Shaina Philpot
And for me, land acknowledgements are important because they do show gratitude and appreciation to those whose lands that you work on, lands you live on, and lands that y’all are benefiting from on a daily basis. And so it’s honoring those indigenous peoples whose lands that traditionally have occupied those and as you mentioned, right? It’s just that first step, you know, like you have to go beyond those land acknowledgements. And so really, for me, the ultimate goal is continued allyship as well as reciprocal relationships with tribal communities. That’s the ultimate goal. So it’s not just I’m reading this land acknowledgement, right? It’s I’m going beyond that to actually build reciprocal relationships. And the keyword there is reciprocal relationships with these tribal communities.

Raechele Pope
Hello and welcome to Student Affairs NOW I’m your host. Raechele Pope, I’m also joined today by co host Gudrun Nyunt, who you’ll hear from in just a bit. Today, we’re discussing the evolution of race and indigeneity in our work in higher education. This is part of a 13 episode series for ACPA, 100th anniversary, and a partnership between Student Affairs NOW and ACPA, we have three great guests today who have been instrumental in leading the field on issues of race and indigeneity doctors D-L Stewart, Shaina Philpot and Monique Atherley, Student Affairs now is the premier podcast and online learning community for 1000s of us who work in alongside or adjacent to the field of Higher Education and Student Affairs. We release new episodes every Wednesday on every week on Wednesdays. Find details about this episode or browse our archives at Student Affairs now.com Today’s episode is sponsored by ACPA, as I said before, an independent 501c3 nonprofit association which is sponsoring this special 13 episode series with Student Affairs NOW to celebrate its 100th anniversary, boldly transforming higher education. As I mentioned, I’m your co host, Raechele Pope, my pronouns are she and her. I’m a professor in the higher education student affairs program at the University of Buffalo, and I also serve as a Senior Associate Dean for Faculty and Student Affairs and the unit Diversity Officer for the Graduate School of Education. I’m recording today near the University of Buffalo’s campus on the unceded Land of the Haudenosaunee people.

Gudrun Nyunt
Hello, everyone, and I’m your co host. Gudrun Nyunt. My pronouns, she and her. And I’m an associate professor and program coordinator of the Higher Education and Student Affairs Program at Northern Illinois University. I also have the honor to serve as part of the ACPA 100 core committee and as ACPA vice president of membership. I’m joining you today from Northern Illinois University, which occupies the homeland of the Anishinaabe peoples, also known as the Council of the three fires. And so let’s get started with the conversation. To our panelists, if you can introduce yourself, and how about we get started with you? -D-L, okay,

D-L Stewart
thank you. Glad to be here with all of you. I’m. D-L Stewart, my pronouns are he, him, his and they them. There. I’m Professor and Chair of the Department of Higher Education in the Morgridge College of Education at the University of Denver, where which sits on and occupies the lands the ancestral and present day homelands of the head now Hena to sister and Muncie.

Gudrun Nyunt
All right, Monique, we have you next.

Monique C. Atherley
Blessings and greetings. I’m so humbled to be amongst this greatness for this discussion. My name is Dr Monique Atherley. My pronouns are she/they. I’m raised and trained by the world’s borough of Queens New York, and coming to you all from the ancestral lands of the Muncie, Munsee, Lenape, Canarsie and Rockaway peoples. I’ve served the community through education for almost 20 years now, serving in New York State, and they’re predominantly and their three major educational systems. I serve ACPA as a coordinator for coalitions and networks, where I serve as an advocate and a steward over the identity based groups. I’ve served the Association for 12 out of my 15 years of membership, and professionally, I’m serving as a program Senior Program Analyst and policy specialist and the Center for racial and social justice and one of the major educational labor unions.

Gudrun Nyunt
Thank you, Monique and Shaina.

Shaina Philpot
Dr. Shaina Philpot. Hi everyone. My name is Dr. Shaina Philpot. I’m an enrolled tribal member of the Hopland band of Pomo Indians, and I use she her pronouns, and I professionally serve as the director of the Native American Student Support and Success Program at Cosumnes River College, which sits on the traditional homelands of the Miwok and nation on people. And the name Cosumnes actually stems from the plains Miwok language. And so it stems from the words kosamu, meaning salmon and Amna meaning the place of and so it translates as the place of the salmon. And so I also serve ACPA as the chair of the indigenous Student Affairs network, and it is an honor to be here with you all today.

Raechele Pope
I hope our listeners can hear that I was not using hyperbole when I said that we had an amazing panel ready to talk to us today. So let’s get to it. So you know before we started to record. Forward and over the weeks in preparation for this, we had a great conversation talking about land and labor acknowledgements and what they mean, what they could mean, what they’re supposed to do, what they don’t do, how people use them. And we were trying to figure out what we need to do. And we decided on what we need to do with this particular episode is really talk about them as part of this conversation. And so we start this episode focused on race and indigeneity, and we wanted the three of you to share with our listeners a bit about land and labor acknowledgement. Why do we do them? How can we go beyond simply acknowledging the land and the labor and start moving towards action? I was wondering, Shaina, would you start us off there?

