Why Black Harvard Won’t Speak Up For Chanequa

From NewsOne:

Why Black Harvard Won’t Speak Up For Chanequa
By Ashton Lattimore
June 4, 2009 11:31 am

A NewsOne Exclusive

When campus police profiled Black students, Harvard’s Black undergraduates protested.

When Harvard’s president soured on legendary professor Cornel West, prompting West to take a job at Princeton, Harvard’s Black students petitioned for him to stay.

But in the wake of the suspension of two Black students, fallout from a current on-campus murder investigation, the typically vocal Black student community at Harvard has remained curiously silent.

Last month Cambridge resident and alleged drug-dealer Justin Cosby was shot to death in a campus dorm, Kirkland House, reportedly in an attempted robbery gone awry. Two Black Harvard seniors, Brittany Smith and Chanequa Campbell, were connected with the incident by the university administration and police. Both women have been barred from graduating with their class today. Campbell, who has repeatedly denied any involvement with the shooting, has since taken her story to the media.

“I do believe I am being singled out,” Campbell told the Boston Globe last week when asked why she was being banned from campus. “The honest answer to that is that I’m Black and I’m poor and I’m from New York and I walk a certain way and I keep my clothes a certain way. . . . It’s something that labels me as different from everyone else.”

Her charge of racism has attracted national attention. Yet Black Harvard students — who normally spring to fight for racial justice — have said nary a word in support of Campbell, nor of her campaign to graduate. Most Black student group leaders have declined to comment on the situation, and several have instructed the members of their respective organizations to do the same. The reasons for students’ silence run the gamut, from doubts about Campbell’s guilt or innocence; to fear of antagonizing the university administration; and good old-fashioned self-interest.

Resentment of Campbell

Campbell was active in Harvard’s Black community. She was a member of the Black Students Association and Association of Black Harvard Women, and participated in the production of the annual fashion show put on by Harvard’s Black Community and Student Theater (BlackCAST), and the Tribute to Black Men awards dinner. However, Campbell was dogged by persistent rumors that she was involved in campus drug dealing, rumors which, in light of the murder, have done little to help her credibility with fellow students.

“People are pretty sure she did something, they just don’t know what,” said a Black classmate in Campbell’s graduating class, who requested anonymity. “We can’t rally behind somebody we don’t necessarily believe in.”

Harvard Murder Exposes Campus Drug Trade (CLICK HERE)

Black students are a particularly visible group on campus. But because two of their own have been associated with the murder, the community is squirming under the increased scrutiny. And some resent that Campbell blames her current predicament in part on racial bias.

“Students feel, to some degree, like she’s trying to sell Black people up the river,” Campbell’s classmate said. “It’s like she gets busted, and suddenly it’s a fight for freedom. People feel like she thought she was going to get Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton up here, and all she got was a bunch of n****s looking at her like, ‘What the hell is wrong with you?’”

History of Racial Concerns

Campbell’s complaints of racial bias are the most recent of several occurrences highlighting the sometimes tense race relations at Harvard. Groups like the BSA, the ABHW, and the Black Men’s Forum (BMF) have been at the forefront of the push for greater discussion.

In spring of 2007, for example, non-Black students called the police on ABHW and BMF members who were holding an event on the Quad lawn, claiming that they didn’t look like Harvard students and were therefore trespassing. University police arrived and reportedly asked the students to show their ID cards.

In response, the presidents of Black student groups began the “I Am Harvard” campaign, with the slogan, “My skin belongs at Harvard.” The campaign began with a march in Harvard Yard and a rally outside of the university’s main offices. Students shared stories of racial incidents they had experienced on campus, including several stories of profiling by campus police and other students.

To address this incident and others, the University created a committee to review the practices of the Harvard University Police Department. The committee met with cultural and other student group leaders to hear their concerns, and in April it released a report critiquing the department and offering recommendations for improving relations with the student community.

Black students on campus have also pushed for greater faculty diversity, and recently met with some success when a Latina professor of English and African-American studies was granted tenure.

“Some of us still want to have a future”

Despite the considerable influence that Black students wield on campus, none of it has been used to help Campbell. Since she was barred from graduation, friends of Campbell’s from outside the campus Black community have started a petition on her behalf, addressing the president of the university, and asking for Campbell to be told why she has been barred from campus. Although a link to sign the petition was forwarded to the email lists of at least two Black student groups, only one of the 133 signatures appears to be from a Black member of her graduating class.

Another Black student, who hasn’t signed the petition and also requested anonymity, explains what appears to be widespread reluctance: “Some of us are still looking for jobs, some of us still want to have a future,” he said. “We don’t want our names affiliated with this.”

Fear of rocking the boat

Black student group leaders must also contend with the fear that directly supporting Campbell might be interpreted as an affront to the university.

“The Black community and Black organizations… have such a unique relationship with the administrators,” says Timothy Turner, a classmate of Campbell’s and the former president of the BSA. Turner notes that, over the years, Black students groups have been increasingly successful in getting their concerns heard and addressed by the university, on issues ranging from faculty diversity and police profiling to social space. He believes that the current student group leaders are waiting for the full story to come out before they express their opinions on the university’s handling of Campbell’s situation.

