Open Letter to UBC from project 1907 + Vancouver Asian Film Festival
Jun 17, 2020
Mr. Lindsay Gordon, Chancellor, UBC
Mr. Santa J. Ono, President and Vice-Chancellor, UBC
UBC Board of Governors
UBC Senate
Dear Mr. Gordon, Mr. Ono, the Board of Governors and Senate,
We write to you as Asian Canadian community members and organizers of Elimin8hate, a campaign formed in response to the surge in racist attacks and anti-Asian hate crimes linked to COVID-19. Moved to action by our own lived experiences of racism, including escalated levels of hate, violence and vitriol throughout the pandemic, Project 1907 and Vancouver Asian Film Festival developed a community-based reporting tool to track incidents of anti-Asian racism experienced by people in Canada. We received 128 reports of racism between April 23 and May 18, 2020 and continue to receive reports.
Over the last several weeks, there has been a global uprising of people protesting the murder of our Black brothers and sisters by police officers. As the world wakes up to white supremacy, this is a critical moment for UBC to interrogate its own history of colonization, systemic oppression and complicity in anti-Black racism. We must acknowledge that Black and Indigenous communities face distinct and often extreme violent struggles against institutional discrimination.
Our society, including the UBC community, is being traumatized by the systemic, institutional racism that pervades the structures that govern and rule us. This requires that UBC urgently take action to dismantle its oppressive structures and systems. Condemning and denouncing incidents of racism is not enough. We call on UBC to:
Collect race-based data on the University’s student body and fulfill its obligation as British Columbia’s leading research University. Data should be collected on an ongoing basis as a means of uncovering inequities, understanding the unique needs of racialized groups and removing barriers to participation.
Undertake a leadership role in collecting data on racist violence and the impacts of racism on Black, Indigenous, Asian and other People of Colour, including differential health impacts. Data must be co-owned by, and collected in partnership with, community organizations as a form of accountability and to prevent objectification or weaponization of data.
Adopt a mandatory anti-racism education requirement for all University students. This should include the history of the University including, for example, its role in training many policymakers and administrators who operated the Indian Residential School system, as well as the expulsion of Japanese Canadian students from the University during World War II, among other injustices. Every UBC graduate should be educated on white supremacy, colonization and anti-racism.
Allocate new resources to the Black Caucus, Indigenous Strategic Plan and Asian Canadian Community Engagement Group. Equitably compensate and recognize students, staff and faculty for their work and emotional labour.
Convene an independent committee made up of IBPOC-led community organizations and external partners to conduct annual, publicly accessible audits of UBC’s progress on its commitments to anti-racism. Transparent, external evaluations will ensure that the University remains accountable to its commitments and that sufficient resources are consistently allocated to achieve all goals.
A failure to address equity issues at the University is to perpetuate systemic, institutional racism and be complicit in bringing IBPOC into harmful spaces. No institution should operate in a way in which its practices benefit some individuals while harming others.
We, the undersigned, call upon the Chancellor, the President, the Board of Governors and Senate to fulfil their obligations to their community.
Sincerely,
Project 1907
Vancouver Asian Film Festival