Shaina Philpot
Yeah, yeah, so I can speak to the land acknowledgement piece. And so land acknowledgements, they’re formal statements that honor indigenous peoples as the traditional stewards of the land, as well as the relationship that exists between indigenous peoples and their traditional homelands. And so a lot of people, I get asked all the time of well, why do we do these land acknowledgements? Aren’t they performative? And for me, land acknowledgements are important because they do show gratitude and appreciation to those whose lands that you work on, lands you live on, and lands that y’all are benefiting from on a daily basis. And so it’s honoring those indigenous peoples whose lands that traditionally have occupied those and as you mentioned, right? It’s just that first step, you know, like you have to go beyond those land acknowledgements. And so really, for me, the ultimate goal is continued allyship as well as reciprocal relationships with tribal communities. That’s the ultimate goal. So it’s not just I’m reading this land acknowledgement, right? It’s I’m going beyond that to actually build reciprocal relationships. And the keyword there is reciprocal relationships with these tribal communities.

Monique C. Atherley
I think that’s really great, Shaina and what you mentioned. And it’s funny, like I reflect on when ACPA was the one space years ago, between like 2015 to 2018 that was doing land acknowledgements, right, and how that literally was a part of us boldly transforming education, higher education, and again, thinking about, what does it mean to honor the folks who have come before us? What does it mean to have restoration with some of these relationships and really being able to continue to center the realities that are important in regards to the land and the land that we’re existing on. So as we continue, I think one thing I’ve really enjoyed with ACPA for the last year and a half is that we’ve been actively doing research and design conversations around acknowledging labor, because honestly, it’s really remiss to discuss justice in any form without acknowledging the dynamics of labor, right? Like, who is laboring? How are they laboring? What is being sacrificed? How are folks being treated? And we know in many instances, there’s inequity in some of these questions, because we know the folks who are laboring often have multiple marginalized identities, right? So I’ve been a part of the ad hoc group that is continuing to do work, and we’re looking at answering some of these questions, right, even to the point where we’re having conversation about, what does labor look like for our entity leaders, right? What does labor look like for volunteering in higher education. And again, like, I think this work for me, you know, especially coming from a labor union, right? So I’m pro labor union. You know, in higher education, we’re not really about that life sometimes, right? So I think it’s really revolutionary for us to be in a space where we’re actively talking about labor thinking. Again, with our 21st century employment report, that was a significant contribution towards us talking about labor, who is laboring, how we’re laboring, and really thinking overall about what labor is and how that shows up. So again, the pandemic has shifted to a place where we cannot, for one for our folks who are volunteers, not talk about labor and what’s happening from a labor standpoint, but again, as we think about as we serve, we need to give honor to the folks who this country’s, who’s this country’s backs were built off of, right like there are people who have come before us, and if we don’t sit here and acknowledge the impact of them, then their sacrifices and the generations that were impacted from that it we really can’t talk about any other dynamics of identity.

D-L Stewart
I really love that Monique and Shaina, what you both shared. I think for me, I’ll personalize it even more. I recognize that I owe my entire career, my entire career, to the forced displacement and attempted genocide of indigenous peoples and to the stolen labor and enslavement of Africans on these lands. I don’t have a career in higher education, employment in a university, the privilege. To study colleges and universities without those dynamics taking place and the ongoing effects of them, right? So, as Shaina said, we continue to benefit from the lands that these institutions occupy. And I would say that’s true even for fully, quote, unquote, online institutions. Right? There is still a benefit, the ongoing benefit of the displacement and attempted genocide of indigenous peoples. There is an ongoing benefit in some specific institutions more than others. But generally, if you think about the sector of higher education, it exists because of those two ongoing, historical and ongoing processes, right? And I the labor, I love Monique, how you’ve how you have built out and expanded what we understand about labor. I think that’s really, really important. And for me, it all originates from that beginning point of the enslavement of Africans, the DIS forced displacement and migration of millions of human beings right to this place to be dehumanized, killed. Right, exploited for their labor in order to build the nation right that we have, and specifically institutions of higher education. I owe my whole career to that, and for me, it’s about because I know I owe my whole career to that. What is my responsibility right to, as Shaina said, build relationships and be in relationship with indigenous communities and with black communities, particularly, but also with minoritized folks in general, particularly those as Monique talked about, who labor on our campuses, right, who are often unseen and invisibilized in the work of higher education.

Raechele Pope
Right? I’m glad you brought up that at the end there D-L about unseen and invisible eyes, because there is this whole erasure, and to me, that’s one of the reasons why we need to do these land acknowledgements, because it’s not only because of the past, it’s because of people right here. And there are whole swaths of individuals on our campuses in our nation who don’t believe that indigenous folks here still exist. Number one and number two, want to erase the history that that that that you wrote out. So I think, yeah, we need to keep doing it, to keep that in the pressure. But that can’t be the end. And I just want to say we could spend this entire episode just talking about land acknowledgements. But I do want our readers to know that if they look through our archives, we have a whole session on beyond land acknowledgements, what we need to do, but that was an important place for us to at least begin. I think, yeah,

Gudrun Nyunt
yeah, yeah. Thank you all for sharing, because that was so powerful and just thinking about right as we’re thinking about waste and indigeneity. How do we even start with this episode and kind of set the tone for how we want to talk about just things right, and how we’re we’re taking that responsibility that we all have to acknowledge the past, to acknowledge what’s still happening today, how it’s going to continue to shape our future, right, and really thinking about that responsibility that we all hold as higher education professionals and scholars. And so, Monique, you got us started about right, some of the ways that ACPA really has pushed the field of higher education to work towards racial justice and decolonization, and all three of you have been engaged in this, involved in really amazing and meaningful and really, really important race, right? And so I’d love to hear a little bit more from each of you of how you’ve seen ACPA and the field transform over the past few years. Monique, do you want to get us started?

