Black women are dying in education, and America needs to do something about it!

The latest news of the resignation of Harvard President Dr. Claudine Gay, and the untimely suicide of Dr. Antoinette Candia-Bailey have shaken me to my core, and their experiences are all too relatable. Dr. Claudine Gray faced immense humiliation, bullying and public scrutiny for her handling of anti-semitism on campus and accusations of plagiarism in her academic work. Lincoln University of Missouri Vice President of Student Affairs, Dr. Antoinette Candia-Bailey committed suicide on Jan 8th, and cited the contentious and toxic relationship between her and her boss Dr. John Moseley which led to the continued deterioration of her mental health. I have spent the past few weeks reading LinkedIn articles and personal testimonies on social media from other Black women expressing feelings of sorrow, defeat, and acknowledgement of their own experiences with racism, sexism, and ableism in predominately white workplaces. Our struggles and suffering are as communal as our support — so when one Black woman suffers at the hands of white supremacy, we all do.

Higher Education’s exclusion of Black people isn’t anything new — -from student resistance movements in the 1960s as a way to demand Black centered curriculum, hire more Black staff and faculty, and admit more Black students into historically white colleges and universities. Today, we’re constantly being reminded of how these spaces were never intended to include us — from the Supreme Court’s end to race-based admission, the attack on DEI, and the continued told and untold stories from women like Dr. Claudine Gay and Dr. Antoninette Candia-Bailey.

Even in the face of blatant exclusion, Black women have always been at the forefront of resistant and social change — and much of our own liberation and self-sufficiency has been achieved through education. As a young Black woman to two working class parents, going to college was non-negotiable, and I can imagine for many young Black girls growing up, you had to shoulder the burden of being the family member who had to make it, or ascend into a different and higher social class. Higher education has often been conceptualized as a pathway towards social and economic mobility, while also simultaneously being a site of racial inequality and systemic oppression.