“Without having all the information we don’t want to do or say anything or try to make any judgment calls that would jeopardize those relationships,” Turner said. “We want to make sure we can continue to trust them and they can continue to trust us in the future.”

Brittany Smith Banned from Graduation (CLICK HERE)

He also notes that Black university officials have kept mum in the wake of the murder.

“Black faculty and Black administrators haven’t given comment or any word on it either, so we’re just following suit,” Turner said.

Concerns that Black admissions will suffer

Rather than focusing on the fate of Campbell, some Black Harvard students and alumni find the issue of future Black admissions in the wake of the murder to be more pressing.

“I think what people are rallying around is concern about poor Black students at Harvard,” said Campbell’s classmate. “I think that poor Black kids from urban communities are going to have a tougher time. The number of Black people from underprivileged backgrounds or poor neighborhoods is going to decrease, or at least [the College] is going to rethink its admissions policy. No one named ‘Chanequa’ is ever getting into Harvard again.”

Some alumni echoed that concern.

“The fact that there’s been such a big focus on the race of the women involved is allowing people to leap to conclusions,” said Kaya Williams, who graduated from Harvard in 2007. Williams points to much online commentary that depicts the botched drug robbery and resulting murder as a result of affirmative action gone wrong.

Brandon Terry, a Black student who graduated in 2005, also recognized the slant the discussion seemed to be taking, and worries about the consequences.

“It would be a shame if this situation kept students from a similar background to Chanequa’s from being admitted in the future,” said Terry.

But others, like former BSA president Turner, are more hopeful, and note that campus drug use isn’t just a Black Harvard problem.

“I believe that the administration and the admissions office wouldn’t make a conscious effort to exclude any group from being admitted to Harvard. There are plenty of poor black Harvard students who have gone through their four years here without having any issues, and who have gone on to do wonderful things,” Turner said. “At the same time, there are plenty of rich white kids who have been involved with drugs on campus. So you can’t really marginalize one group of people and expect that that’s going to solve the problem.”

I'm going on the record: I have little to no sympathy for this young woman.

You're at Harvard. Choose your associations WISELY - that's what my mother told me when I was growing up, because you never know when it can come back and bite you.

Harvard to Reduce Tuition Costs

From AOL.com

Harvard to Reduce Tuition Costs
By JUSTIN POPE,AP
Posted: 2007-12-10

Harvard University announced Monday a major expansion of financial aid that will reduce tuition bills by thousands of dollars - even for families earning six figures.

The university said it would replace all loans with grants, and spend up to $22 million more annually on aid, mostly targeting middle- and upper-middle class students. Families earning under $60,000 already pay nothing to attend the world's richest university, with an endowment of nearly $35 billion.

Now, however, there parents earning between $60,000 and $120,000 will pay a percentage of their income, rising to 10 percent. Families with incomes between $120,000 and $180,000 will have to pay 10 percent of their incomes.

Harvard also said it would take home equity out of its wealth calculation in financial aid, which should provide a greater boost for students and parents. Overall, Harvard said a typical family earning $120,000 would pay about $12,000 next year, down from $19,000 under current award policies. For a typical family earning $180,000, the bill would drop to $18,000, from more than $30,000.

About half of Harvard students receive some form of aid, including students from about 100 families who earn more than $200,000.

For those who pay full tuition, room and board, the price is $45,620.

University officials said their surveys showed even students from well-off families were feeling the pinch by having to work outside jobs and not being able to fully engage in the life of the university. Harvard officials also worried prospective applicants were scared away by the school's cost.

Dean of Admissions and Financial aid William Fitzsimmons said Harvard had grown concerned students were having an "Upstairs, Downstairs" experience. "On the one hand the more affluent students had full access to the full Harvard experience in its totality. But this chunk of people ... 53 percent of the population, we felt were having a diminished experience."

The announcement is the latest of a string by well-endowed universities who are trying to combat perceptions they are unaffordable with major initiatives to reduce the price students actually pay.

A handful of schools, starting with Princeton in 2001, had eliminated all student loans, but Harvard had declined to match that step until Monday's announcement.

Harvard President Drew Gilpin Faust said the money would come from funds from a variety of sources, including the strong returns on Harvard's endowment.


Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. All active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL.
2007-12-10 16:18:33

More than a few posts have been written here about the 'affordability' of college. It's a very important subject. I have been fortunate to attend excellent schools, and I realize now, that, if my parents had to send me to school, they might not be able to afford to send me to the schools that I attended. My parents are middle-class, and back when I went to college, just a little over a decade ago, while it was uncomfortable for them to pay that parental contribution, it was never impossible. Nowadays, it has turned impossible. So, I applaud Harvard, and would hope that other wealthy colleges will follow suit.

Harvard Study Finds Racial Bias Among Doctors

Could This Help To Explain Some Of the Racial Disparities in Heathcare?

I think this could be a contributing factor, but this does not deal with all of the disparities. This study only covers treatment once a patient is able to see a doctor. It doesn't deal with many of the other disparities impacting healthcare, such as access, cost of medicine, health insurance or lack thereof, economic status, etc.