Monique C. Atherley
I’ll go ahead and jump in. So first and foremost, I want to make sure I’m lifting up an area in the association that has been a consistent, generational force in this work, and that’s the ACPA coalitions and networks. The coalitions and networks represent who we are as an association, and they provide affinity groups that amplify and advocate for the realities associated with various social identities and common link communities. So over time, the name has changed, but the coalitions have. Networks have kept us purposeful. They continue to hold us accountable and making sure that the association is considering equity, inclusion and access at the forefront of all of our work. They’ve challenged us to do and be better. And you know, working with folks over the last three years within my tenure has really been a privilege to see how much. They’ve really leveled up their game. We have so many dynamic offerings, both in programming and scholarship, that are centering in their particular communities. And as I think about some of our networks, again, challenging us to think about what are some intersections that we need to highlight a little bit more as we do this work, and again, what are resources and ways we can support these communities that are on our campuses, as well as folks in our professional colleague networks that are represented in these spaces. The other thing that I think about, that I’m really excited about as ACPA is going through his 100th year. We just went through a governance transformation process, so we’re in our second phase of putting in our new leadership council. And with this work we again, we centered looking at race and access and identity. So three positions in particular that I’m really excited about seeing them continue to grow and have impact, and again, hold our association accountable. First is our decolonization strategies. Chair, which actually was hap came in phase one. And again, this chair is responsible for holding the association accountable, providing materials really helping us look at the benchmarking of how we’re considering the colonization, the way that we say that we’re considering colonization. Second in this iteration of our election process, we are have our racial strategies chair as well as our universal design chair. So again, all of these roles are built to make sure that we are supporting these populations, and again, keeping identity and access and equity in the front of what we’re doing in these communities.

Shaina Philpot
And I just would love to jump in in terms of, you know, like I mentioned, I’m chair of indigenous Student Affairs network, and so you know, what I’ve seen from ACPA is their commitment to doing better. And so they have an indigenous advisor to the convention steering committee, who is there to advise them and guide them right when it comes to working with indigenous peoples and indigenous communities. They have their elder in residence, which for me, is so huge that there’s a conference this big has decided to have an elder in residence and really make that commitment to the local indigenous community. And then, you know, like mentioned, right, the commitment to land acknowledgements, which y’all have been doing for a hot minute. And I love that y’all have been doing that. And then also something in particular for indigenous Student Affairs is that ACPA has really made a commitment and has showed their continued support for our indigenous Student Affairs network discount. So for folks who work in indigenous Student Affairs, if first year attending conference, first year joining ACPA, it’s completely free. And then there’s a tier discount system, right? So year two, there’s a discount for membership and convention registration. That’s total of $150 and then year three, and year four and beyond. And for us, that is such a huge commitment from ACPA for indigenous student affairs folks because of issues with funding, right? And the fact that they are making that commitment of like, Hey, we are here to have this disc tier discount for y’all and we’re going to continue to do so, says a lot for ACPA and what their commitment into, yeah,

Speaker 1
yeah, I take a long view on this too, as I think about being I don’t know. I think I joined ACPA first in 1997 perhaps when I was still a grad student and in my master’s program. And now here no starting 24th year as a faculty member, and continue to be engaged with ACPA in various roles during that time. ACPA was always from when I came in, was always the association that was kind of known for that’s where you want to be if you’re interested in these issues of light diversity. That’s been a long time. Part of ACPA is kind of ethos. But what I’ve seen in terms of evolution or transformation. Those are two very different processes, but I kind of see them working in tandem in some ways. Within ACPA, there’s an evolutionary aspect to it. There’s also a transformational aspect to it. Is the naming of the thing, right? So you really can’t address something until you name it and name it specifically and explicitly. And that’s what I saw happen and begin to happen as the strategic imperative was being rolled out, right? So was that? Donna, we. 2016 of them getting my presidential years correct somewhere in that neighborhood was okay, we’re going to name it, and then the naming of it, the it being racial justice and decolonization, which had to be added, right? So I think that’s the thing that sometimes gets lost in the conversation, is that as ACPA began to do this explicit naming of the work that needed to be done, issues of settler colonialism, indigeneity, decolonization, were not originally uppermost of mind, right? Or were considered, perhaps embedded within or conflated with, racial justice without the recognition that no, we’re talking about sovereign peoples on stolen land, and that’s not the same as talking about racial justice, right? They’re related concepts. They systems of oppression. Often work in similar ways, but they’re not the same thing, and so the need to lift that up very specifically. And what I saw happen is a listening. There’s been greater emphasis on listening, I think, in the association and then responding right? So I’m I’m taking the time to stop, to pause, to listen and then to act right, and to shift action in response to what has been heard, right? And I think we’re doing better at that as an association.

