Teach-In Urges Focus on Race

More than 500 Cal State Northridge students, faculty members and administrators took part in an emotional teach-in Monday on the King beating verdict, some calling on the university to help South Los Angeles, others calling for more emphasis on campus racial programs.

The teach-in turned into an open forum, with some faculty members and students urging the audience sitting on a sunny campus lawn to give money or manpower to help clean up the ravaged neighborhoods of South Los Angeles. Others focused on the university itself, saying more multicultural education could foster changes in attitudes that would be carried in coming years into the society beyond the campus.

Still others used the three-hour event to express grief over the post-verdict destruction.

“When I got home Saturday evening, everything around me was burnt and everything was torn down,” sobbed sophomore Whitney Janeen Davis, 19, who lives in Windsor Hills. “I’m hurting. I want everybody to know that we hurt.”

The teach-in was convened by university President James W. Cleary, Faculty President Albert Baca, the Black Student Union and Associated Students. Cleary asked professors to tell students about the event and indicated that they should not penalize them for leaving classes to attend. Cleary also encouraged the faculty to participate.

“We are here today to encourage dialogue, which can help lead us away from the tragic incidents of violence and disintegration of community bonds which have already occurred,” he told the audience. “Today and tomorrow and the weeks ahead are all about coming together for solution to the problems of racism and inhumanity.”

To that end, the university has scheduled a convocation at noon today to again address the issues. One Pan-African studies professor plans to offer workshops on issues of race. And a group of student and faculty leaders is organizing a drive to gather food and clothing for residents of riot-ravaged South Los Angeles, as well as forming cleanup crews to lend help.

But some students criticized the university for not making the teach-in mandatory and said the administration was out of touch. Cleary told a reporter that requiring attendance might encroach on academic freedom.

“Cleary doesn’t know how . . . we’re feeling,” a young man from the audience objected. “I wish you’d come up here and talk to us, not like a politician. We need someone who understands.”

The teach-in came two months after black students and faculty leaders accused the administration and athletic department of racism and demanded extensive changes in campus policies and the curriculum.

A number of committees were set up to look at the allegations. A presidential advisory committee, under formation for two years, will be formally established this week to look at curriculum issues and allegations of racism.

And this week, four finalists in the search for a replacement for Cleary, who is retiring, will visit the campus. The committee searching for Cleary’s replacement has been charged with finding a president committed to meeting the needs of a multiethnic student body in a metropolitan suburb.

Cleary told a reporter Monday that he and the faculty have already made a commitment to increase multicultural education on campus. The plea for such an approach was heard again and again at the rally. And many of those at the teach-in said changes in race relations must be made first at the country’s universities.

“We don’t even need to look to South-Central Los Angeles,” said Selase Williams, chairman of the Pan-African studies department. “We can find racism, sexism and class injustice right here.”

He said that Cal State Northridge must work to increase graduation rates for black students, and that a five-year program should be put in place to further develop ethnically oriented programs.

Karen Brannon, president of the Black Student Union, said after the teach-in that it was a first step and probably helped defuse tensions, but that the American educational system must change.

“Leaders of this country perpetuate racism and have all been educated by U. S. institutions so the educational system has to change from kindergarten on up to higher education,” she said.