNeilly spoke to trustees about the campus strategic plan and freedom of expression. They are both members of UNC’s Heterodox Academy Campus Community, which promotes viewpoint diversity and constructive dialogue on campus.
- The professors suggested building a new strategic plan with the pursuit of truth being the key mission. Students are learning to self-censor and be politically correct, they said, when they should be trained to be “anti-fragile.”
- “UNC’s current strategic plan mentions diversity 29 times, equity 28 times and inclusion 25 times. It mentions truth once,” McNeilly said.
- McNeilly said the new UNC School of Civic Life and Leadership will extend constructive discourse training into the curriculum.
- Putnam-Hornstein discussed an instance earlier this year in which a group of protesters disrupted a speaker event. She said the University needs to clarify how violations should be handled and which of the university's current policies will be enforced.
- She also said UNC needs to tackle grade inflation and reinstate minimum standardized test scores, including SAT, ACT and GRE requirements.
- “When high grades are handed out so freely, we make it harder for employers and others to distinguish among our graduates based on their relative level of preparation and achievement,” Putnam-Hornstein said. “That hurts the reputation of UNC and it hurts our students.”
- McNeilly said DEI trainings at the University also need to be revised. He said he has taken trainings with several of what he called "gotcha" questions.
- "The training is, I'll be honest with you, time-consuming, not effective, I think it's frankly not well done," McNeilly said.
- Faculty Chair Beth Morocco, in response to McNeilly, said many of these trainings have important purposes that need to be considered before wanting to abolish or reduce them. Student Body President Christopher Everett said social issues and truth can coexist and asked if there is a compromise that can be made. In response, McNeilly said it is certainly possible, and the more you listen to people, the closer you will get to the truth.
- The professors suggested building a new strategic plan with the pursuit of truth being the key mission. Students are learning to self-censor and be politically correct, they said, when they should be trained to be “anti-fragile.”
- Members of the board voted to approve new faculty salary ranges in the UNC School of Law, Hussman School of Journalism and Media, and School of Data Science and Society.
- The purpose of the proposed salary range revisions was the need to stay competitive with faculty compensation from other competing graduate programs, Vice Chancellor for Human Resources and Equal Opportunity and Compliance Becci Menghini said.
- With the opposition of one member, the board approved to continue the motion of these salary changes.
- Trustee Jennifer Halsey Evans spoke about refining non-academic Honor Court policies.
- Evans said updated laws in the past decade include a federal law stating that sexual assault cases are now managed by UNC Equal Opportunity and Compliance, rather than being heard by student honor courts, and a state law that says students involved in honor court proceedings have the right to representation by a licensed attorney.
- “There may be more that we can do, and should do, to ensure integrity and fairness in our campus proceedings,” Evans said. “We are studying this further and will report back to this committee in May.”
- Evans said updated laws in the past decade include a federal law stating that sexual assault cases are now managed by UNC Equal Opportunity and Compliance, rather than being heard by student honor courts, and a state law that says students involved in honor court proceedings have the right to representation by a licensed attorney.
- Trustee Perrin Jones shared a story from Alfred Hamilton about the discussions surrounding the renaming of Hamilton Hall to Pauli Murray Hall.
- Hamilton is the great-great-grandson of the late J.G. de Roulhac Hamilton, who Hamilton Hall was named after because of his contributions to the University in the history department.
- J.G. de Roulhac Hamilton was also a self-proclaimed white supremacist, and faculty and students have advocated for removing his name from the building and replacing it to honor Pauli Murray, a civil rights activist who was denied admission to UNC's doctoral sociology program due to their race.
- Jones said he recently had dinner with Hamilton, who said that although he disagreed with many members of the Race, History and a Way Forward Committee, he felt heard and respected throughout the process.
- “I tell this story not to revive a settled process, but rather to exemplify how even the most difficult conversations can occur without unnecessary rancor, when people of good heart interact with one another in a manner recognizing the inherent humanity we each possess,” Jones said.
The next Board of Trustees meetings are scheduled for May 15 and 16.
