30 September 2016

Kansas State University,

The students of the American Ethnic Studies Student Association recognize that Kansas State
University is an institution that supports the continued marginalization, exploitation and
silencing of historically oppressed groups. The recent blackface incident is not an isolated
episode of one racist gone wild, but rather a symptom of the global disease of racism. However,
not all racists necessarily wear blackface. Although this blackface incident is deplorable, this
incident has only one small difference from the daily racism we experience in classes, in student
organizations, on committees, during meetings, at work, in the grocery store, and on the streets
and that is that this incident has been visible and in the media.
As a response to the media, Kansas State University has added insult to injury by wrongly
insinuating that they expelled Paige Shoemaker, when she was not a student at the time of the
incident. The media has misrepresented the story and Kansas State University has failed to
officially clarify. This is of no surprise, because KSU has been determined to put the fire out as
we have witnessed the institution double down on its strategy of paying lip service to diversity
while tokenizing and continually marginalizing people of color.
We demand a true commitment to anti-racism in 2016. We should not and will not wait until
2025 to be seen as human. We should not be forced to be in the same classroom with people
who view us as less than human, and that requires cultural education. We demand that this
university institute a diversity overlay requirement in every college that requires students take a
course in the American Ethnic Studies department in order to graduate. The language of
diversity has obfuscated the real need for a commitment to faculty of color. This institution
cannot continue to claim a commitment to diversity when have failed to retain and increase
faculty of color. Students have expressed a need for cultural competency, and yet the American
Ethnic Studies department remains the smallest department on campus with only two tenured
professors. American Ethnic Studies professors are teachers of color teaching courses on
communities of color. In this sense, cultural competency courses already exist and yet Kansas
State University continues to exclude this department from our core curriculum. Students of
color are required to learn about white culture every single day in order to survive. We will not
accept no for an answer. We demand that American Ethnic Studies courses be added to the core
requirements for graduation for every student at Kansas State University by Fall of 2017.
We will not wait for 2025 for the development of a multicultural student center. Kansas State
University is the only big twelve school without a multicultural student center. Faculty of color
have worked incredibly hard to push for this center because they understand how much of a
difference it can make for students of color. However, what is lacking is an institutional backing
in terms of financing. We demand that Kansas State University fully fund the development of a
multicultural student center. If you are going to continue to claim our work as your own, then
pay us. We demand that Kansas State University show written commitment to start construction
of a multicultural student center by fall of 2017.
 30 September 2016

The KSU Black Student Union hosted a meeting the night that the snapchat blackface incident
occurred, and many students of color broke down in tears because they must shoulder the
burdens of racism every day. This can no longer be a problem for students of color alone to
bear. We cannot wait any longer. We demand true diversity in 2016.

Sincerely,
American Ethnic Studies Student Association
Alonso Pena, President

Asia Upton, Vice-President

Kia Harris, Communications

Kowan Russell, Historian

Lyssa Peralta, Secretary

Lani Sandoval, Public Relations