Race-Consciousness in Higher Education

Race-evasive discourse is the most insidious as it uses terms like “underrepresented” or “diverse” to broadly reference racially minoritized groups, but stays abstract in ways that the policy amendments proposed do nothing to explicitly benefit or support communities of color (Felix & Trinidad, 2020). In this way, race-evasive discourse seeks to minimize race-specific discussions or use veiled descriptors to discuss policy problems and potential legislation that is “well-intended” to support “diverse students,” yet still maintain and reproduce racialized stratification and inequitable practices.

Victor Ray’s (2019) work came to me when I was struggling to understand how well-intentioned, race-conscious, equity-oriented individuals gave their time, energy, and effort to dismantle racialized organizational barriers, only to see their efforts delayed, diluted, or derailed. Like Sisyphus, equity advocates woke up each morning, headed to campus, and pushed the boulder up the hill towards more racially just institutions, just to have it roll back down. Rather than focus on the individual and the practices developed to instigate change, a theory of racialized organizations help to understand longstanding organizational routines, process, and structures that diminish agency, legitimizes unequal distribution of resources, and ultimately veils the root-causes of inequities experienced in the community college context. 

Race-consciousness within higher education is mindset that a) acknowledges the racialized nature of higher education (McCambly & Colyvas, 2022), b) uses explicit language that prioritizes racially minoritized communities (Felix & Trinidad, 2020), c) develops strategies addressing root-causes of racial inequity experienced by students (Jones & Nichols, 2020), and d) redirects material resources to the areas and groups with the greatest need (Bensimon, 2018).