Raechele Pope
Well, I can take it probably back even further. You know, when I think about how the association has moved and changed, and that where we are, in many ways, is light years from where we began and I wasn’t even there when we began. I want to be real clear I am old, but I am not and so where we begin, but I remember the none of these changes hum as easy as we almost make them sound. You know, we’re now listening, because this was pushing and for every time we said, Stop, look, listen, there was someone who was feeling left out, someone who was feeling too big a change, someone who was feeling this was the only focus that we add there was a problem, and maybe that was hurting the association. And so I remember when we had these, at that time, standing committees, the the commissions and the networks. When we had those, they were sort of marginalized, and the only people who were interested in doing this kind of work. You know, it was supposed to be relegated to those who had that interest or that expertise alone, nobody else had to have it.

Speaker 1
And it was an ethos, but it was marginalized, right, right? So it’s like the association was almost taking credit for things that were only happening and have been sidelined, that’s right, right, yeah, yeah.

Raechele Pope
And so there were a lot of people feeling marginalized and isolated, and particularly with our indigenous communities. I mean, I remember when we were in Boston back I guess, in 95 Yep. Oh, was it the next time we were in Boston? But that was really ugly, and it had a lot of indigenous folks in particular, but others in solidarity feeling, I’m not so sure I can stay a member. So ACPA has had an interest, has had a desire. It’s been a part of our our breathing, part of our ethos. But it hasn’t been easy. It’s been a struggle. And for the people who stay and remain and become that, who helped to transform it, who stayed in the conversation to say, we can be better, and we can do better, right? So that’s in some way, you know, it’s hard to say right now, but that’s in some ways, what we see beyond ACPA, right? You know, I’m sure other associations who say this is their ethos, have those had those same struggles? Or those who have said, No, it’s not. They might be struggling too, because there are people involved, our society, our nation, you know, all of that. And I’m wondering if, as we talked about ACPA, can we move this to the field as a whole, how do we see those same issues operating on campuses, evolving on campuses, transforming on campuses? I know you can’t speak for all of the campuses, but you work on campuses in some ways. You consult. You. To speak on different campuses. What are you seeing out there? And I’m wondering if we can begin with you again. Shaina, yeah,

Shaina Philpot
let me step up on my soapbox. Real. Okay, it’s like, where did I even begin? Um, like mentioned earlier, right? Uh, land acknowledgements are a big one. Is an issue on college campuses where they’re seen as performative. You have some college campuses who are just doing it, just to do it, and they’re not doing it in consultation with and in relationship with their local, tribal communities, which is a problem, and also those same institutions, right? They’re not going beyond land acknowledgements, like we talked about, right, like having those reciprocal relationships with tribal communities and ongoing reciprocal relationships with tribal communities. You know, some other issues that I see on college campuses are just the lack of native and indigenous identifying faculty and staff on campuses. There’s just so few of us, even on my current campus, now I’m one of two, right like doing this work, um, you know? And so that then goes into these students who come here don’t see themselves within the people who are teaching them and they’re to guide them and who they’re learning from, and then that also goes into the curriculum piece, right? Because then they’re also not seeing Indigenous ways of knowing being valued within these Western colonial institutions, and which is another problem. And I can also keep going on about, you know, and then I also think too about just this overall lack of funding. A lot of these programs, not all of them, but a lot of them are on soft money, so they’re on grant money. And so it’s not an institutionalized program. There is no institutional commitment to continue this program once that funding disappears. And that’s a whole and then there’s this issue of pretending, right? So folks who say they’re native, but they’re really not, and just trying to use it as a benefit to move higher up in an institution. And that’s a whole other thing that I that would be an issue on his hotel. If that’s a you know, we’ll, let’s leave it at that. But what I see on college campus is really just this overall lack of knowledge around indigenous issues, right? You know, there’s just this lack of knowledge there on that, and then also seeing it as, this is a shared responsibility across all campus departments. And a lot of people don’t see it that way. They see it as, oh, you’re the Native student support program. That’s just, that’s you, you take care of that. And it’s like, no, no, this is a shared responsibility across everybody on campus, exactly,

Speaker 1
yeah. So it’s yeah, it’s supposed to be a shared responsibility. And universities, right? Talk this there this very interesting rhetoric that I see happening that diversity equity inclusion because they don’t want to talk about justice, diversity equity inclusion is everybody’s responsibility. Which, oh yes, but what you’ve actually done is, Raechele, as you were talking about earlier, sidelined and marginalized, ghettoized the folk who are actually doing that work and defunding it, right? And that trend was happening before the attacks on dei that emerged in the last year, year and a half, right? And a focus on this, there’s still a food, fun and festival focus, right? That’s how we used. That was the term we used to use right back in the day, food, fun and festival. And there is still that kind of approach to these issues of you know, and I saw it. We all saw it coming out of 2020 in the midst of covid, the racial uprisings and protests in response to police sanctioned murders and disproportionately of black folks and the anti racism, we’re an anti racist campus. Do you even know what that’s mean? I don’t think you know what that means, but you’re using this language to still do the same thing you’ve been doing and not actually shift systems and structures. So that’s when we think about the same issues. Op. Already how these issues operate on campuses we’re seeing, perhaps, like we talked about with ACPA and Monique, you really like, drew out that history of, like, all the different things that are happening in Shaina as well. Those are some systemic, structural process changes, right? That’s when you start talking about equity and justice. It’s systems and processes and structures, right, and how they shape and inform how institutions operate and how people, therefore operate within those institutions. That’s not what’s happening in my view, across the landscape of higher education, when we think about institution wide, right? There’s not an interest and not a commitment to shifting systems, structures and processes. They want more bodies, but they want to have more bodies without disrupting how they operate the status quo, right? So that means they’re looking for certain kinds of bodies who are willing to cooperate and find and or find ways to still survive, not thrive, but survive within the current status quo. Right? And that I think is, is, is is just dangerous in all kinds of in all kinds of ways, you know? But it’s that absence of systems, structures and process work that is what I see happening, but still trying to adopt this language that is a that is a shield, right, or masks what’s actually happening?

