UNCW Trustee Dr. Jimmy Tate, also a Pender County commissioner, was named chairman of the new certification subcommittee, tasked with making sure the university is in full compliance with the UNC System’s new equality policy.
“I think what the local UNCW Board of Trustees hopes to accomplish is to show that we're in compliance with the policy. The UNCW board, in their defense, did not establish this policy. This was a policy passed by the UNC Board of Governors,” Tate told WHQR this week. “There were no trustees asking for a review of our equality policy.”
That policy, which rolled out last year, broadly sought the removal of DEI offices and programs, and prohibited universities from weighing in on ‘social or political issues of the day.’ But the details of how to comply with the UNC System’s fairly broad directives fell to individual universities — and not every chancellor or local board of trustees has pursued compliance the same way.
For example, as reported by The Assembly last month, “seven UNC System schools eliminated campuswide DEI offices with no direct replacements, while another six redesigned them. Four schools never had them.” Many, including former UNCW Provost Jamie Winebrake (now president of Coastal Carolina University, a public institution in South Carolina) have noted that, in situations where there are broad and sometimes vague policies, there are concerns both about undercomplying and overcomplying. There has been reporting, including by WHQR, about fears of self-censorship, but also about faculty or staff allegedly flouting the new policy.
That may have contributed to the UNC Board of Governors’ June directive to local trustee boards to form certification subcommittees, ahead of an annual compliance report due September 1.
As UNCW prepares to file its second report since the equality policy was introduced, it’s not entirely clear what happens if the UNC System doesn’t find UNCW up to snuff.
“That’s a good question,” Tate said. “We don't know all the details on that part. What they would do if we filed a report and it doesn't meet all of their expectations, we're still waiting to hear more about this. As you know, this is new, so more about those types of details are forthcoming. What we do know is that the university must comply with all of the UNC System policies as well as state and federal law, and if we do not comply, we've been told that it could affect university funding.”
The UNC System equality policy prevents universities, including deans and upper administrators, from wading into political issues — but it’s not supposed to impede the academic freedom of professors and faculty to teach or research the way they want to (the caveat here is that the course cannot compel any student to "affirm or profess" a particular belief that would violate state law or the equality policy).
But that hasn’t prevented a chilling effect, with some faculty voicing concerns to WHQR about whether their syllabi and course materials could run afoul of the new policy. It’s worth noting, though, that some of that has been due to executive orders from the Trump administration, rather than directives from the UNC System; as The Daily Tarheel reported yesterday, a subsidiary of The Heritage Foundation has filed a public records request for the course materials and syllabi for nearly 80 courses in about 30 departments at UNC Chapel Hill, looking for anything that runs afoul of those federal orders.
Tate said the subcommittee’s work, and the policy’s intent, was to look at the use of public money on administrative work, not what goes on in the classroom.
“Let me say that to date, I've heard no one say, ‘Let's censure what is being taught in the classroom.’ This policy looks at, in my understanding, and our job is to look at ‘what are the taxpayers’ dollars being spent on for extra programs and services that meet only a specific group of students?’ This policy is, in my understanding, not to censor free speech in the classroom among the professors or the students. I'm not aware of that at all, and I haven't seen that written at all, that we are to tell teachers what to teach or not to teach,” Tate said.
Tate said as a former college president he valued academic freedom. He said he didn’t think the university was trying to “micromanage” what faculty taught, and noted that the current accreditor of UNC Schools, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS), has “always been very clear that teachers are to have academic freedom in the classroom.” Although, notably, UNC System President Peter Hans told The Assembly earlier this summer that he intends to drop SACS as the state schools’ accreditor in favor of a newly formed “‘streamlined” and “non-ideological” organization with five other states.
Tate did note that, under the new policy, if a professor wants to teach a topic that is covered under the equality policy, they’re free to do so – but “they must reveal that in their syllabus up front, so a student can decide if he or she wants to take the class.”
Further, if that class was a degree or graduation requirement, Tate said the student would have the right to appeal and have a substitute class approved to fill the same requirement. In essence, Tate said, objecting to course material could not be “held against” them on their degree and graduation track. (Tate acknowledged the subcommittee hadn’t delved into this part of the equality policy yet, but would probably do so at an upcoming meeting.”
Another question many have asked after the rollout of UNC’s equality policy is how effective UNCW’s four student centers – the Upperman African American Cultural Center, Centro Hispano, the Mohin-Scholz LGBTQIA Resource Center, and the Asian Heritage Cultural Center – will be after they were reorganized with reduced resources.
Last year, in an interview with WHQR, Vice Chancellor Dr. Christine Reed Davis acknowledged the situation was “challenging,” saying the University would continue to evaluate student needs and could discuss additional staffing in the future.
Tate said he shared some of the concerns he heard about the centers – but also wanted solid data to base an evaluation on, something he hasn’t seen presented.
“At the last meeting, I asked Vice Chancellor Davis and Chancellor Volety if they could show us data,” Tate said. “Now that the student centers are no longer in operation as they were before, and they have been revamped now, are those students who were served previously, are they still on target for graduation completion? What are their retention rates? Are students that were served before now dropping out and leaving UNCW? How are their grades, are they declining?”
According to Tate, there was “not a lot of data” that had tracked students served by the university’s four centers. Tate said, starting now, he hopes the university will start documenting that kind of data to inform future conversations.
“I'm very interested in knowing, is there going to be a difference? And if there is a difference, then that opens this up to even a bigger discussion,” Tate said. “But if there's not a difference, then it shows that the UNC system had a lot of valid reasons for doing this, it supports revamping this. I think it would bring much more clarity to it.”
Tate said he would “like to believe” that no one in the UNC system or UNCW was “targeting any individual.”
“I believe that they're looking at the way that those resources are being aligned,” Tate said. “Are we spending money on a center that might be serving 250 students with a specialized program or are we going to spend those dollars on a dormitory that we need to put 3,000 students in because we don't have the space on campus. Or do we need to put those dollars into a classroom to get more biology and chemistry labs, or to put those resources where we advance medical programs at UNCW.”
Tate, who is Black and gay but also a Republican with an eye for fiscal responsibility, said he understood the different perspectives on the UNC equality policy — and the sometimes oppositional concerns underlying them. That, he said, is why he wanted to chair the committee.
“I agreed to chair this committee, because as an undergraduate and graduate alum of university, and as a person who understands the value of equality, the value of fairness for everyone, and also understands people from diverse backgrounds — such as myself — I welcome the opportunity to chair this so I could provide a voice on both sides, and make sure everyone's voice is heard as we comply, but also make sure that equity exists for everyone,” Tate said.
On Monday, August 25, the subcommittee is set to meet again. Tate said during this meeting that they would get into the granular details of the draft compliance report. Like the initial meeting earlier this month, some of the subcommittee's business will be conducted in closed session. Tate said he would respectfully decline to comment on anything that happened in closed session, but noted that only those items protected by statute would be discussed there.
A UNCW spokesperson said they would share the report after it was approved by the UNC System, although the draft version is legally a public record. WHQR plans to file a public records request at the beginning of next month.
