Required Course on Blackness & White Privilege

Creating a required course (or an alternative curricular innovation yielding a similar goal) that will examine Blackness, white privilege, and related issues.

The Antiracism Curricular Initiatives Working Group (ACIWG) is working on a proposal to the Existing Curriculum Committee (ECC) for faculty to approve courses that would meet the spirit of the requirement, with courses designated to address issues of power and privilege. The proposal will be submitted to the ECC in the fall, and then move on to the faculty for discussion/approval.

In addition, the Provost’s Office and the Dean’s Office are collaborating on a Campus Read for the class of ’23, the incoming class of ’26, and any faculty and staff who would like to join. The inaugural book selection is South to America: A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon Line to Understand the Soul of a Nation, by Imani Perry, Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University. There will be a series of coordinated events beginning with an author conversation on September 20, 2022.

Working groups at Haverford and Bryn Mawr are each working on developing such a course based on individual campus cultures and faculty interests. To acknowledge the enduring and good work of faculty currently teaching such courses, in May of 2021, the working group shared a list of courses with students and advisers which already address issues of power, privilege, and difference.