Our Meeting with Carleton College

On Thursday, September 3, the original organizing group attended an hour-long meeting with President Poskanzer and members of his External Relations team. The meeting was encouraging and yet also highlighted the College’s continued struggle to commit to a transparent and inclusive process.

We take heart in the President’s acknowledgement that a more systemic response is required, moving beyond the recycled strategies of the past and toward a more meaningful effort to address racism and anti-Blackness on campus. He and the Board of Trustees have agreed to a combination of short-term and long-term strategies to address the concerns raised in the student and alumni letters, and Carleton’s administration will draft a plan of action for the Board to review at their October meeting.

While this is encouraging, we continue to believe that the proof of his and the Board’s understanding of and commitment to these issues will be revealed not by what they say, but by how they enter into this next phase of planning and action.

We reiterate our challenge to President Poskanzer and his team to:

• Engage diverse stakeholders — including students, staff, faculty, alumni, and Board members — in a democratic process to identify the scope and nature of the problem(s) before committing to a particular plan of action.
• Build formal channels to allow diverse voices to enter the process — not merely as commentators, but as true participants, contributors and, (as appropriate) decision-makers.
• Break down the silos between departments and communities (e.g. students, alumni, staff, faculty, Board) that have led to deeply fractured conversations and piecemeal efforts, rather than to clarity and a shared commitment to address personal and systemic racism on campus.

Not long after that meeting, President Poskanzer used his opening convocation to stress his commitment to creating a more equal and equitable college, and we heard the spirit of our comments in his speech. We welcome his words and are willing to give the College a chance to formulate next steps.

We note, however, that since that meeting there has been no formal communication with alumni about how Carleton will tackle this process, who will be involved, or how alumni can connect with key decision-makers to share their perspective and views. There has been no sign that the administration will create any open forum to engage the 2,100 signatories of the alumni letter before a plan is presented to the Board (which continues to be our request). And there are signals that whatever is moving on campus already continues to move in silos.

These next steps are in Carleton’s hands. We continue to withhold our time and financial contributions until progress becomes clear; we encourage you to do the same. We wait and we watch, and we will share with you what we learn in the time leading up to the next Board meeting.

All the best,

Nimo Ali ‘11
Rose Chahla ‘10
Shannon Finnegan ‘11
Sarah (Ogden) Johnston ‘86
Katie Jumbe ‘04
Beserat Kelati ‘12
Ainsley LeSure ‘05
Halah Mohammed ‘14

Additional Resources:

• The original Open Letter for Carleton
• Listen to the Close Reading the Carleton Response to the Alumni Open Letter with Carleton professors, Adriana Estill and Anita Chikkatur;
• Read about our call to action in the Star Tribune.