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Affirming our values

To: UC Santa Cruz Community

From: Jaye Padgett, Vice Provost for Student Success Herbert Lee, Vice Provost for Academic Affairs and Campus Diversity Officer for Faculty Martin Berger, Interim Associate Vice Provost for Academic Affairs and Associate Campus Diversity Officer for Faculty Teresa Maria Linda Scholz, Campus Diversity Office for Staff and Students Nader Oweis, Chief of Police

September 29, 2017

Dear UC Santa Cruz Banana Slugs,

We have received numerous reports about fliers posted on campus with white nationalist/white supremacist messages. Such postings occurred several times last year, and given the tensions in our country, we are not surprised to see them again.


While the fliers’ messages, protected under the First Amendment, seem benign by not being overtly “hateful,” they seek to create divisions within our campus community just as we mark the first week of classes.

UC Santa Cruz is a community where we support one another and respect our differences. Our diversity—in all forms—makes us stronger.

These fliers seek to undermine our efforts to create a welcoming, diverse, and inclusive campus. As a campus community we stand against racism and denounce all forms of hate, bias, and discrimination.

We appreciate everyone who took the time to report the fliers. We must work together to counter messages that seek to divide us and to call it out when we see it.

To encourage everyone to play a role in combating hate, we are launching a new campaign— Take a Stand Against Hate—and invite everyone in our campus community to “take a stand” by pledging to fight hate in concrete ways. You can learn more about our effort online; we will share more about the campaign through the academic year.


If you come across hateful or divisive fliers, please immediately contact the UC Santa Cruz Police Department at 831-459-2231 ext. 1.

We also encourage you to:

  • Take a picture of the flier and include it in a report to reportthate.ucsc.edu

  • Inform a college administrative officer, assistant college administrative officer, supervisor, dean, or provost so they can assess whether the fliers were posted under proper posting protocols (all unauthorized postings, regardless of content, are removed).

 

We firmly believe that the best way to respond to offensive speech is with more speech—that is inclusive and educational. We must affirm our values and lend our support to one another. We must all do our part to ensure we are building the kind of campus to which we aspire.

Campus resources