Editorial: UNC trustees did their job and did the right thing

Thursday, July 1, 2021 -- On a 9-4 vote the UNC-Chapel Hill trustees did their duty and decided on the request to grant tenure to Nikole Hannah-Jones. It was their responsibility to do the right thing. They did that by granting Hannah-Jones' tenure request.

Posted 9:00 a.m. Jul 1, 2021 — Updated 12:32 p.m. Jul 1, 2021

CBC Editorial: Thursday, July 1, 2021; Editorial #8681

The following is the opinion of Capitol Broadcasting Company.

On the last day of June. In the closing hours of the day, the currently composed University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Board of Trustees fulfilled their duty.

On a 9-4 vote (see roll call below), the trustees did their job and decided on the request to grant tenure to Nikole Hannah-Jones, who has been hired to be the Knight Chair in Race and Investigative Journalism at the Hussman School of Journalism and Media.

It was their duty to vote on the tenure request. They did it.

It was their responsibility to do the right thing. They did that by granting Hannah-Jones’ tenure request.

“At our worst moments we forced people to go across the low stone walls that surround our campus to speak,” said Trustee Gene Davis, who chaired Wednesday’s meeting, after the tenure vote was taken.

“And at our best moments we have invited the world’s leading thinkers, conservative and liberal people alike, to our campus and said: ‘Here’s the podium, we may or may not agree with you, but we want to hear what you have to say.’. We are open to ideas. We want to learn together. And that is exactly what a university is. A place for diverse ideas and viewpoints. A place for open inquiry and a place for civil, constructive disagreement. Our university is not a place to cancel people or ideas.”

By nearly any measure, what became one of the most visible, controversial and contentious matters in American education should have been a matter of routine. This tenure decision was not.

It put the state’s flagship public university in an unwelcome spotlight and exposed increased politicization of the University of North Carolina System and its constituent campuses.

This was a largely manufactured controversy after the Knight Chair was shifted from digital advertising and marketing to race and investigative reporting. It was done with the knowledge and approval of the chair’s donor, the Knight Foundation.

By most measures and criteria Hannah-Jones holds similar qualifications and experience as previous Knight Chairs at the journalism school who’d been hired and given tenure. She is a renowned journalist whose work earned her nearly every top professional award as well as a MacArthur genius fellowship.

But here’s the critical differences:

She’d been the creative force behind the 1619 project – a Pulitzer Prize-winning effort by The New York Times that “aims to reframe the country’s history by placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of black Americans at the very center of our national narrative.” Its focus on the impact and legacy of slavery on the nation’s founding and subsequent history, stirred outrage from some factions – particularly those who continue to embrace the false Jim Crow-era narratives about race and the Civil War that were used to perpetuate racial segregation and linger to this day, particularly in the South.
She is Black and plain spoken.

The approval of tenure is an impediment that has been overcome. As Hannah-Jones should know well from both her work as a journalist and experience in life, it is just a battle and she has the opportunity to make those doubters – even those who might also be prejudiced – see the error of their pre-judgment and offer them enlightenment and a broader view.

She must take this job. Each day she’s in the classroom, each interaction with her students and fellow academics, is a chance to further enhance the university’s reputation for higher education excellence and freedom of thought.

Those who seem bent on limiting intellectual inquiry at our public universities will be further thwarted as she gives her students -- regardless of who they are – opportunities to exchange ideas, open themselves to a variety of perspectives and challenge conventional thought with civil dialogue.

After the tenure vote, Hussman School Dean Susan King praised the “Carolina community … who have stood by our school, the centrality of journalism to democracy, the ideals of the University and to Hannah-Jones herself. This outpouring of support has reinforced the very principles of the nation’s first public university.”

But it is the comments from trustee Davis that should be enshrined as a lesson-learned from this unnecessary episode.

“Our motto is ‘Lux et Libertas,’ light and liberty. We remain committed to being a light shining brightly on the hill. We embrace and endorse academic freedom, open and rigorous debate and scholarly inquiry, constructive disagreement. … Light and Liberty. Academic freedom. These bedrock principles allow our elite faculty to address the world’s most pressing problems.”

The UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees voted 9-4 to grant a tenured faculty position to Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones.

How the UNC-Chapel Hill trustees voted on granting Nikole Hannah-Jones tenure:

FOR: Richard Stevens, chair (term expires June 30, 2021); Gene Davis, vice chair (term expires 2023); Teresa Neal, secretary (term expires 2023); Jeff Brown (term expires June 30, 2021); Munroe Cobey (term expires June 30, 2021); Chuck Duckett (term expires June 30, 2021); Kelly Hopkins (term expires June 30, 2021); Ralph Meekins (term expires 2023); Lamar Richards (Student Body President 2021-22).

AGAINST: David Bolick (term expires 2023); Haywood Cochrane (term expires June 30, 2021); Allie Ray McCullen (term expires 2023); John Preyer (term expires 2023).

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