When Black and Brown students stood against campus racism, my Jesuit University chose punishment over support
A restorative justice path was open, but Marquette University chose a harmful disciplinary process for Black and Brown students who protested against campus racism during Convocation.
As a professor with nearly 15 years of teaching and researching educational policy across three different institutions of higher education, I know the importance of having restorative justice at the center of anti-racist educational practices. Restorative Justice is a framework with Indigenous roots, that resolves conflict so that relationships can be repaired and built upon as everyone takes responsibility to create an inclusive and trusting community. When working with students who will become teachers, school support staff, higher education staff, and community educators, I highlight restorative justice as not just another discipline plan or method, but a complete overhaul of the school discipline policies that resemble our criminal justice system. For example, we analyze the racial disparities in disciplinary actions and learn about how these form the school-to-prison pipeline, and explore how restorative justice can be implemented with a racial justice lens to disrupt these patterns. Ultimately, restorative justice should be transformational and not punitive, “a space to learn, practice, and dream our collective freedom into being.”
I have been proud to teach future educators about restorative justice at Marquette University, a Jesuit institution whose mission includes a commitment to develop students who will “actively enter into the struggle for a more just society.” The way I teach is in line with Marquette’s stated goal, “to graduate students who are transformed by their education and who will transform the world in which they live.” Sadly, over the past month I have witnessed Marquette fall short of these Jesuit ideals. On August 25th, student leaders of color protested at Convocation for more resources and support for not just themselves, but the growing number of students of color on our campus. University administrators chose to not take the restorative justice approach, where they could have listened and worked with these student leaders to build a more inclusive campus that aligns with Marquette’s official goals, and instead charged all students involved with student conduct violations.
Students received letters with these student conduct charges on Friday afternoon before Labor Day weekend, making it difficult for them to reach out to trusted mentors before they were required to appear for their student conduct hearing, which began the following week. I witnessed the distress and anxiety that the letters caused these first-generation college students, who don’t have easy access to lawyers or family members who could help them decipher what these charges meant. Students told me they were terrified — Would they get suspended? Fined? Lose their campus jobs? Get kicked out of school? But despite their fears for their individual repercussions, they remained committed to working towards Marquette’s goals of being a diverse, inclusive, and engaged campus. They collectively wrote an apology letter and asked for a restorative process, in which they could discuss with the President, Provost, and other administrators how they might take responsibility for their actions. They then tried to schedule a meeting, but their invitation was declined by every single university administrator.
After multiple failed attempts to engage in dialogue, students were under extreme distress in preparing for hearings, some students only had two days to prepare after the holiday weekend. In seeking letters of support for their hearings from faculty and staff, they had to retell their experiences with racism on Marquette’s campus, and the lack of representation and support, which had pushed them to take action. At their hearings, they were ready to explain what led them to participate in the protest, their lack of knowledge on the university’s demonstration policy, and to give their genuine and sincere apology. They prepared for what Marquette states is “an educational process” that should result in “educational outcomes.” In fact, Marquette explicitly notes that this should not be a punitive process.
As an advisor — which is a misnomer because I was allowed to attend, but not allowed to speak — I accompanied 5 students to their hearings. What I witnessed in these hearings was far from educational; instead, students left feeling traumatized. The Student Conduct Director interrogated each student about who organized the protest, who asked them to join, who walked on the stage first, and who made the decisions. When students exercised their right to not answer some of these questions or did not remember the details, they were pressured to answer, through comments such as, “your silence might have unintended consequences for you and others involved.” These comments caused many students emotional distress. In trying to justify their action, students were forced to relive, sometimes in painful detail, the marginalization, isolation, and racism they have experienced as students of color on Marquette’s predominantly white campus. They were told that this hearing was not a space to validate their feelings. Even when they cried to the verge of being unable to speak, the Student Conduct staff overseeing the process did not pause the hearings so students could compose themselves.
To put it clearly, I was a witness to harm in many of these hearings. Students felt unheard and emotionally broken. How can students experience this harm and traumatization from their institution and continue their education there? Will these students trust their administrators, faculty, or staff next time they are struggling? Will they feel included, nurtured, and welcomed in ways that enable them to fully engage in campus life? And yet, they persisted in going to class, completing assignments, and leading student organization meetings and events as they awaited the “educational outcomes” that would come from this student conduct process.
Much like the process of the hearings, the outcomes students received at 5:30pm on September 21st are anything but educational. Outcomes included probation, suspension with abeyance, a $300 fine, and requirements to write an apology letter, complete community service, and create educational programming on the demonstration policy. As an education professor who thinks very carefully about expected learning outcomes for my classes, I can tell you that these “outcomes” are punitive sanctions. Probation, fines, and suspension are purely punitive, and meant to silence students. Developing an educational program on the demonstration policy is not their responsibility — they didn’t create this policy, which works to limit students’ right to free speech and dissent. The university did. The university should be the ones to educate their student body on it and explain how it doesn’t violate the very freedom of speech that universities say they promote. Finally, a $300 fine for first generation college students, many of whom work multiple jobs to pay for rent, food, books, and even tuition, is simply deplorable — a hardship that in no way can be framed as “educational.”
Marquette had the option to choose restorative justice that could have led us to a place of collective growth and reconciliation. A starting place for improved relationships of trust. In fact, Marquette has the Center for Peacemaking and a newly $5 Million dollar funded initiative for Restorative Justice in the Marquette Law School, both of which administrators could have leaned on for a better and truly educative and restorative process. Despite these resources and its mission statement, Marquette chose to engage in a punitive process that adds to the harm that students of color already experience on this campus. For years, Marquette’s students of color have pointed to the ways that the institution has fallen short in providing authentic support for them, and advocated for change, including to the university’s restrictive demonstration policy. Students of color have repeatedly presented demands to the university to provide resources for authentic support for the growing diverse student population. Once again, as Dr. Rivera Berruz details here, Marquette has failed our students.
One of the reasons why I decided to join Marquette as a professor was because of its strong Jesuit values, including commitments to cura personalis, to teach students to stand for social justice, and, as its motto states, to “Be the Difference.” I felt fortunate to be part of the Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI) Initiative and support all students, but especially those who come from communities like mine: a Latinx immigrant community that works tirelessly to belong in this country and has big dreams for its children. This past month has shaken me to my core as I’ve seen the ways in which university administrators have again and again chosen to further harm our students of color, who are some of the most vulnerable on our campus. Marquette had the opportunity to listen and work with student leaders who were willing to engage in conversations and collaborative actions to improve the campus climate. But instead, they chose to punish and silence these students. This experience has made me question everything I thought to be true at Marquette. I’m not sure where we go from here as a university. I don’t have all the answers. I just know it didn’t have to be this way.