The diversity training demand for all Student Government Association-recognized groups and Greek life organizations is already partially underway.

Sororities and fraternities must provide multicultural competence programming in order to be recognized by the university, said Corin Gioia Edwards, Department of Fraternity and Sorority Life advising and programming associate director.

However, the training isn’t uniform, so each organization can choose what works best for them. Some groups may bring in a speaker, such as a representative from the Office of Multicultural Involvement and Community Advocacy.

Implementing a consistent training across all Greek organizations would be ideal, Edwards said, but she isn’t sure it is possible to coordinate with 59 groups and more that 4,000 students.

“It’s more just like a logistical: ‘What would the training look like?’; ‘Who would be responsible for doing it?’; ‘How would it get tracked?’” she said. “In theory, I would love that for all of our students.”

The SGA passed a bill requiring cultural competency training for all its officers at its final meeting of the semester Dec. 1.

SGA Speaker of the Legislature Chris Ricigliano, a junior government and politics and history major, said it’s important for the body to understand diversity-related issues.

“We hope to get all of our members of the SGA trained in cultural competency, so we can be a more informed body when we’re debating and making decisions,” he said. “It’s important that we recognize different issues that are in campus spaces and try to approach them in a respectful way.”

SGA President Katherine Swanson, a senior government and politics major said the idea of requiring competency training for all SGA-recognized organizations is one the body has not yet addressed.

“I’m interested in exploring the idea, but would need legislative approval to officially pursue it,” she said.

Reporting by: Christine Condon

Freshman Taylor Turner said she was supposed to see a counselor about three weeks ago, but is still waiting.

The Counseling Center has “a lot of people on their list,” said Turner, who identifies as African American and Indian. “I was supposed to be assigned a counselor like three weeks ago and I still haven’t so, they kind of like take a long time to get back to you. Now it’s finals and I’m just like, well, maybe next semester.”

The Counseling Center is understaffed and underfunded, and a long waiting list is expected, The Diamondback reported Nov. 2015.

The center’s policy allows students eight free individual counseling sessions per year and unlimited group sessions. There are specific counseling sessions for varying groups, such as women of color or LGBT students, specific walk-in times for students of color or foreign-born students, and a collection of links to additional resources on campus, according to its website.

Turner said she thinks ProtectUMD’s demand for an increase in these resources for students of color would help those, like herself.

The Counseling Center declined to comment, but its website includes a diversity statement.

“We strive to provide services and programs that are inclusive and give voice to these varied experiences by providing a safe place to be heard, appreciated and accepted…. Our commitment to diversity is an ongoing and open-ended journey.”

“More kids just need help,” Turner said. “And there’s not enough people and not enough time in the day.”

Reporting by: Leah Brennan and Andy Dunn

The University of Maryland supports underrepresented groups with a variety of scholarships, including some focused on those in the STEM field, those pursuing Latinx studies and female leaders on campus.

Despite these offerings, some students such as freshman computer engineering major, Zaakira Ahmed, agree with the ProtectUMD demand that the university offer more scholarships for students in marginalized communities.

“I came here and I didn’t get any scholarships and I didn’t get any financial aid either,” Ahmed, a Muslim student, said. “I think that definitely for people of like Muslim identity, and minorities in general, there should be more. Rather than academic scholarships, there should be more scholarships available for marginalized communities.”

Karla Casique, a junior journalism major with indigenous roots from Venezuela, said a specific indigenous scholarship for incoming students, as demanded by ProtectUMD, could help people adapt to an environment where they may feel secluded.

“UMD prides itself on diversity and inclusion, but when you come to UMD, it’s really difficult to find,” she said. “Having a scholarship for high school indigenous students would provide that support and vision to pursue the careers that they want, and I think that it will further empower students that think it’s not possible.”

Freshman Misha Bucknor, a kinesiology major, said she thinks the university is doing a “good job” compared to other schools in terms of providing a range of scholarships, but “they could definitely do better; there’s always room for improvement.”

Bucknor, who is African-American, also emphasized the importance of these scholarships, citing herself as an example.