Monique C. Atherley
Yeah, so I’m listening to you all, and two things came up that tied a little bit together of what you all were talking about. And it’s definitely a systems issue, right? It’s a systems it’s a structure, it’s protocol and all the things. And I know Shaina earlier was mentioning funding, right? Like we were using this grant funding, we have no actual institutional commitment, right? So I always firmly believe, like, if you show me your budget, I know you will tell me what you value, right? And then if we continue to do that, it tells this is a systemic issue. Let’s be really honest about it, right? If you systemically and consistently do not fund the things that need to be funded, although you’re bringing the bodies, like, what are you doing? Like, what are we actually doing in all of this? So I just wanted to connect that. Because I always think about like, the funding piece is huge, the funding piece is huge, that that’s the loudest, um, institutional commitment that comes up, but a couple things that I see. So I what I really appreciate about the work I’m doing now. So I’m supporting members across the country, right? So it’s interesting to see how these issues are showing up. One, through, uh, through P through 20 education to, you know, the different states, the different locations. And as always, I’m seeing like diligent servants and folks who are ready and willing to do the work, but they cannot do it in the fullest capacity for whatever reason, whether they’re in a state that is anti Dei, whether they’re in a place that, again, from anti de islands, is taking away funding, closing offices, and, you know, it’s, what’s interesting is, with all this anti DEI, anti CRT efforts, like, it’s really anti sharing real truth, right? And it’s a lot of information gatekeeping and of developmental opportunities that are going to impact these students and how they’re being served. You know, I’m also seeing from folks like a lack of blatant disrespect and a lack of regard of personhood, of avoidance of real issues and Band Aid fixes. And I think deal you mentioned earlier, you know, how folks were responding in that time of racial reckoning, right? A time where some of us already knew how things are going down, but everyone else kind of joined us and learned what how the other side lives. But during that time, one of the things that was a big response, as folks have seen, has been identity centers, if folks did not already have an identity center or department, right? But with that, having those departments be erected, no long term plans, no long term goals being funded by grants like no actual way to continue doing that work, and a sustainable way that shows that they’re actually committed to it, and it makes it look even worse and even more performative when you have some of these structures fail because of the lack of support, and then folks having to save themselves in all of this. But as I think about some of these issues, you know, I’ve also seen a lot of folks who are just sick and tired of being sick and tired, right? And they’re looking at different ways to disrupt, to push back, to work around some of this gatekeeping, and they’re really, again, connected to folks like us to be able to get the resources and support that they need to bring it back on the ground for some of the issues that they’re dealing.

Gudrun Nyunt
all, yes, all of that’s right, and it is, like you said, Monique, it’s a systems issue, right? It’s how we do things, it’s what we value, not in what we say we value, right? But But in our actions, in our processes, in our policies, right? And so and our students are smart, right? They know they they know when an institution issues a statement that says we don’t agree with this, so we’re horrified by what happened, and then that’s the end of it, right? And that, and I think sometimes that creates even more dissonance for students, right? Who are, who are activists on campus, and we’re seeing this right now, right? Students standing up and being activists and speaking up, and institutions using police to shut it down like we haven’t learned anything right around police brutality and why that is the worst response possible in those situations, right? And, and, yeah, right. And it’s that dissonance where you where you think higher ed should be doing better, right? We we know we should be doing better and whatnot, and so I guess one of the questions I have for all of you is, how, how do you see us moving forward from this like, what? What are these pressing issues that we address? Where do we start? Right for our listeners who who are maybe looking for ways to get engaged in this fight to make things better. Where do we start?

Speaker 1
I can jump in if that’s if that’s cool. I think we need to start with examining our systems and structures and processes and this and the things that communicate our values. So Monet nailed it, because I’m like a but a budget is a values document. Absolutely, it’s a statement of values. So how and where are you spending your money? Okay, how are you investing dollars into building relationships, into humanizing processes, into supporting the initiatives, the programming, the you know, everything that actually enhances the life chances for those who are most vulnerable on your campuses, right? It also begins, you know, I get this question a lot when it comes to folks who are not senior level administrators or faculty in their institutions. What can I do? And the other piece, you know, I really lean on le paper since work third University as possible, where le paperson talks about how there are already within pockets of the universities, these kinds of anti colonial, decolonial, anti racist movements happening, right? And sometimes, I think we over focus, perhaps on the institutional level. It’s almost like an electoral politics. There’s a whole lot of attention at the top of the ticket, and people don’t look down ticket right down the ballot. And I think that same dynamic is a parallel within institutions. What’s happening in your sphere of influence? How are you using your degrees of freedom right to shift practice and policy right, even in small ways. I think we don’t understand the ripple effect that those critical, small changes actually can have right across the landscape of a place and group of people, you know, but it’s, it’s the systems, the prophecies, the structures, that’s where we have to go next, because otherwise we’re just going to continue to reproduce the same effects that we have continued to see right? It becomes intransigent because we’re not addressing what’s actually at the root of the problem, and the ways that whiteness, white supremacy, settler colonialism, antigeneity, anti blackness, show up in how we do things, the tacit assumptions by which we operate, right? And I think the other thing we need to do, and I’ll stop here, is that we need to actually, you know, talked earlier about naming the thing as higher education. We don’t name the thing. We talk around it. Right? But we don’t actually name it, right, really specifically, and I think that is something we need to do, particularly as regards anti blackness and anti indigeneity and how we operate as an institutions, because that feeds into all these other systems and structures of oppression. They’re not isolated, right? And so I like building solidarity amongst communities. Is the other the other piece that where we need to go.

