Dear Academia, Please Respect My Identity
Story by Imani Brooks, photograph by Eye for Ebony
Five days after graduation from Emory University, I moved to Washington, D.C. with a full U-Haul, my dad, and my dog in tow. Over the summer, I rented a bedroom in the house of an alumnus/alumna** from my college. The nation’s capital is an interesting place, to say the least, to earn my law degree, especially in a world where Black people can be publicly, mercilessly murdered by those who are supposed to “protect the public”, and our nation is led by a president who seems oblivious to injustices in the African American community. I was really looking forward to the next chapter of my life, moving months before classes started to adjust to a new city. However, I fell into a deep depression instead, asking myself if I was strong enough for law school. Once I identified my triggers, I proactively began building a support system for matriculating in law school as a Black woman. The summer became all about my journey finding Black mentors in the legal field through affinity groups and prep programs for underrepresented populations. While I was leaning on those groups and programs, I was still vulnerable to the institutional discrimination that was trying to dismantle these safe spaces.
Finding black mentors felt like a natural coping mechanism because my undergraduate experience was largely defined by my work as president of Emory University’s Black Student Alliance as well as the president of one of the National Panhellenic Greek organizations on campus. Emory University still has Black students dedicated to building up organizations to support Black students.
One of those students is Ronald Poole II, an Emory University sophomore and a Comparative Literature and African American Studies double major. While Ronald does not like the term “affinity group” because it doesn’t show the multiple ways to be Black within a group, they believe such groups should create a space for people with similar interests, backgrounds, and experiences to come together to care for each other. Ronald actively chooses to be a part of student organizations to surround themselves with Black people at a predominately white institution (PWI).
During COVID-19, Ronald defines these groups--such as NAACP, Black Star Magazine, and Blackout Queer Discussion Group--as especially important in providing spaces for Black people to endure, recreate, and redefine what comfort is. The virtual setting emphasizes the disparities between students because Black students cannot ignore that white students are the majority. For example, Ronald’s African American Studies class with a Black professor has two Black students, including Ronald. With Zoom, Ronald feels like he is bringing white students into his place of comfort since he is learning from home and it is just impossible to escape the discomfort.
With that background in mind, Ronald and other students have formed the Coalition of Black Organizers and Clubs (CBOC) at Emory University to build cohesion in the Black community and encourage the Black community to be there for themselves instead of relying on other organizations to speak up on their behalf. After the murders of George Floyd and others gained traction in the media, white student leaders sent out messages of solidarity but Black organizations were not responding in the same way. CBOC allows for organizations to be in contact with upper administration regularly. A letter to administration with Black student demands was written and gained over 1500 signatures from organizations and individuals. Modelling after Cornell Students for Black Lives, CBOC is compensating for not having a physical presence on campus and asks Emory to recognize the racial trauma their Black students endure even in a virtual setting.
Collectives of black students can be just as powerful at the graduate school level. 5% of lawyers are Black. But I refuse to allow that sad percentage to scare me away from success in law school. I believe the best way to learn how to persevere is to listen to the stories of those who come before us. One of my first mentors for the summer was Alex McCray, a 2011 grad of American University Washington College of Law (WCL). She encouraged me to reach out to WCL’s Black Student Law Association (BLSA). They are a force to be reckoned with on campus today, even in “Zoom Law School".
Daraja Carroll, a third year law student at WCL, is the WCL BLSA President with an interest in civil rights. She has been dedicated to BLSA from the beginning, consistently attending community service events, serving as Chief of Staff, and attending regional and national BLSA conventions. Daraja aims to focus on advocacy, raising money, and redistributing the wealth while leading BLSA this year. The organization was busy this summer with a successful virtual fundraiser of $3,000 for the NAACP Legal and Educational Defense Fund and WCL BLSA and the March on Washington on August 28.
“I think an affinity group is a collective unit of people who have a similar characteristic. [BLSA is] a safe place where black students can go for everything and anything.” -Daraja Carroll
During quarantine and Zoom classes, Daraja believes that affinity groups are especially important because of how COVID-19 disproportionately impacts the Black community. At a university where 5 out of 80-100 students are Black, it is important to have a home at school during a time when people’s families and childhood homes are changing due to COVID. While WCL Black Law Student Association is actively adapting to virtual learning, there is still a general feeling that Black students are not getting the attention they deserve from the university.
For example, BLSA does not have financial support from the university due to the economic impact of the pandemic. Now, the organization is trying to exist with no money on top of being a part of an elitist space that is predominately white. Additionally, the generational disconnect between the administration and Black students is more evident during the pandemic and virtual setting. When racially offensive tweets by student leaders were uncovered, the administration was slow to speak and it was painful for students, even for me as an incoming student, considering the protests across the country against racial injustices. Even though the protests were very visible on social media, that does not matter if an administration refuses to look at social media and relies solely on students to bring up the issues.
WCL BLSA capitalized on the silence to effectively be an organization that champions Black students. The executive board used Groupme to get general body members’ opinions on the slow reaction of WCL to craft a letter addressed to the top deans asking for a stronger standard of acceptable conduct for the entire WCl community. Now, the executive board regularly meets with deans and we've seen an improvement in how racial bias incidents are reported coming out of those meetings.
I felt prepared for virtual law school because I saw the advocacy of WCL BLSA on behalf of students like me even though I had not stepped on campus yet, and wouldn’t be able to until the spring. I was further able to overcome my mental blocks because of Black female lawyers, like Dionne Lindsay (American University Washington College of Law Class of 2018), who encouraged me to achieve any goal I want in spite of 5% of lawyers being Black women. If groups like CBOC and BLSA did not exist, Black students would be at a disadvantage during the pandemic, not to mention the disparate health impact making it easier for us to be ignored. Mentorship and safe spaces should be prioritized by university administrations, not just the students who seek them out. Creating a support system in academia is invaluable for Black students. And that idea is even more true in this crazy world of racism and health pandemics. I am so glad I could step back this summer and recognize this to build up my mental arsenal for the school year ahead of me.
*Also See Imani's Piece Published at Black Youth Project