“It’s definitely valid because a lot of marginalized people like communities, they have come from a point where they’re being set back and it’s just like a chain reaction where if someone’s parents haven’t been to college then their children probably won’t be able to make it because they don’t have jobs that can provide them the funds to get there,” Bucknor said. “Scholarships are one of the main things that are getting people here.”

ProtectUMD is also asking the university to create merit scholarships and emergency funds for undocumented and DACAmented students. "All of the scholarship requirements are all U.S. citizen or permanent resident ... you can't ask like, 'what if you don't have that,' while at the same time revealing your status," said an undocumented student who is here under DACA.

Reporting by: Carly Kempler

Erica Fuentes, president of Political Latinxs United for Movement and Action in Society, said university President Wallace Loh is “out of touch” with the students of color on the campus and cited his annual State of the Campus Address on Dec. 6.

In his speech, Loh reaffirmed his November promise to protect undocumented students at the university. He said the university will not share student information or grant access to campus buildings to immigration enforcement officials unless they have a warrant. He also said that the University Police would not partner with such officials to help with enforcement.

"These are the things that we will commit to, that we will do and will not do in order to create a safe and supportive learning environment," he said.

But for students involved with the issues of undocumented students, Loh’s statement was already assumed, Fuentes said.

“For him to say, ‘I wouldn’t let [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] come onto campus unless they have a warrant,’ is kind of useless, because if ICE were seeking to come on to campus, it’s because they have a warrant,” she said.

“I think the biggest worry on the minds of undocumented students right now is, ‘If I’m walking to class or if I’m in my dorm and ICE gets the address to my dorm, am I even safe in my dorm,’” Fuentes said. “And the statements that President Loh has made so far doesn’t really assure anyone that they’re safe in their dorm.”

Reporting by: Daphne Pellegrino

Eric Billings, a dining services employee at this university for four years, was walking to his apartment on the bike path behind the Varsity one night when he said he encountered a loud group of white males wearing pro-Donald Trump shirts.

“I had my headphones on, acting like I didn’t hear it,” said Billings, who is black. “But I paused my music to know what they were saying.”

That’s when he said heard them say, “That faggot is getting ready to go back to Africa.”

Since Election Day, University Police received four reports of hate bias incidents on or near the campus. Title IX Officer Catherine Carroll and Chief Diversity Officer Kumea Shorter-Gooden notified the campus in a Nov. 17 email of a “reported increase in bias incidents and discriminatory conduct.”

ProtectUMD is demanding “the immediate response to hate speech and actions from the university” and the “immediate turnaround for the removal of hate speech” on campus property.

However, drawing the line between what is considered OK — and thus protected under the First Amendment — and what is not, is a “slippery slope,” said Michael Spivey, a constitutional law professor at this university.

“And with respect to hate speech, it’s very difficult to draw that line,” Spivey said. “Once we start down that road, now a whole lot of speech that is not the ‘obvious’ hate speech is going to now expand to simply folks who express opinions that are unpopular.”

Billings, who said he is now afraid to walk home at night, said he understands First Amendment concerns surrounding free speech, but the university should have strict punishments for hate speech that might incite violence.

“There is a certain way you express how you feel,” he said. “You don’t up and draw swastikas or say, ‘Heil Trump, build a wall, send every n-word to Africa and kill all the faggots,’ and that stuff. That’s not what you’re supposed to do.”

After a racist, sexist email from a former Kappa Sigma fraternity member resurfaced and incited protests on the campus spring 2015, the Student Government Association unanimously passed a resolution that aims to combat hate speech with education, such as showing the perpetrator “the harm they have caused through talks with affected groups, Office of Diversity and Inclusion and anyone else that is determined relevant.”

However, the University Senate shot down the bill because it conflicted with the First Amendment, which generally protects hate speech.

While hate speech is protected by the Constitution, actions that interfere with one’s well-being are not, Spivey said.

“You can’t go around threatening people,” he said. “There’s a point at which speech goes from being generalized and being protected, to being particularized and a threat to another human being. The line is not exactly clear, but there is a line there and you can’t do the latter.”

