The Harsh Reality of Discrimination at Penn

Posted bypenndisorientationguidePosted inImpact on Students and Staff - 2023Tags:, , ,

by Anonymous

Note: this article has not been updated since 2022

Most people entering Penn for the first time think they are joining one of the country’s most liberal campuses. Penn loves to proclaim just that: their admissions page has an entire section dedicated to diversity, and they repeatedly tout equality as an integral part of their community. However, this is far from the everyday reality faced by minority students. Underneath Penn’s progressive facade is an old-fashioned administration that upholds the bigoted values of many students and faculty. 

Racial Profiling and Segregation

Penn is one of America’s oldest PWIs (predominantly white institutions), and the effect of this racial disparity is felt through the prejudice expressed by faculty and students alike. Several Black Penn students have detailed negative, racially charged interactions with professors. In 2020, two black Penn graduates from Classes of 2016 and 2018 reported being pressured by professors in the Chemistry Department to drop courses and take easier alternatives. The effect was devastating: both struggled to perform well at Penn after the fact, and one student ended up developing severe test anxiety and depression that lasted for years. According to another Black student in 2021, this is an experience that continues today, and has convinced some Black students to avoid majoring in Chemistry or give up being pre-med. The university response has been disappointing, to say the least. No official statement has been made by Penn administration, and, besides an apology to one of the students, the Chem Department formed a Committee on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) that has nearly all white members and so far has hosted only 2 events.

Professors are emboldened to declare these statements openly and directly to their students because they know that the administration will be slow to react, if at all. An extreme example of this is Penn Law professor Amy Wax. Wax has made national headlines for her many racist comments about Black and Asian people, questioning their intelligence and academic merit as students at Penn Law. Although her bigoted remarks first made the news in 2018, Wax has worked at Penn for more than 20 years. In spite of a petition from Penn Law students for action against Wax, as well as a letter from Philadelphia City Council pleading for an investigation into her conduct, the school has not fired Wax, as she is protected by tenure. Instead, she has been transferred to teaching elective rather than mandatory courses and only recently faced a formal review in 2022. This review is still ongoing, despite a long history of racist comments and complaints from students dating back to at least 2017.

Greek organizations are another example of on-campus prejudice lacking direct institutional response. As one Daily Pennsylvanian columnist describes, the party scene at Penn is racially segregated. When Black and brown groups of students arrive at parties hosted by predominantly white frats, they are told to “take a lap” while white students are easily let in. POC students that arrive with a group of white students, on the other hand, are more easily able to gain entry. This happens so often that it is clear that these Greek organizations simply don’t want to admit Black and brown people into their parties. At Penn, where Greek life is central to the party scene, bigotry at this level becomes a significant roadblock to the happiness of Black and brown students. If POC students want access to parties without worrying about racism, they are forced to attend parties hosted by Black fraternities or travel over 30 minutes away to parties at Temple and Drexel University where this type of prejudice is less common. Even incidents that don’t take place at Greek houses may be connected to fraternity and sorority culture–in 2019, a white woman yelled “I love Donald Trump” and “Build a wall” several times at a Mexican student in Huntsman Hall. This woman was likely being hazed as part of entry to a sorority, since she was being filmed and followed by a group of women, one of whom was wearing a shirt from the Kappa Alpha Theta sorority.

Sometimes, this racial bias escalates to violence. In 2021, a South American student was physically assaulted by a member of the Castle fraternity at one of the frat’s parties. The victim had previously argued with his attacker about the latter’s racist comments about South Africa. When the assault occurred, several Castle brothers watched without intervening; only after the student fell unconscious did they decide to carry him out. The attack prompted a wave of protests from students, with demands to move Castle off-campus and turn their house into space for the cultural centers on campus. The university, however, remained noticeably silent on this issue and didn’t meet any demands. The student has yet to be punished by the university, and Castle remains a fixture on Locust Walk, a constant reminder to POC students walking around campus of the university’s disregard for the lives of its non-white students. 

