Loyola Takes a Hard Look at Campus Racism

In eloquent, often impassioned testimony, more than a dozen Loyola Marymount University students and faculty members addressed a special committee on minority relations this week, describing frustrations among minorities, feelings of not being welcome and outrage over racial slurs, including a classroom incident involving a visiting professor.

The problems, they said at the meeting Wednesday, extend from the classroom to extracurricular activities to social life on campus.

“I’m here to tell you I’m tired of insensitivity to minority issues,” sophomore John Crocker said. “Not just to blacks--to Asians, Latinos or anybody else. We just want a fair shake for everyone.”

About 150 students and faculty members crowded into the auditorium of St. Robert’s Hall for the open forum, sponsored by the Select Committee on Minorities.

The 11-member committee of faculty, alumni and community leaders was appointed by President James N. Loughran after five students walked into his office in April and refused to leave until he discussed the issue of race at the private university.

The administration pledged last year to investigate students’ concerns, but some students said the racial climate has yet to improve in the new school year.

“The average student on campus doesn’t realize how frustrating this is,” said Patricia Hudson, a freshman who said she has been stopped at least three times since September by security guards and asked what she was doing on campus. Hudson said she feels she was singled out because she is black.

Sophomore Martha Arevalo cited an incident on Sept. 29 involving a visiting assistant professor of statistics who allegedly made ethnic and racial slurs in the classroom, causing many students to walk out.

Arevalo, newly elected president of the Concerned Student Union--the group that took over the president’s office in April--said about half a dozen students immediately complained to Seth Thompson, associate dean of liberal arts.

The assistant professor--who was employed as a temporary replacement--was later fired, said university spokeswoman Leah Chester-Davis.

“He was removed from the classroom and in fact dismissed from the university,” Chester-Davis said. “As far as the university is concerned, they’re considering it a personal problem.” Chester-Davis did not elaborate.

At Wednesday’s forum, students pointed to other incidents, including racist graffiti sprayed across the entrance sign to the university over the Labor Day weekend, and said they believe that there are insufficient numbers of minorities in the faculty and student body. The university said the undergraduate student body is about 31% minority.

Loughran, however, said he believes he has kept his promises to improve attitudes on campus.

“Everything I said I would do, I’ve done,” Loughran said. “If anybody said I reneged on anything, (it’s) not true, absolutely not true.

“In general throughout last year, I was aware there were some difficulties and we needed to address them,” Loughran said. “I take this seriously. . . . We have a commitment to students in general and to minority students in particular, and we’re always looking for ways to improve it.”