Racial Bias in the Tenure System

Not only is there racial bias in the college admission system, there seems to be a form of that in the tenure system as well. There has been an emergence of cases where minority professors are being denied tenure on the bases of their race. Such a case is that of Jennifer R. Warren, who was an assistant professor of communications at Rutgers University, and was denied tenure. She believes that it could have been based on her race. Rutgers discouraged her from writing a book and suggested that she change her teaching style, which caused her student ratings to drop. She couldn’t prove that the denial was on the basis of systemic racism, but with the help of student activists and rallies, Mr. Warren got another chance to apply for tenure in the spring of 2017. Another case of institutional racism in the system of tenure is Stephen Hong Sohn. Mr. Sohn is Asian American professor at Stanford, who identifies himself as queer, and has done extensive research on race and sexuality, which some say could have contributed to his tenure denial. Tenure has become a new issue for minority student activists because the process and data on faculty diversity is very obscure and takes a long time to understand. Not only in difficulty of understanding the process, but also trying to destroy the stereotypical image of what a tenure professor is. The image is traditionally white and is male, and they are the ones who have a say in deciding whether a professor from a minority origin is worthy of getting tenure, because they believe that they know exactly what professors do. But in actuality, it’s the minority-based professors that know what do to because they connect easier with students, especially students who also come from a minority based origins. Because this is such a huge issue, groups such as “Who’s Teaching Us” have tried to come up with solutions to avoid cases like Mr. Warren’s and Mr. Sohn’s. Solutions such as changing up the system of tenure, so that faculty members who go up for tenure can be clearly informed about what is expected of them and to receive feedback throughout their early careers. Another change is to have the university have minority scholars evaluated by colleagues who understand their academic interests. I believe that it’s good that students are becoming more involved in this, even though it pertains to faculty members, we have to keep in mind that what affects the faculty, our professors, will surely affect us as students. So in the end, students should be more involved with changing this old rigid system and make it better for the society we live in today, for students and faculty members.