Monique C. Atherley
I want to jump in really quickly, because I also want to big you up. Dr Stewart, there’s a article that you’ve written years ago. I think it’s 2018 or 2019 with your ideologies of absence, and it’s one of my favorite, favorite articles in particular, and I think about the the ideology of unbelonging, right, and how belonging is for a certain type of person who does a certain type of thing, and who is this ideal type of person. And again, like, what does that mean and say for people in regards to them being at these institutions. So I mentioned that because, you know, one of the things I would hope that we would do a better job on is really considering the visibility of some of these populations who are out here recruiting and trying to bring to our campuses. And then the other thing with that is consistency, consistency on stance, right? Because, again, if we’re bringing folks and we’re saying that we want them there, and we’re not providing any structural supports. And then all of a sudden, we switch the game like again, what are we doing? A couple of things that comes to mind for me, you know, I think about Porter and bird, and they’ve done some work in regards to both undergraduate and graduate black women on campus, who, again, are recruited to come to campus, to be a part of the diversity on campus. But then again, have nothing there for them, right? They themselves have to create structures, as you mentioned about connecting with communities. They have to create their own structures to be their own retention plan, just because, you know they’re they get there and they are no longer visible and needing service, almost, right? Like that’s how it appears that their experiences. And then I think the other thing, again, thinking about different types of populations and the nuance that comes with population, right? So one of my colleagues and I were actually coming up with a book chapter that focuses on the black immigrant experience in higher education, right? And one of the things that the literature says is, again, when we’re not considering black students as a whole, like, if we’re operating from a place of anti blackness, we couple them in together. Anyways, we have no actual interest in any of their actual intersections. We don’t we see that blackness to them is a monolith, right? So as we think about having students who have multiple identities within a group, like, how are we honoring who they are as they come to us, right? And how are we not losing their journeys and their stories along this as we’re supporting the larger community? So like, visibility is huge, right, seeing yourself, but also having folks who see you and you can see yourself in systems and structures that you are being considered and taken care of? Yeah? Yep,

Raechele Pope
oh, yeah,

Shaina Philpot
oh, people are just incredible. Like, I’m just sitting here, like fan fangirling over here, wow. Honestly, I mean so to everything Y’all said, and I think I would just add, in terms of moving forward for indigenous peoples, is that institutions need to reckon with decolonization and what it actually means in terms of the repatriation of plans that that’s got to happen. I’m sorry, moving forward, that’s that’s priority for me, and then also just centering Indigenous ways of knowing as valid and legitimate. You know, like I said, we’re in these Western colonial institutions that were not made for us in the first place. And so now, like, how do we again system right? These system shifts. How do we shift this to where these Indigenous ways of knowing are now going to be valued and legitimate? And I think institutions also need to realize what tribal sovereignty actually is, and that when it comes to working with these communities, right, you are working with communities that have a political and racial identity, and they’re a sovereign nation. And so what does that, you know, these institutions need to realize, like, what does that look like when you are building a reciprocal relationship with another nation, not just right? You know, this group of people, so, right?

Speaker 1
I would just add that, right? So we talk about internationalization, right, right, but we’re not thinking about that in the terms or in the context of, as you’re saying, Shaina, what dealing with other sovereign nations on which we are occupying their lands? Right? What does that mean? What does that look like? And I think the other pieces, I would think, as I was listening to you, Monique, particularly, I would started to think about intersectionality, and not intersectionality of identities, simply that people have multiple identities because, yes, but. As I think about Crenshaw work and Patricia Hill Collins, who often is lost in the conversation, also on the leading edge of this conversation around intersectionality is, or the introduction of the framework, is the ways that systems and structures of oppression interact intersect to catch people at those intersections right, who are confronted by multiple systems of oppression and how They’re operating on campus, to create added layers of vulnerability, right? So as I think about vulnerability and college campuses and in, and this is where I think the solidarity conversation really needs much more attention, as we think about the intersectionality of systems of oppression. And we recognize, for instance, that as Xena Collazo, I think about, has written ghost stories of the academy, an article that came out now, like, I can’t believe that it’s been, like four years now or so since her article came out about the invisiblization and the like the in access of trans women on college campuses, both as faculty, staff and students, and also pushing even further thinking about the absences of black trans women in these spaces, right? So, Monique, you talked about blackness being under being considered as a monolith. What that ha? What happens in the midst of that is the erasure of certain populations that don’t fit in with the presumption of what blackness is. Right. Same thing with indigeneity is happening, right? So the the, you know, the quote unquote, safe Indian, the quote unquote, you know, good black person, or, you know, like you’re a different than and being put, then within this box. And so we’re going to engage anti racism for those group of people right and not recognize the ways that racism, white supremacy and whiteness and settler colonialism interact with other systems of oppression to Catch right black and indigenous folks and other racialized communities right in this space that is operating on them in by multiple vectors. Okay, so this policy change right? Are you? Are you recognizing how this policy change that you say it’s going to benefit black students on campus, right, or Asian apida students on campus, Latina students on campus, but by doing that, you have still excluded and you’re not attending to the needs of students within those communities who are disabled, who are queer, who are trans, who are immigrant, right? Um, and there, there’s just not sort of this, this putting two and two together, right? Is really just not happening on campuses. So you constantly seeing these additional communities and individuals who face these interlaced, interacting, intersecting layers of vulnerability left out of the conversation, right? And then being pushed out of the university, right? Okay, yeah,