The researchers seemed to go out of their way not to call this racism, but instead... an unintentional or "unconscious" bias. A 2005 study didn't try to use such sugar coated language, referring to the problem as entrenched unconcious racism. It may be true that most of this is unintentional...but I would say that it stems from an institutional racism of sorts, that planted the seeds in the minds of some of these doctors that trained them (perhaps unconsciously) to accept the idea that a Black life may not be as valuable as those of other races.

Regardless of what they call it... there is now more and more evidence that it is there... so they can't say it is being made up or is all in our heads. Many black folks don't need any convincing from a study... they have first hand experience with this two-track healthcare system. However, such studies are still useful in bringing the problem to the attention of the wider public.

Other reports and studies have pointed out numerous disparities in healthcare, but it was only within the last few years that these efforts have sparked a wider interest in the medical community.

As more studies come out, perhaps good public policy can now be developed to begin to deal with the problem.

Report below from United Press International

By ADRIANNE APPEL
UPI Correspondent

BOSTON, July 20 (UPI) -- Young doctors may harbor implicit racial biases, and this gets in the way of African-Americans receiving care equal to that of whites, a Harvard University study reported this week.

It has been well documented that there is a gap in the healthcare treatment African-Americans receive, especially in emergency rooms, according to the study authors.

A number of studies have shown that whites are twice as likely as blacks to receive full treatment for heart attacks in the emergency room, according to the study, available at the Web site of the Journal of General Internal Medicine.

The Harvard study and a handful of others in recent years are attempting to zero in on whether inherent racial bias on the part of the provider is a factor, and how this may play out, said Dana Carney, a postdoctoral fellow in the psychology department at Harvard.

The Harvard study examined the conscious and unconscious attitudes of 220 interns -- almost all of whom were white -- toward white and black patients.

The study found that most of the physicians, whether white, Asian or Latino, tended to harbor biases against black patients and that this resulted in the patients receiving less thorough treatment, Carney said.

Just six of the interns were black, and while they expressed less bias against black patients, in some, it was there, Carney said. The reason is broad stereotypes propagated by the media and society in general, she said.

"It's the culture's thumbprint on our mind," Carney told United Press International.

"The problem is they can influence judgment and behavior in ways we don't want them to," Carney said.

In the study, 220 interns from four institutions in Atlanta and Boston took a computerized survey that asked them to show how they would treat a 50-year-old man who came into the emergency room with chest pain, a potential heart attack.

The interns were randomly assigned to either a black patient or a white patient.

The interns who were assigned to a black patient and who expressed unconscious bias against black patients tended to give them less care for a heart attack.

The more bias they expressed, the less treatment they would tend to give to the black patient.

Those interns who were biased against black patients would tend to give more treatment to white patients, the study found.

Further, the results found a tendency on the part of the interns to view black patients as uncooperative in general and in terms of agreeing to treatment recommendations.

The study checked for conscious bias against black patients by asking the interns to rank whether they preferred black or white patients and how much. Very few physicians expressed open bias against black patients.

Nelson Adams, the president-elect of the National Medical Association, which represents African-American physicians, said biases that result in less care for African-Americans is a problem that has serious consequences for the African-American community and the nation.

"It is my belief and the association's position that some of these biases are contributing to the continued gaps we see in the health status of citizens in this country. Though we know education is crucial in alleviating most ills, without adequate resources very little will take place," said Nelson, an obstetrician/gynecologist at Jackson North Hospital in Miami.

"The NMA has also been clear in stating that something ought to be done," he said.

Broad, systemic changes are needed to root out the bias that still exists in the United States against many groups, Nelson said.

"One thing that is crystal clear among the medical community is the whole notion of human beings being human beings. We have so much in common, the differences are minuscule," he said.

"We ought to be clearly aware that bias in healthcare occurs in providers but that it happens at all levels -- at the individual level, the provider level and the institutional level. All need to be addressed, and not just one," he said.

One factor that would help on a number of different levels is for medical schools to recruit more black students to become doctors. Last year there were just 100 black medical students in school, excluding those at historically black colleges, he said.

"We do have ways to make people less biased," John Dovidio, a Yale University psychologist, told UPI. High on the list are training and classes.

What would help in the physician community is a requirement that they receive such training after they leave medical school. Physicians are required to take a certain number of courses during their careers, usually focused on new treatments. They should also take courses on cultural sensitivity, communication and race, Dovidio said.

For example, studies show that communication needs to be improved between white physicians and black patients. Dovidio also believes that black patients bring their inherent biases and stereotypes with them as well.

"Whites have a very different impression of how the interaction went. Blacks tend to believe that it went less well. Whites tend to think it went well, and that blacks thought it went well," Dovidio said.

Still, it isn't as if the training is easy and that everyone is very open to the idea that they may hold unconscious biases, he said.

"People go into medicine because they are good people. If you try to bring the message that they aren't as good as they think, it's a hard message to bring," he said.

"These issues still don't get the kind of importance that a new drug or treatment would get. People aren't bad people, they are busy. The effects of bias are more subtle, more long term. Other issues are more immediate. This takes a back seat," Dovidio said.

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Additional report from Kaiser