Note to web: insert photos from Castle protest here

Even when Black and brown fraternities choose to host their own parties, they still can’t escape racism. In 2022, Black students were egged as they tried to enter a Black-hosted party. Racial and homophobic slurs were directed at attendees throughout the event. Police were present at the house when these incidents occurred, presumably to provide protection, but they didn’t intervene or investigate at all. In fact, the party was shut down early by police due to noise complaints from neighbors. One victim reported eggs being thrown from a neighboring house, thus the complaints could have very likely come from the assailants. On the same night, Penn Glee Club, which is predominantly white, hosted a party. But when police arrived due to noise complaints, they were weak in enforcing the warning and even joined in karaoke with the students.

 The inadequate police response to vandalism at the Black party is just one example of Penn police’s long history of mistreating the Black community. Penn police are also guilty of overpolicing and racially profiling Black students. A member of the UMOJA board explained that Black student parties at Penn “have a long history of being shut down or just cut short”, usually because neighbors call the police. Police officers are found all over Penn’s campus: while this may lead people to believe the campus is safer because of it, Black students experience a different reality. One Black student, Ernest Owens, described being stopped while wearing a Penn shirt by a police officer who patted him down, demanded his name and ID, searched the paper bag of food he was carrying, and followed him to his college house, watching him as he entered the building. Other Black students and alumni have also been stopped and frisked on Penn’s campus at a rate much higher than that of their white counterparts. Sometimes the justification given by police is that their searches are prompted by reports of criminal activity in the area. However, Penn sends out crime alerts frequently, ranging from violent crime to suspicious activity. If being Black is all it takes for police to feel justified in harassing Black people, then Black students at Penn will never get to experience peace.

Rampant Accessibility Issues

Penn’s administration neglects the needs of its disabled students. Issues are found throughout every step of setting up testing accommodations, all stemming from poor communication and lax effort on the part of Weingarten Center’s Students with Disability Services.

There are several barriers to getting approved for accommodations. One student was required to undergo an additional psychological evaluation before being approved for accommodations, despite providing official documents of their ADHD diagnosis. This evaluation took several days and cost the student thousands of dollars out of pocket. Requiring additional medical evaluations and multiple appointments with Disability Specialists before approving accommodations discourages many students from seeking help that they may need to do well academically at Penn.

 Setting up accommodations is often a tedious process. In 2021, the Disability Services’ testing center in Biotech Commons was closed for several weeks due to construction. The alternative locations provided for exam accommodations were noisy and small, in comparison to the quiet, spacious rooms that are supposed to be provided to students taking the unaccommodated exam. Sometimes it takes several weeks or months to receive accommodations after being approved (one student reported waiting seven months). Not to mention, students and proctors are often given inaccurate information about accommodations, leading to discrepancies between expectation and reality for disabled students’ testing experiences. One student, Ellie McKeown, was initially told she could take her midterm virtually since she has Ehlers-Dans syndrome and could damage her hand from writing. To her surprise, she was abruptly informed on exam day that she had to test on paper, forcing her to use her own arthritis gloves and endure severe pain, and potentially permanent damage, in the process. She was able to take her next three exams virtually, but only after waiting up to half an hour to receive a computer. Her experience with Weingarten is emblematic of the deep-set communication issues within Weingarten. Many other disabled students have had issues with getting a response back from SDS: repeated phone calls and emails will be received with silence for weeks, if there is any reply at all.

Accessibility is also a major problem in on-campus buildings. Many buildings have accessible entrances or elevators, but they often require a security guard to open from inside, forcing students to wait for someone to open the entrance or to use inaccessible stairs. The automatic door touchpads for some entrances don’t work, and Penn is slow to repair them. Moreover, these entrances and elevators tend to be hard to find and are reached by a much longer route than the path needed to find an inaccessible entrance, which is worsened by the narrow time frame between classes and thus essentially defeats the purpose of an accessible entrance or elevator. Penn also offers an accessible transit system, but the buses are usually 20 minutes late on average, even when scheduled far ahead of time.

