Universities confront bias with programs

National Catholic Reporter, March 29, 1996 by Gustav Spohn

At Fairfield, the number of both Hispanic and Asian students increased more than sixfold from 1984-94, while African-American enrollment doubled but remains relatively low at 1.6 percent Currently, almost 10 percent of the 2,900 students at Fairfield are AHANA students.

Minority students comprised about 12 percent of the freshman class at San Diego University in the late 1980s, but that figure is now up to about 30 percent, with high numbers of Hispanics.

The University of Detroit has an African-American enrollment of about 30 percent.

The association in Washington also identified 15 Catholic institutions where the total number of Hispanic and African-American students nearly equaled that of Caucasian students.

The idea of multiculturalism and its attendant spinoffs in the admissions office and classroom are not universally applauded. Gertrude Himmelfarb, writing in the January issue of First Things, the journal of religion and pubic life edited by conservative Catholic priest and scholar Richard Neuhaus, called race, class and gender "the Holy Trinity presiding over higher education in America."

In an article titled "The Christian University: A Call to Counterrevolution," Himmelfarb criticized the modem university for being "highly politicized" and "at the mercy of the whims and wills of interest groups and ideologies."

"This new identity-centered education," Himmelfarb wrote, "is evident not only in departments and courses of women's studies, black studies, ethnic studies, gay and lesbian studies, but in more traditional disciplines as well."

Himmelfarb joins a chorus of critics, and even strong supporters of multiculturalism are sympathetic to some of their complaints.

Jesuit Fr. Gregory Chisholm, who teaches mechanical engineering at the University of Detroit Mercy and was a keynote speaker at the Fairfield conference, is among advocates of multiculturalism who reject any suggestion that they are simply responding to pressure from the left or trying to be "politically correct." Rather, they contend, they are following Catholic social teaching.

Chisholm acknowledges that it is possible to "rush pell-mell into the issue of diversity" if numbers and "random groups of people" rather than community, are the focus. "Nevertheless," said Chisholm, "I think our university realizes that it takes courage to foster an environment (for) groups of people who themselves have a history -- they're not just random groups, they have a history, they have traditions, they have bodies of literature, they have culture. It takes courage to foster the presence of such a group and the integrity of such a group."

He insists it is faith, not politics, that must be at the core of attempts to foster multiculturalism and diversity on Catholic campuses. "If faith is not an issue, for blacks, if faith is not an issue for gays and lesbians, then, we are doing nothing special, we are doing nothing particularly Catholic," he said. "And I am very concerned that we do something, Catholic."

Donald J. McGraw, associate provost at San Diego University, said, "If it was politically correct to have done what we did, so be it. The nature of Catholicism is such that you would normally work along these lines."