Monique C. Atherley
can I jump in right behind you? Because, in short, one, you gave a good word. I just want to say that like I’m holding on. I’m taking notes myself, but it’s just like in short, people really need to think about what they know about intersectionality. They’ve made intersectionality real pretty and real cute to be able to talk about these diverse population. But exactly what you said is intersectionality, it’s the impact of power on these people, period, right? So the biggest thing that would be helpful to folks is to challenge what they think they know about intersectionality. Because Kimberly Crenshaw, I’m not sure if there was a Times article, I think around 2021, and she’s just so tired of people misusing, so tired of people, and it’s like, Yes, you are not utilizing. In the way that the scholar came up with it. So get clear on what it is before you say that you you have all these practices that are adhering to are acknowledging intersectionality, come back to the basics. Let’s start. There’s levels come back to the basics.

Raechele Pope
Well, what they’re acknowledging is is multiple identities, different than intersectionality, because it leaves out the notion of power, right? So when we talk about what our institutions can do, and we talk about what these groups coming together to need to do, but the one push that I always put in addition to going back and saying, know what the words mean that you’re using is that we need to learn more about each other. Yeah, right. So I cannot ally, true ally. I’m always afraid of that word anymore, right with you, unless I know you, unless I’ve listened to you, unless I know the struggle and know when our struggles come together and come apart. I’m tired of working with people who don’t understand, who haven’t taken the time to listen that important word that was brought up earlier by dia they haven’t taken the time to listen to what the needs are of this group, the history is of this group, the the the the context right now and how the zeitgeist is affecting them, not just me, right, affecting them, affecting this group that I am not a part of, but I need to work with, I need to join with. And I see that as a big component here that is also the message for us, not the message for the institution, the message for those of us trying to push these institutions, trying to help lead the institutions, yeah. How are we creating put all those pieces together? That’s where that’s where I am, yeah.

D-L Stewart
How are we creating spaces for relationality to emerge? Right? Because I do, and I is, I think about the the origin right of this, of this construct, of this practice, right? Because it’s a practice of relationality out of Indigenous ways of knowing. Right? Is something that emerges. It is not a thing that you do that’s right, right? It’s a habitual practice. It has to be. And so how are we creating spaces for those habitual practices to develop, right, and be sustained? So I agree with you, Raechele, we’re not doing that. We talk about free expression, right? So that’s a big thing in my on my campus right now, is freedom of expression and pluralism. But it’s, it’s being done in such a way that it’s really not anchored in under it’s really, it’s just really not anchored in relationality. It’s anchored in this notion of diversity and inclusion that I’ve talked about and and kind of just attempted to disrupt and and really complicate, but it’s anchored in this understanding of diversity and inclusion. That means that’s a all voices kind of thing, and all voices on the same level of validity. And I’m pausing because this it’s I’m trying to be very careful about what I’m saying. Right? Hiring institutions are supposed to be promoting critical thinking. I think any, every single higher education institution you look at probably has within their learning outcomes for what they want for their students, something about critical thinking, right, which, to me, means not all ideas have the same level of should have the same level of expertise attached to them, right? And I find it curious what conversations we allow to happen on campuses and what conversations we disallow from happening on campuses, relationship to that right we would never bring I have yet to see a geography department or whatever, like, bring a flat earther to campus to have a debate and a conversation? Right? It wouldn’t happen, right? I mean, but I don’t think anybody listening would be like. Like, Oh yeah, no, no, no, that would not happen on your campus. It just wouldn’t right. But we are totally comfortable with supporting, not just allowing, but supporting anti trans, anti indigenous, anti immigrant, right voices to be part of a debate as though there were two equally legitimate underpinnings of these ideas.

Raechele Pope
Well, what that makes me? I’m sorry. It just makes me there’s that I read this quote about journalists, and they were saying it’s this whole both sides notion, this whole thing about our the that if one side says it’s raining, of a debate, and the other side says, No, it’s not, the journalists job is not to present both sides to look out the damn window and see if it’s raining or not. And then do you deal with the facts? If a journalist has that responsibility, then educators surely have that responsibility to help us find fact. I mean fact in its broadest sense, right? That really honors an indigenous way of thinking. You know, it’s not, I’m thinking about, Oh, I can’t think of her name, Brady sweetgrass, as she talks about it in biology, right? What’s her name?