Reporting by: Josh Magness & Daphne Pellegrino

In the next year, ProtectUMD wants to see a study looking into punishment statistics by race, gender and other relevant demographics.

Sociology professor Rashawn Ray said a study like that would be beneficial.

"Collecting and analyzing data and creating more transparency is always important,” Ray wrote in an email. “Students have a simple request, which includes having data on the social interactions that students have with campus police and authority.”

Ray said students appear to be responding more broadly to the lack of national data on police killings.

“The U.S. knows how many people catch the flu each year, but we do not know how many people have police contact and get killed by the police each year,” he said.

Earlier this semester, Ray gave a lecture titled, “Why Police Compliance Does Not Save Black Lives: Racial Bias and the Need to Restructure the U.S. Criminal Justice System.”

He presented FBI data that shows black people are more likely to be killed by police compared to whites and Hispanics/Latinos. Black people are also more likely than whites to not ambush the police officers during these encounters.

“The legal system is rife with discrimination against minorities,” the demand reads, “especially those in poverty.”

Reporting by: Leah Brennan

ProtectUMD demanded that administration should support and defend activist groups by nullifying slander and smear campaigns from bigger groups or organizations. Protection would be given in some cases such as in April, when members of Students for Justice in Palestine, protested Israel Fest, JSU’s annual event celebrating Israeli culture, on McKeldin Mall last spring.

As a result, Laila Abujuma, sophomore biology and nutritional science major said she and a handful of other SJP members have been called terrorists, anti-Semitic and violent by the Canary Mission, a website that compiles information on college students and professors it deems to promote hatred of the United States, Israel and Jews.

This scares Abujuma as she moves forward in college, and the demand for increased support to nullify slander would “provide a little bit more protection for students and also give [more] comfort,” to students who are afraid of speaking for what they believe in.

“If you search my name, it’s literally the first thing that comes up,” Abujuma said. “And if someone truly believes it, that’s not going to be good for me either, so it makes me scared to speak out against what I believe in and it makes me scared to fight for the causes … because of things like this. But I guess I realize that’s the price of activism.”

In situations like this, Abujuma said she and those affected have felt helpless.

“The thing about this whole situation is we can’t talk to administration or anyone about it because there’s really nothing that they can do. There’s nothing that says you have to protect students from being slandered for their rights or what they believe in,” she said. We’re all just kind of in this place where we honestly can’t do anything about it.”

The coalition also demanded this university “[m]ake free legal advice available for students participating in activism who face slander or other dishonest claims while exercising their rights to protest and free speech.”

The Student Legal Aid Office would not be able to assist a student who is in a conflict with the university, but can provide advice on free speech, said Syndy Shilling, the office’s director.

“If it is a general issue of advising them on their free speech rights or any of their first amendment rights, certainly we can advise them,” Shilling said.

Reporting by: Daphne Pellegrino

None of the University of Maryland’s Jewish student groups or organizations signed on to ProtectUMD’s list of demands.

ProtectUMD issued a statement to The Diamondback explaining why no Jewish groups were represented:

“ProtectUMD is a coalition of organizations throughout the University of Maryland’s campus dedicated to uniting the different voices into one voice for change. When the coalition was created, multiple organizations were contacted to participate while others contacted us themselves. Not all organizations chose to be a part of the coalition. ProtectUMD respects this choice. No one organization is in charge of the coalition and as such, the purpose of ProtectUMD is not to prioritize demands but uplift the needs of all marginalized communities. As a result of this, we did not turn away any communities that wished to stand with us.

In regards to the discrepancy with JStreet, the organization did decline the invitation to join ProtectUMD due to their disagreement with a demand previously submitted. This does not mean that ProtectUMD does not support their issues or want their personal demands responded to. Again, the coalition does not prioritize demands submitted and is not an exclusionary organization. Our aim is for all marginalized communities on the UMD campus to feel at home, safe, and protected.”

In response to the Pro-Palestinian student communities' set of demands, the following student leaders agreed to comment on behalf of their organizations: Sam Koralnik of Terps for Israel, Sam Fishman of the Jewish Student Union, