Protesting a racist incident at Purdue

MEMBERS OF Purdue University's Anti-Racism Coalition (PARC) recently organized a silent walkout while presenting a petition to the University Board of Trustees calling to take steps to eliminate racism on campus.

The coalition created the petition and resolution against racism and discrimination at Purdue University after a February 2012 racist defacing of the late Dr. Cornell Bell's portrait in the renowned Krannert School of Management building on campus.

When PARC reached its goal with a 170 signed petitions, the next step was to develop a way to present the petitions to Purdue University's Board of Trustees. PARC contacted the university correspondents for the Board of Trustees, Janice Beard and Alyssa Rollock, to find out what the formal procedures were to pass the petitions to them. The correspondents responded with the formal procedures and PARC acted accordingly by sending two copies of the petition to Beard and Rollock.

One week after submission, PARC had not received any response or confirmation from Beard or Rollock. PARC then decided to re-send the signed petitions in hopes of receiving a response, and again, no confirmation from Beard or Rollock was received.

A critical goal of PARC was to make sure university officials and the Board of Trustees received the signed petitions and understood PARC's demands. These demands included: the creation of an anti-discrimination taskforce to monitor the overall conditions of racial equality on campus; increasing minority and student faculty enrollment; and creating a university-wide course on the history of race and racism in the United States to be taught by qualified faculty based on their area of study and research agenda.

Due to the lack of communication from the proper university officials, PARC decided to develop a strategy to make certain that the petition would get in the hands of the targeted officials. The group discovered that the Purdue Board of Trustees has a meeting open to the public once every month. PARC realized this would be an ideal opportunity to show their presence as well as get the physical copies of signed petitions in the hands of key members on the Board.

The members of PARC decided that a demonstration would have a powerful impact in getting their message across. They devised a protest modeled after peaceful protests of the civil rights era. Members of PARC contacted local media outlets and agreed that the demonstration would be a silent protest in which members would show signs while sitting together wearing all-black clothing.

Each sign had at least one of the demands from the petition, and others had the list of campus organizations--including Purdue Alliance for Immigrant Rights (PAIR), Black Graduate Student Association (BGSA), Black Student Union (BSU), Asian American Studies, Students for Justice in Palestine and Occupy Purdue--that supported the petition. PARC also decided to take copies of the signed petitions and hand them to Board of Trustee members as they entered the room.

The group was very organized and in the meetings prior to the demonstration, discussed just about every possible scenario that might occur in order to ensure that everyone would be on the same page throughout the entire demonstration. With all the proper steps in place, PARC would proceed with the demonstration.

PRIOR TO the Board of Trustees meeting, PARC members were introduced to university marketing official Chris Sigurdson and one member of campus police. Sigurdson told PARC members that our protest could lead to a student or faculty member being escorted from campus and made "persona non grata" while subject to trespassing upon return to campus.

PARC members replied respectfully with head nods and asserted that our presence was meant to be peaceful thus agreeing to continue with the silent protest.

Members of PARC then met before the Board of Trustees meeting to discuss a final strategy for the silent protest. The plan for all members was to stand with signs listing the demands with a photo of Dr. Bell in the center and leave after 15 minutes.

PARC members held seats along the wall of the room and sat and waited for the meeting to begin. The meeting was full of high-profile university officials including university President France Cordova, Provost Timothy D. Sands, Vice President of Student Affairs Melissa Exum, Director of Diversity and Inclusion Christine Taylor and 10 Board members, most notably chairman Keith J. Krach and Don Thompson. The media outlets that had been contacted were also present during the meeting to witness the demonstration.

At the beginning of the meeting, all the members of PARC stood with their signs in their hands, which drew the attention of those in attendance. Chairman Krach, asked the members to sit and they complied with this demand, but still held the signs as they sat.

A short time later, Chairman Krach asked PARC members a second time to put the signs down but the members ignored this request and kept the signs up. A few minutes later, the members of PARC all stood up and marched out the room quietly, while holding their fists in the air.

As the group met downstairs, trustee member Don Thompson, the only African American and minority member of the board, left the meeting to speak with PARC. Thompson expressed how impressed he was with the demonstration and told the members that they had done a great job. He stated that he would like to serve as a liaison between PARC and the Board of Trustees and discussed how he had similar experiences of racism and discrimination while he was a student at Purdue.

After words from trustee Thompson, local news media WLFI-West Lafayette and The Journal and Courier interviewed members of PARC. It was clear that the Purdue Anti-Racism Coalition's demands would be taken into further consideration.

The demonstration proved to be powerful enough to gain the attention of the Board of Trustees. Furthermore, the petition has reached more campus and community members with 200 petitions now signed.

With the success of the silent protest, PARC members plan to meet throughout the summer to begin planning workshops and activities for the 2012-2013 school year. Some of these workshops include teach-ins about racism and xenophobia, a reading group featuring Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, and a student organization potluck.

Along with campus involvement, PARC needs the others' involvement to continue the fight against racism and discrimination on university and college campuses worldwide. Sign the online petition and help spread the word about our important cause.
Tyrell Connor and Casarae Gibson, West Lafayette, Ind.