Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, May 18, 1990 TAG: 9005180202
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: PATRICIA LOPEZ BADEN EDUCATION WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
By this fall, Dyke said, he expects universities to submit plans "to ensure that their campuses are communities of civility, where blacks, Jews, whites and Asians can live together without being victimized by racist or anti-Semitic conduct, where women can walk across campus in security."
Speaking at a forum sponsored by Roanoke College in Salem, Dyke said he wants administrators to send a clear message that "severe disciplinary action awaits those who engage in harmful conduct such as sexual harassment, date rape, or drug and alcohol abuse."
Dyke said that the general increase in what he termed "student incivility" is troubling.
"If a general and liberal arts program means anything at all, it means learning to value all human beings," he said. "To accept that some persons on our campuses are being ill treated means we are failing in our mission."
Dyke said incidents of sexual and racial harassment and anti-Semitic tension have already cropped up on several Virginia campuses.
In November, racial tension erupted on the Virginia Tech campus after students there learned that some white fraternity pledges were told to have pictures taken of themselves kissing black women.
Tech has since begun exploring the possibility of a multicultural course requirement.
Dyke said that public policy makers "must stand up now and say `No more.' We need to make it clear that such conduct is unacceptable and intolerable."
Dyke vowed that he will ask the state Council of Higher Education to work with both public and private universities to address reports of rising racial and ethnic tensions on campus, and how to deal with increased reports of sexual harassment and rising drug and alcohol abuse.
He said that creating greater racial harmony and promoting a global curriculum go hand-in-hand.
"Our lives are intricately related to those living in other nations, other cultures," he said, "and we must show our students how world affairs have a direct impact on the quality of economic and political life in the commonwealth and the nation."
For that reason, he said, he wants state colleges and universities to prepare a thorough review of their entire undergraduate and graduate curriculums with a global perspective.
By this fall, he said, "I expect detailed reports on how they plan to develop such reviews."
Dyke also said that colleges must do a better job of recruiting and retaining minority and female faculty members.
by CNB