June 2, 2020
The Department of Educational Studies (EDST) condemns, in the strongest terms, the anti-Black racism and police violence that has emerged again in cities across the world, and especially in the US. We also denounce Anti-Indigenous racism, Anti-Asian racism, and xenophobia amplified worldwide at this time of pandemic crisis. We support calls for justice in the light of such violence and call for an end to systemic racism.
We acknowledge that all forms of racism are historically endemic to our social, economic, and political systems; we acknowledge that white supremacy and colonization continues to be at the root of inequality. We acknowledge that universities and wider societal institutions continue to perpetuate anti-Black racism, marginalization, and oppression of racialized and Indigenous faculty, students, and staff, in subtle and covert ways. We also acknowledge that, as a department, we are implicated in the reproduction of racism and colonialism, and we continue to learn and unlearn in an effort to take responsibility for change, individually and collectively. In as much as universities are spaces that fight for social justice, they are also part of the larger systemic structures that uphold white dominance and supremacy.
In pursuit of our EDST mission, students, faculty, and staff value equity, diversity, inclusion, anti-racism, and social justice, support for Indigenous educational advancement and decolonization, respectful engagement with our community partners, criticality in our approach to educational orthodoxies, and integrity in our relationships. In keeping with this mission, our work promotes, and insists upon, anti-racism, anti-bigotry, anti-hate, and social justice. We call on our white community members, in particular, to interrupt racist and colonial behaviors and assumptions in both themselves and others. We are producers and cultivators of knowledge and, in addition to individual and personal action against racism, we will continue to create and engage with scholarship on the topics of race and racism to combat racial hatred and injustice.