Missing: UMass Boston's Restorative Justice Commission
Please come back. We need you!
On his first day in office, our Provost announced the creation of the Restorative Justice Commission (RJC) as part of our dedication to social justice and equity.
The RJC became a fixture in our administration’s communications, and it was clear that it was destined for big things.
In the beginning, the university declared an initiative for restorative justice in academic dishonesty. When the RJC found out no one understood what it meant and needed guidance, they went out of their way to explain. They even explained that shaming a student in front of the whole class is actually a form of restorative justice. It was true because they said so.
It felt good. We felt cozy, safe and protected. We knew there was someone there to guide us on our shared journey towards social justice, inclusion and equity. Someone was there to show us how to eradicate all forms of discrimination, oppression, and racism that dominated every aspect of our lives… including punitive measures against students who cheated.
However, it soon became clear that re-imagining academic dishonesty was not sufficient, as we still had too much freedom and independence were still walking around unsupervised; you wouldn’t let a toddler walk to school alone, would you? Our Provost, in his infinite wisdom, reminded us again and again (and then again and again) that anti-racism work requires us to dedicate each and every aspect of our being to restorative justice and equity. Accordingly, over time the commission grew in scope and had unlimited power to force its will guide the entire campus in every aspect of academic life. It could mandate/encourage/kindly ask for anti-racism training, redistribute the budget to reflect our commitment to restorative justice, restructure the curriculum to better indoctrinate educate students, hire and promote faculty based on their commitment to DEI, control inform our teaching and pedagogy and more. They were EVERYWHERE - a panopticon was watching you, listening to you and controlling your life at the university and maybe beyond, who knows? Who were they accountable to? No one knew.
But we knew it was all good. It was necessary. We STEMmers were still struggling to transition from scientists into the full-fledged and full-time social justice and anti-racism activists. We even launched a misguided pushback effort. It was obvious that we needed more guidance as we were taking our baby steps towards complete dedication to anti-racism. We were so lucky to have the equivalence of Kendi’s suggested department of antiracism on our campus, ready to bestow its benevolence and wisdom upon us.
But then, one day… POOF! It was gone. Just like it appeared, the RJC simply disappeared off the face of the earth without warning. It is no longer mentioned by our Leaders, and not a trace of it can be found on our website (although it may be just because our website sucks), and it is no longer a regular part of our campus updates. It’s as if it has never existed.
We feel lost. Empty. Abandoned. Forsaken. Even Orphaned. Who will give us his stern yet warm, sympathetic and forgiving look when we want to penalize a student for cheating? Who will be there to censure us when we inadvertently revert to our old habits and use the scientific method?
Did our Supreme Leaders quietly backpedal? Is it because we were such bad kids and the RJC members simply gave up on us? Whatever the reason is, we ask you: Please come back. We’ll try to do better, or in the words of the Provost from his unforgettable Fall 2021 convocation speech: We will continue to work harder, accomplish more, and become the opponents of whiteness, racism and anti-blackness that continue to dominate our society and our institutions of higher education.
But we can’t do it without you. Besides, if you go - what are we going to write about here at the Flickering Beacon?
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