The Whiteness of Administration in Higher Education

College Trustees Remain Mostly White

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Board of Trustees had a “racially charged” controversy in a meeting in the summer of 2021 over the tenure bid of Nikole Hannah-Jones, a black female journalism professor. When the board voted on whether they thought Jones would receive tenure, they decided by split vote to grant it. But by the time they did so, she had already accepted a tenured position at Howard University, a historically Black university. This Chronicle of Higher Education article covers that controversy to bring to light what we already know: white men have ruled American higher education for centuries. “Policies, Practices, and Composition of Governing Boards of Colleges, Universities, and Institutionally Related Foundations,” builds on data they have gathered since 1969, when board members were “97 percent Caucasian” and only 12 percent female. In 2020, still nearly 80 percent of board members at private colleges are white, and 64 percent are men. This is the same at public colleges: nearly 65 percent of trustees are white, and 63 percent are men(AGB). These statistics reflect what scholars Angela Harris and Carmen González state in their introduction to Presumed Incompetent. They write, “For many women of color on college and university campuses, the problems begin with numerical representation. While the nation’s student population is becoming increasingly diverse, most full-time faculty positions continue to be filled by white men and women” (2). Nikole Hannah-Jones is a great representation of the concepts displayed in Presumed Incompetent because she is a woman of color who was sabotaged of her right to tenure.

https://www.chronicle.com/article/as-race-looms-large-college-trustees-remain-mostly-white