Demand Change at Carnegie Mellon University

This website is a centralized list of resources, petitions, and concrete actions being put forward by concerned students, alumni, faculty, and staff at Carnegie Mellon University. (Have something to include?)

"There is genuine desire across the institution to embrace a more inclusive and respectful climate, but desire without collective action is not the Carnegie Mellon way."
—Farnam Jahanian

Accountability

• New
  Official Progress Tracker
  Confronting Racism and Promoting Equity and Inclusion, an official progress tracker and update hub for commitments to concrete actions made by President Farnam Jahanian.

• Open Letter
  Hold Grenell Accountable, an open letter from the Roosevelt Institute at Carnegie Mellon, with the support of 30+ student organizations and 180+ students, calling for Senior IPS Fellow Richard Grenell to be held accountable for his actions. Community members are enouraged to email CMU administration with this pre-filled template and attach the above the letter attached in support of this effort. [Update 12/3: Read President Jahanian's message to the CMU community on the launch of the Commission on Academic Freedom and Freedom of Expression, reviewing and addressing some of the issues raised in the letter. This Tartan article provides additional context.]

• Progress Tracker
  SCS Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Progress Tracker, a student-run progress tracker for the asks from the open letter 'Towards Anti-Racist Change in SCS' sent to Dean Hebert and the SCS community, maintained by the SCS PhD Student Advisory Committee, Anti-racism working group.

• Anonymous Reporting
  ReportIt Anonymous Online Reporting Tool (Username: "tartans" Password: "plaid"), an official "independent, third party, anonymous reporting hotline service for Carnegie Mellon University" through which to report the conduct of student, faculty, and staff members. Save your tracking code and password to anonymously follow up with issues here.

• Petition
  Hold the CMU Student(s) who Vandalized The Fence Accountable, a petition to push administration to commit to holding accountable those responsible for the vandalization of the fence on the first day of classes during the Fall 2020 semester. [Update 9/2: In an email to the CMU community, President Jahanian confirmed that "At this point in time, we have not been able to determine the person(s) responsible, including whether that person is a member of the CMU community, but we are committed to pursuing all leads." This Tartan article provides additional context.]

Platforms

• Discussion Hub
  Join the 'Demand Change at CMU Slack', a university-wide discussion group to educate, organize, and seek change at CMU.

Resources

• incoming student resource
  Dis-Orientation Guide, a comprehensive, CMU-focused resource that aims "...to serve as an "alternative" orientation to CMU: these are the things that the university should tell you, but won't... This is our attempt to begin filling in the gaps; a nudge towards holding CMU accountable and working toward real change." Created by CMU Against ICE.

• Structural Racism and Police Violence Resources, submitted by a CMU professor with the following note: "The work of social and behavioral scientists is crucial in helping to dismantle mechanisms of discrimination, oppression, and violence and create a radically improved society. Here you’ll find a range of resources based on social and behavioral science for researchers, instructors, students, policymakers—as well as the general public— to help you educate, inform, research and learn."

• Higher Ed’s Toothless Response to the Killing of George Floyd, written by Dietrich Professors Jason England and Richard Purcell

• Evolving Resource
  Anti-Racism Resource Guide, begun by the CMU Graduate Student Assembly

• Evolving Resource
  CMU Testimonies: Racial Prejudice at Carnegie Mellon University

• Evolving Resource
  Resources to Support BLM, assembled by The Frame Gallery

• Evolving Resource
  Crowd-Sourced Audit of Policing Technology Development at Carnegie Mellon University

• Full Report of the CMU Task Force on Campus Climate, a 2019 report that, "make[s] specific recommendations to support a climate that is more diverse, inclusive, fair and respectful."

• Understanding the Barriers to Diversifying CMU Faculty and Recommendations for Improving Diversity: A Focus on Under-Represented Minority and Female Faculty, a 2018 report by Drs. Linda Babcock (Dietrich Professor, Social and Decision Sciences Department Head) and Rosalind Chow (Tepper Professor)

Actions

University-Wide Actions

• Open Petition
  Disrupt the Tech-Talent Pipeline! Tell Palantir #NoTechForICE, a petition calling on Palantir "to cancel its contracts with ICE and [calling] on all students to join us in withholding our talent from Palantir." For more, see CMU Against ICE.

• Open Petition
  Commit to All-Gender Equity at CMU, a "petition in support of trans, intersex, and nonbinary people at CMU," sponsored by TINA. [Update 8/21: Farnam's direct reply to the petition followed by TINA's public response.]