Penn dorms also suffer from accessibility issues. As Penn is an older campus, many residential buildings such as Du Bois, Gregory, and Stouffer, have limited elevator access or no elevators at all. The Quad (a popular set of three freshman-only college houses on campus) is largely inaccessible due to its complex organization of floors and stairs. Laundry rooms are usually in the basement, forcing disabled residents to seek off-campus resources or outside help just to do laundry every week. Despite constant construction going on at Penn, accessible ramps are rarely renovated: the oldest ones have potholes and most are made of uneven stone, creating a bumpy experience for wheelchair users.

Sexism, Sexual Violence, and Rape Culture

Sexual harassment, especially of women and transgender, genderqueer, and nonconforming (TGQN) students, is prevalent on Penn’s campus. A 2019 report on campus climate at Penn found that 25.9% of women and 21.5% of TGQN students experienced unwanted sexual contact since entering Penn (compared to 7.3% men), and 30.8% of women and 43.9% of TGQN students reported sexual harassment that interfered with academic performance or created a hostileenvironment (compared to 11.8% of men). Actual percentages of sexual harassment and other forms of sexual violence are likely much higher, since these incidents often go unreported. Only 51.2% of women and 42.1% of TGQN students (compared to 73.5% of men) thought a sexual misconduct report would be taken seriously by campus officials, and 38.6% of women and 21.8% of TGQN students (compared to 53.2% men) thought campus officials would conduct a sexual misconduct investigation fairly. Evidently, Penn students don’t feel confident that the administration will address sexual violence on our campus.

The results of this report haven’t changed much since the survey was given in 2015. One Daily Pennsylvanian writer noted in 2018 that after just a few weeks at Penn, most of the women she met had experienced sexual harassment or assault. Many of these experiences happened at frat parties, including being groped or kissed without permission. 

Sexism, sexual harassment and rape culture are endemic to Greek life. In 2016, a sexually explicit email was sent to freshman women at Penn that attempted to sexually coerce them for the senders’ upcoming frat party (urging them to drink alcohol and wear tight clothes in anticipation of hooking up with the frat brothers, and criticizing women who are “teases”). The frat brothers guarding the door of their Greek house frequently judge women partygoers on their attractiveness and the nature of their clothes (assuming, for instance, that tight clothing is a sign of their desire to hook up) to determine their entry. They view the women that attend these events as mere sexual objects for their own enjoyment.

Sexual violence from faculty, especially professors, is also a significant issue. Students at Penn have horror stories of being sexually harassed by their professors, often men. These professors will invite them to office hours under the guise of offering extra academic help and instead make unwanted sexual advances. Some men teaching at Penn brazenly make inappropriate comments about women’s intelligence and inferiority. Despite having a long history of doing so and several instances of being reported, these faculty usually receive little to no repercussions from administration. In fact, sometimes the student victims will be the ones punished by the university. In 2021, a student, April Ploeger, sued Penn after being sexually harassed by the director of Penn’s Counseling and Psychological Services and took a leave of absence. When she tried to re-enroll, she was rejected and in her second attempt was charged thousands of dollars in re-enrollment fees.

An Undercurrent of Queerphobia

Although Penn is recognized in the news as being one of the friendliest colleges for LGBTQIA2S+ students, the reality on campus is much different.

Greek life, as discussed previously, is still quite backwards in its beliefs. Testimonies from queer students who rushed in 2017 reveal that homophobia pervades fraternities and sororities. Six years later, not much has changed. The use of homophobic slurs (like calling people “gay” as an insult) is still common in fraternities. With customs like girl’s rush and boy’s rush, or sorority members being pressured to present themselves in conventionally feminine ways, and fraternity and sorority interactions that emphasize dating and hooking up in straight couples, it is clear that the rush process, and Greek life at large, is inherently built for cisheterosexual people. Those who don’t fit into those norms, which often means the TGQN students and other members of the LGBTQIA2S+ community, are pushed out. And even if they don’t want to rush, the effects of this prejudice is still felt at a school like Penn where Greek life is so deeply embedded into the social scene here.

