Current EPPC Motion Should Be Defeated

To the Editors:

Persistent racism in America is chiefly responsible for the pathologies afflicting most blacks and those pathologies are incontrovertibly documented: shorter lifespan than most whites, substantially less annual income than most whites, much poorer access to healthcare than most whites, etc.
None of the afflictions, however, are more troubling and more far-reaching than the shockingly poor education young blacks receive in our schools. To a few blacks and to some whites, this is not a pleasant problem to highlight. Yet I remain convinced that we gain much from admitting openly that while none of us caused racism, we must be the ones to minimize its effects on this and subsequent generations of blacks.
Virtually all colleges sought to do a little to improve education for blacks in the 20th century. But Oberlin College did a lot more both in the 19th and 20th centuries. Oberlin set a goal of admitting 100 blacks each year. Although only fifty to sixty-five blacks generally are admitted, a far cry from the target, the College pursues the goal seriously and unrelentingly; it deserves the warmest praise for staying ahead of many other colleges.
While some blacks enter the College less academically advantaged than many whites, most succeed in graduating and moving on to distinguish themselves and reflecting credit upon Oberlin College, thereby defying any and all criticisms about their worthiness and merit to have been admitted in the first place.
The EPPC motion to restore F’s on students’ permanent transcripts, however well-intentioned to make students work harder to keep standards high and to stop manipulating the system for higher GPAs, etc., will have the unintended impact of slowing down, if not halting, much of the progress Oberlin College has made since the late sixties when very few blacks were enrolled. In its present form, the motion should be defeated.

–Booker Peek
Professor of African American Studies