A resolution proposed at Wednesday’s Student Senate meeting would request the university add an “expansive” diversity, equity and inclusion statement to the Student Government website.
The resolution’s author, Sen. Chloe Berry from the University College of Freshman Year, said the legislation would provide SG with a diversity, equity and inclusion statement even if other parts of the university system don’t have one.
Sen. Berry said she’d seen students present concern in recent weeks over the removal of online DEI language. As student senators, she added, it was important that they show the student body they’re listening.
In early January, LSU removed DEI language from much of its online presence in a wide-scale scrub. The university deleted its long-standing diversity, equity and inclusion statement, and renamed the Office of Inclusivity, Civil Rights and Title IX to replace the word inclusivity with “engagement.” Several colleges within the university also removed DEI language from their online presences.
The erasure has drawn criticism from LSU students and professors alike. Some have pointed to the early January inauguration of Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry and the early January DEI scrub as more than a coincidence. The university has said there is no connection.
LSU political science professor Belinda Davis said she thought the change was a direct result of the new governor and a supermajority of Republicans in both chambers of the state legislature.
“The Republican Party in Louisiana and Gov. Landry has expressed hostility towards diversity, equity and inclusion programming, and I think that LSU is responding to the political reality that it now exists in,” Davis said.
SG Director of Academic Affairs John Michael Sweat also connected Gov. Landry’s recent transition to office with LSU’s recent change in language.
“The president of the university meets with the governor’s office a lot,” Sweat said. “And I’d be willing to bet that they talked about that, or at least predicted it in some way, and changed the name.”
LSU President William F. Tate IV has staunchly maintained that the removal was not influenced by any politician. He has, however, spoken on the wide-ranging and political nature of DEI language disputes and the Supreme Court’s recent decision to ban affirmative action in university admissions.
“We most certainly have paid attention to the ripple effects,” Tate said at a Faculty Senate meeting this month. “It has happened to campuses across the country, and we are keenly aware of it.”
While DEI has disappeared from much of the university’s online presence, SG’s executive branch so far retains its Department of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion.
The department’s director, political science senior Reginald Rideaux called the university DEI deletion “disappointing” in an interview with the Reveille.
“It almost seems as though you’re taking away those students’ existences, in a sense,” Rideaux said.
Rideaux’s DEI Department is now planning a week devoted to diversity, equity and inclusion for this semester. The event will be a celebration of LSU’s diverse community and reaffirmation of their commitment to equality and diversity, Rideaux wrote in a message to the Reveille.
The Senate has sent Berry’s DEI resolution to committee, where it will be considered, then sent back to the Senate for a vote at a future meeting.
Berry said Wednesday if more people and organizations speak out to promote diversity, equity and inclusion at LSU, there’s a better chance that the university will understand the impact their removal has had and will continue to have on campus.
“The work is still very important,” Berry said. “And there’s still a lot of work to be done, especially in Louisiana.”
