Anna Lee Mraz Bartra Peninsula 360 Press [P360P].
Mills College, a very prestigious women's liberal arts college with a 169-year history located in Oakland, California, will close to new students to possibly become a high school.
I have been fortunate to participate as a guest lecturer at Mills College's Research Justice at the Intersections (RJI) for a year now and, despite the pandemic and virtuality, it has been a profound and enriching experience.
Unfortunately, due to the economic burdens of the COVID-19 pandemic, structural changes in higher education, and declining enrollment, as well as Mills' budget shortfall, the college will no longer be accepting freshmen beginning fall 2021. This is a real shame.
It was founded in 1852. Mills College provided transformative learning opportunities for many people, broke barriers, forged connections and changed lives.
In recent years, women's colleges have suffered declining enrollment and several have had to close or become coeducational to survive. These colleges top the rankings for the most racially diverse student bodies, and several educate large numbers of low-income and first-generation students.
Mills, for example, has actively recruited students of color, especially those from surrounding areas such as Oakland, and has attempted to reduce tuition costs. Mills, in addition, has worked to provide a safe campus for transgender students.
The group I belong to focuses on interdisciplinary research at Mills College that fosters social justice-oriented research and innovative critical analysis.
RJI encourages scholars to consider new forms of knowledge production that challenge traditional research hierarchies, mobilize the leadership of those directly affected by the phenomena under investigation, and recognize and engage with subaltern forms of knowledge.
This group is just one example of Mills' mission: promoting women's leadership, advancing gender and racial equity, and fostering critical and creative thinking.
But major changes are coming. Mills must begin to move away from being a degree-granting college and become an Institute that sustains Mills' mission," said Mills College President Elizabeth Hillman. Mills College's "transformation" is a blow to fair and equitable education, as it will close to new students to become an institute.
The closing of universities like Mills is part of a crisis of values in the United States in general, manifested in the cruelty of the use of excessive violence towards certain specific groups - African Americans, Asian Americans, Native American Indians, women, people of the LGBTTTIQ+ community - as we saw with the murder of George Floyd, the massacre of Asian women in Atlanta, the indigenous women in Montana who continue to disappear.
Just when the recognition of ethnic diversity and the fight against white supremacism and machismo is more necessary than ever. Just when the best weapon and defense against racism and sexism is education; the closing of Mills College, as a center of educational specialization whose priority is social justice, does not contribute to the formation of a more just society. This loss is regrettable.
Today's news marks the end of an era in Mills College history. It is likely to provoke a variety of reactions and emotions in you, as it has in me," wrote Elizabeth Hillman.
The statement has produced a shock wave among students, teachers and my RJI colleagues. It is sad.
We are all devastated but the students are really hurting?
Said an associate professor of Ethnic Studies.
In the coming months, faculty, administrators, staff and others will discuss the future Mills Institute that will be grounded in the university's principles, prioritizing racial justice and the voices of women and people of color.
My participation in the Mills College program will come to an end this April 22, 2021: https://inside.mills.edu/academic-resources/grants-special-programs/research-justice-intersections/index.php
