The Woodrow Wilson School was Racist and the Princeton School of Public Policy is too!
By now, many of you have heard that Princeton University took a singular step in the right direction in correcting centuries of structural racism at the institution by changing the name of Wilson College (now First College) and, more notably, the Woodrow Wilson School for Public and International Affairs to the “Princeton School of Public Policy and International Affairs.”
I want to be clear that while I am happy about the change, this by no means scratches the surface of the type of change Princeton needs to adopt to make up for centuries of propagating structural racism globally.
To wit, A group of courageous graduate students at the school have made the following demands:
Pay reparations - by committing 5% of Princeton’s $26 billion endowment to reparations for the descendants of every enslaved person owned by the University’s Presidents and Board of Trustees
Divest from the prison industrial complex - because it is fundamentally immoral to finance an educational institution through profits from carceral industries, especially given its disproportionate and unjust impacts on the Black community
Abolish the police - by cutting ties with the Princeton Police Department and defunding Campus Public Safety while reinvesting in a holistic approach to public safety
Implement an anti-racist curriculum at our policy school - by incorporating anti-racist frameworks as core components of all of our policymaking courses and implementing the DEI core requirement
Increase Black faculty, lecturers and practitioners at our policy school - by setting forth a plan to ensure that by the end of Fall 2022, 25% of professors affiliated with the policy school are Black
Establish a center for anti-racist policy - to foster collaboration among scholars and create a pipeline of faculty who specialize in anti-racist policymaking
Increase Black student enrollment - by banning the box and eliminating the GRE requirement, while also disaggregating admissions demographics to account for diversity of Black experiences
As I sit here and gather my energy for my next fight against structural racism in the post-George Floyd, post-Breonna Taylor, post- Ahmaud Arbery era, I have to remind myself that, although I am more than eager to accept the wins as they come, I am under no uncertain terms willing to accept mere tokens in lieu of actual, structural changes.
Changing the name of Wilson College and the Woodrow Wilson School was the bare minimum, and arguably the easiest thing to do given the actual list of demands and the reality the institution faces now that the world is finally waking up to the horrors of being black in America.
It was the bare minimum. Shame on you, Princeton School of Public Policy.
So, no, the newly dubbed Princeton School of Public Policy does not get a gold star today, and it certainly does not get a pat on the back. Instead, it gets a swift kick in the ass with the hope that, as an institution, it will do the right thing. The path to righteousness has already been laid. These demands, both reasonable and well imagined, actually do not go far enough as far as I am concerned. While those at the institution are probably wondering how these students have the audacity to dream of demanding such a thing as reparations, how dare the institution ignore them for so long.
Indeed, these students are simply the latest students to ask for structural changes. But one need not do much research to find that literally every class for the past few decades have, in one form or another, asked the school for change. The response? Platitudes. Special counsels. Diversity initiatives. Bullshit.
I appreciate the token, but I do not accept it. Bring forth real change or take a seat and let other policy schools show you the way.
The Princeton Policy School or whatever the hell it is called today is it’s own greatest enemy right now. Name change aside, it should endeavor to accept all the proposed changes elucidated above or suffer the consequences.
yours always,
… the trendy one
