Email from WWU President and WWU Chief Diversity Officer to WWU ASA and JVP Representatives

May 14, 2024

Good morning,

Thank you for the meeting last Thursday afternoon, as well as for our earlier meeting on May 3rd. We appreciate the opportunity to continue hearing your thoughts and concerns, and we are committed to moving our conversation forward. We also recognize that an encampment was established on campus early this morning and respect peaceful expression and demonstration. Our goal in this dialogue is to make sure that all student voices and concerns are heard and to actively address your concerns to the extent we are able.

During our meeting last week, we discussed several matters to which you have called our attention. We shared some of our ideas for addressing these concerns and appreciated hearing the ideas you brought to the table. To recap, we shared the following during last week’s meeting:

  • Neither WWU, nor the Foundation for WWU and Alumni, has direct investments in companies on the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) list. We can share more information with you about the University’s investments the next time we meet.
     
  • We are open to developing a new process for consideration of divestment from companies or industry sectors, and we hope to continue to explore this concept in subsequent meetings with you.
     
  • The core mission of WWU as an academic institution is to create and disseminate knowledge through research, teaching and service. Freedom of inquiry and expression, and the free exchange of ideas, are foundational principles of this work and must not be abridged by geopolitical considerations. Along these lines, WWU does not support curtailing students’ experiential learning programs and faculty research projects with private industry, including the Boeing Company.
     
  • Western does not have its own agreement with the University of Haifa; rather, Western affiliates with multiple third-party study abroad organizations to provide Western students with a diversity of study abroad options throughout the world.  In our research on this matter, we learned that the University Studies Abroad Consortium includes the University of Haifa in their catalog of offerings, though that program is on hold this year and for 2024-25. WWU will not end its contract with any study abroad organization, as it is critical to the mission of the University and to the concept of academic freedom that students and faculty have access to inter-cultural educational exchanges around the globe. It is also important to note that the University of Haifa has the most diverse student body in Israel, with nearly half of the study body comprising Arab students, many of whom are Palestinian.
     
  • Western’s Ethnic Studies program is on track to launch this Fall and faculty searches for the program are underway. We appreciated hearing your specific recommendations related to the program curriculum and wish to note that faculty have been building the curriculum for some time and will continue to follow the established curriculum development process. A number of events and teach-ins have also been scheduled on campus to enhance understanding of the Israel-Palestine conflict, and we recognize the value in these exchanges for the broader community and are committed to ensuring that they continue.
     
  • Both in our meetings, as well as publicly at a recent Board of Trustees meeting, we have acknowledged that a message to campus last fall related to the Israel-Hamas war may have inadvertently been hurtful or offensive to some students at Western. We understand your concern that the administration has been silent on the war and the impact on Palestinian people. We respect the views our community members hold on geopolitical issues. However, as an institution, the university leadership will not take positions on international political matters that do not connect directly with university operations. At the same time, we are committed to raising awareness within the campus community about terms and words that have historical significance and that can be interpreted differently by different individuals within our community. We are taking an institutional or campus-wide approach to this nuanced and often difficult conversation by engaging the campus community in broader dialogue about the interpretation and use of terminology and how it impacts members of our community. We hope to engage you, as well as other student groups, in this dialogue.
     
  • We discussed the support that you —WWU student groups— need from the university on an ongoing basis. We would like to better understand where and how our existing systems have failed to support your growth and education so we can identify specific steps to ensure that you are heard and supported at Western.
     
  • Special meetings of the WWU Board of Trustees are scheduled when the Board has identified specific agenda items requiring Board deliberations. Students are welcome to share their thoughts and concerns directly with the Board during regular Board meetings, with the next meeting scheduled for June 14, 2024. The Board has delegated a significant amount of authority to the President and administration, which means administrators can engage with the community on university matters without direct involvement of the Board. We have and will continue to share with the WWU Board of Trustees all concerns that you have brought to our attention, and we will keep the Board apprised of our ongoing dialogue.
     
  • We also discussed some other strategies that we can partner on together to center our efforts on the Palestinian people whose lives have been upended in Gaza, and specifically the long-term educational needs of those communities, and we can further explore those concepts in subsequent meetings.

Again, we would like to continue the dialog with you, and the President's Office will reach out to schedule another meeting later today. We will invite and encourage the full memberships of the WWU Jewish Voice for Peace and Arab Student Association to participate in this meeting.

Thank you again for your continued engagement on these matters. We look forward to meeting with you again soon.

Kind regards,

 

Sabah Randhawa
Jacqueline Hughes