• Open Petition
  CMU: Confront Racist Policing in Our Community, sponsored by the Coalition Against Predictive Policing in Pittsburgh

• Open Petition
  Confronting Racial Prejudice at Carnegie Mellon University

• BOYCOTT
  Withhold Donations to CMU Until Action is Taken

• Strike
  CMU Unpaid Student Labor Strike

• Open Petition
  Achieve Racial Justice in Mental Health Care at CaPS, a "petition to CaPS to diversify hiring, strengthen diversity trainings, and provide accountability and transparency."

• Graduate Student Assembly's Response on Racism and Police Brutality

• Letter to the Editor: Coalition of graduate students and student organizations asks CMU to do more

• Editorial Board: University administration needs to take action

• Faculty Petition
  Concerned CMU Faculty & Staff - It's Time To Stand Up!

• Fundraiser
  Carnegie Mellon Students for Black Lives Matter, a fundraiser for "10 organizations that are doing work to serve and uplift the Black community of Pittsburgh." As of June 20th, the fundraiser had more than doubled its initial goal by raising $11,355.

• Petition
  Cancel classes for the 2020 election, a petition to "ensure that [CMU's] student, faculty and administrative bodies need not make the choice between academic life and casting a vote on November 3rd." [Update 10/15: In a community email from Provost Garrett, CMU declined to cancel classes. "After consulting with our deans and academic leadership, we have decided not to cancel classes. However, our expectation is that maximum flexibility be extended to students, faculty and staff on Election Day, including cancelling non-election related events and assuring that no academic deadlines fall on the day."]

College- and Program-Specific Actions

Institute For Politics & Strategy

• CMU 'bent over backwards': A maskless Grenell spreads misinformation, an article in The Tartan about pushback against Grenell's recent behavior. Previous coverage in The Tartan includes two different articles on his involvment with events in IPS, three distinct editorials questioning his hiring and administration's lack of action, as well as previous reporting on the CMU community's reaction to his controversial hire.

• What to do about Richard Grenell? Confronting Racism in our Midst, a blog post by SCS Professor Jonathan Aldrich addressing the background and context of Grenell's hiring, his behavior as a CMU Senior Fellow, and how future faculty and staff appointments should be reviewed.

• Faculty Petition
  Defending CMU's Integrity, an open letter to Carnegie Mellon University's administrators from its faculty and staff, with hyperlinked sources to "reiterate our grave concern over the appointment of Richard Grenell as a Senior Fellow in the Institute for Politics and Strategy at Carnegie Mellon University." The link to add signatures has been removed in the interest of sharing the letter more broadly. [Updated 8/30 to reflect the petition reaching over 300 signatories]

• Open Petition
  Undergraduate Student Senate's Open Letter To The Institute For Politics & Strategy

• Open Petition
  Rescind Richard Grenell’s Senior Fellow Position

• Evolving Resource
  Crowd-Sourced Richard Grenell Resource Document, highlighting his prior actions that violate CMU standards of diversity and inclusion

Dietrich College

• Action Plan
  Dietrich College Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Plan

• Evolving Resource
  Support Anti-Racism/Resist Anti-Blackness - Statement from the English Department

School of Computer Science

• Open Petition
  Towards Anti-Racist Change in the School of Computer Science, a petition demanding "that SCS make bold, well-resourced changes to lead on anti-racist DEI," authored by the SCS Dean's PhD Student Advisory Committee in collaboration with "URM students in SCS, student organizations across CMU, DEI-related organizations in SCS, SCS staff and faculty with DEI expertise, and DEI experts from CMU at large." Also included in the letter are over 100 personal testimonies shared by the almost 600 cosigners.

• 2020 MHCI Cohort Requests and Thoughts Resulting from Racial Injustice, Diversity and Inclusion, and Design Ethics, which secured commitments from MHCI to increase the visibility of application fee waivers as well as a review of possible program-specific financial aid.

• Critical Race Theory for HCI, a 2020 paper written in part by Alexandra To (HCI Doctoral Student)

Pittsburgh Community Actions

• Ongoing Action
  Justice for Marquis Jaylen Brown (JB), a petition in support of "Danielle Brown, JB's mother, [who] is on a hunger strike demanding Pittsburgh Police and Duquesne University release information about her son's death in 2018 and actionable measures for police reform."