In 2021, Lia Thomas, a trans woman and competitive swimmer for Penn’s women’s swimming and diving team, faced transphobic attacks after setting new records. Not only did conservative news companies, in addition to millions of people online, vilify her for being a transfeminine athlete, but her own teammates joined the mob as well. Two of her peers went to a media company to oppose her participation by accusing her of having an unfair advantage. After USA Swimming enacted a national policy change that worsened eligibility restrictions for trans athletes, sixteen of her teammates published a letter to the Ivy League praising the policy, using transphobic rhetoric that referenced “biology” to push forward accusations of Lia having an advantage. At a time when Lia was facing backlash from all over, her own team failed to have her back. Meanwhile, Penn’s administration stood silent, neglecting to release any statement when Lia was being targeted by these transphobes. 

Unfortunately, the members of the Penn swimming and diving team hold bigoted beliefs that are shared by many others in the Penn student community. One genderqueer student described being harassed by a worker at Joe’s Cafe about their gender identity. They reported the incident to the cafe manager and despite being promised that the matter would be investigated, the cafe never reached out. Another student was called a homophobic slur while walking to class, just for wearing baggy clothing. Despite Penn’s liberal facade, the reality while walking around campus is that students who are trans, nonbinary, gender-nonconforming, queer, or even just presenting in a way that is unconventional don’t feel fully comfortable or safe on campus. They are in constant fear of being stared at, harassed, or attacked for the way they present.

Besides its neglect of Lia, Penn’s administration has also failed its trans students with its gender-neutral bathrooms. For cisgender students, choosing what bathroom to use is simple. For TGQN students, however, this is usually a stressful decision, where they may have to choose between a bathroom that aligns with their gender but carries a higher risk of being harassed, misgendered, or kicked out, or a bathroom that is a safer choice but causes them anxiety and depression because it doesn’t fit their gender. That’s why gender-neutral bathrooms are important for TGQN students to make using the restroom safer and less stressful, which is especially important at a time when trans people are facing heightened scrutiny. As of 2022, several years since the university first started constructing all-gender bathrooms, less than half of the buildings on campus (79 out of over 180 buildings) have gender-neutral bathrooms. For example, Houston Hall and Class of 1920 Commons, arguably the two most popular dining halls for Penn students, don’t have any all-gender bathrooms. Even when a building does have a gender-neutral bathroom, there is usually only one for the whole building, and it is often inaccessible a. Take the Chemistry Building, for example. Despite taking up over 270,000 square feet, (that’s more than 4 football fields of space) and being the site for nearly all chemistry and biochemistry recitations, laboratory courses, and lectures, it only has 1 gender-neutral bathroom. David Rittenhouse Laboratory, a popular building for hosting classes for math and physics courses, has over 240,000 square feet, also has a single all-gender bathroom that is on the highest floor). For TGQN students, the simple task of going to the bathroom during class becomes a nearly impossible logistic problem. It becomes all the more difficult for trans, nonbinary, and gender-nonconforming to succeed in Penn’s already rigorous academic environment when going to the bathroom is this hard.

What Now?

Undoubtedly, it is impossible for me to give you an exact description of what you might face as a POC, woman, disabled student, and/or LGBTQIA2S+ student at Penn. But, whether it is from personal experience, or stories shared by your friends, the systematic and widespread nature of discrimination means every one of us will be affected by the bigotry at Penn at some point. However, there are many students and faculty at Penn who are working tirelessly to fight against prejudice at Penn. A selection of minority organizations and centers at Penn that are dedicated to this cause are listed below. I encourage you to join them and support them in whatever way you can. There are also plenty of cultural clubs (listed under the “Cultural” tab on Penn Clubs) that offer spaces for students from minority backgrounds to celebrate their culture.

By reading this article, I hope you are able to enter Penn more prepared for the reality you might face here, and thus be better able to challenge the prejudiced traditions and values here that allow this bigotry to continue.

Centers:

Organizations:

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