Racism And Racial Diversity In Universities

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It is that time of the year, high school seniors graduate with hunger in their eyes looking forward to the ‘real world’. Waiting to hear their names be called and ready to start a new chapter, college. College, a place where scholars are made and one is exposed to widening their knowledge. A place known to be the best four years of your life, to find your circle of true friendships. However, there is one concept that is not mentioned during the tour or pamphlets, it is also a place where there is institutional racism. According to mic.com in 2013 Georgetown University’s center on Education and the Workforce, “white students are still overrepresented in the nation’s 468 elite institutions. Even though many white and minority students are unprepared …show more content…

If there is such a thing as racial diversity within universities than why do according to univstats.com do only 14.10% of the population make up for blacks or African Americans and 14.86% of the population are Hispanic or Latino? In 2010 the number of white students who received a bachelors degree was 72.9% while the number of black students was 10.3% and 8.8% for Hispanics based on the National Center for Education Statistics6. In Fact according to the website brookings.edu the US, educational system is "one of the most unequal in the industrialized world" when students, "receive dramatically different learning opportunities based on their social status". 7 Racial inequality is very much alive, especially white privilege despite what universities have claimed to the public. The website chronicle.com posted on August 2013 and article about white white privilege on university campuses …show more content…

Therefore, when students of color attempt to describe their feelings of being uncomfortable or feeling alienated on predominantly white campuses, they are likely to be viewed as ‘complainers’ or ‘paranoid.’”11 It can be accepted that whites may never see the racial inequality on campus, because of the environment they grew up in and prior to taking a diversity class were never exposed to racial inequality. An example being on the University of California, San Diego on April 2016, a day prior to the universities students acceptance day, a group of white students with hoodies were seen writing racist comments in front of the Raza Resource Center according to US Today College, the words “build the wall,” “deport them all,” “f— Mexicans,” and “Mexico will pay”12 were written in chalk. Unfortunately not all the messages were able to be erased in time before the event the next morning. On another California university there was also a racist incident regarding black students on campus. On October 7, 2015 the Alpha Phi sorority and Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity from UCLA were put under fire for having a “Kanye Western” theme party where the party goers dressed in “baggy clothes, plumped lips and padded bottoms”13, in addition, the photos posted

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