Shaina Philpot
Robin wall Kimmerer,

Raechele Pope
thank you. That book just changed. Well, here she’s doing it in science. And we’re always saying, no, no, no, you can’t do it in things that aren’t it can’t be done in science. And yes, it can obviously, right? It’s a thinking and being with the world differently. But so we have to understand the notion of fact. We have to understand the notion of of gathering information, and we don’t have to present both sides always. There are some times when it is appropriate. It’s just not always appropriate. And we don’t do it in geology, like you said, right? But why would we do it in some places? And so there is that whole conversation of this both sides. When you were saying that, that made me think of it. If a journalist has that responsibility, is being called out. My goodness, as educators, we certainly

D-L Stewart
do, and we don’t have a paradigm that values story, yeah, and the the expertise of lived experience, right? So when talking about looking out the window, is it raining well, and being able to receive this, I would even go further and say looking out the window, are people wet?

Raechele Pope
That’s right, what’s the ground look like? What are we on those leaves? Yeah, right,

Raechele Pope
Goodren, take us away. I know that we are.

Gudrun Nyunt
I know this has been such a great conversation. Thank you all. And we could obviously keep going forever, but the you know, this podcast is called Student Affairs NOW, and so I know y’all have given me lots of things to think about, but I’d love to hear from all of you after this conversation, what are some of the things you’re thinking about, troubling pondering right now.

Monique C. Atherley
I think right now I’m actively thinking about what we’re just talking about in regards to responsibility, right? And again, our institutions and our profession is calling for folks to for us to yield students who critically think we needed to do the same ourselves, right? We need to get real clear on stance, real clear on next steps, all of those things. So one thing, and another thing in particular I think about, is that recently, a couple of civil rights organizations banded together to put out a policy agenda in relation to equity and diversity in higher education. And I named that because we need to be more informed, and that’s a great tool that folks can tap into to see what would be helpful to them in their context.

D-L Stewart
Absolutely. Yeah. Uh,

Shaina Philpot
yeah, I’m just thinking about, you know, this whole system of education, right, and how it’s not equitable, and so we need to continue to do this work, and what’s my role in that, and what can I do right to move, move the needle just a little bit more forward,

Raechele Pope
right? Can I do I like that? Yeah, yeah.

D-L Stewart
I am thinking about how we support the work of those who are in currently, I say currently on purpose, currently in battle spaces, because I don’t believe we need to disrupt this whole notion of safety. My there they are safe spaces. Particularly sitting here in what’s now called Colorado, and with a openly gay governor, and I’m in Denver and you know it’s all and that, you know, supposedly better here. No, we may not have a legislature that is like acting in the ways that it is across the south and certain parts of the Midwest, but it is not necessarily safe and so but we are not currently embattled, right? And I think that’s a difference. So how do we support our colleagues who are in currently embattled spaces? Um, both in terms of geographies of states as well as geographies of institutions, right? Because sometimes there are institutions that are making these moves, even if they’re not in a state, right, where the legislature is put it, pushing it. So those embattled spaces are not just about the state of XYZ, but the institution of XYZ made me doing this as well, either in tandem with or apart from. And so that’s what I wrestle with, is what does it look like to support them who are doing that work? Because everybody can’t leave. Everybody doesn’t want to leave. Everybody doesn’t have the resources and privilege to leave. Everybody doesn’t have some place to go, even if they did leave, right? And so for those who remain, what is our responsibility to them, and how can we show up in support? And I don’t have the answer to those questions, because it is complex, right? People’s jobs and livelihoods are at stake some of these spaces, right? And so how do we practice and learn the practice of subversion, right? Or fugitivity, is how it’s discussed in Black Studies, fugitive pedagogy. It’s fugitive administrative practices, right? What does it mean to be fugitives? What does it mean to be subversive? How do we support that subversiveness in these embattled spaces from the outside right for those of us who are outside and for those of us who are in these embattled spaces, what does it mean to move within right and still preserve the life chances of themselves, as well as the student body, the staff, the faculty that they may be serving in those spaces as well. That’s what keeps me up at night.

Monique C. Atherley
Well, that is a lot to keep you and all of us up at night. You know this has been terrific. Thank you. Thank you so much all of you for your leadership in this space. And I also have to thank our sponsor of today’s episode, ACPA, college student educators International, celebrating its 100th anniversary, is boldly transforming higher education by creating and sharing influential scholarship, shaping Critically Reflective practice and advocating advocating for equitable and inclusive learning environments. ACPA aspires to be higher education and student affairs most inclusive and community driven Association by leading our profession in centering social justice, racial justice and decolonialization as defining concepts of our time and our foreseeable future. Visit my acpa.org, or connect with us on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. I refuse to call it the other thing to learn more about ACPA, huge shout out to to our producer, Natalie Ambrosey, who does all the behind the scenes work to make us look and sound good. We love the support for these important conversations from our community. Community, you can help us reach even more folks by subscribing to our podcast, YouTube and weekly newsletter, announcing each new episode and more. If you’re so inclined, you can leave us a five star review. I’m Raechele Pope with Gudrun Nyunt. Thank you, and thanks again for our amazing guests and everyone who is watching and listening, take care of yourselves. Be kind and spread joy.

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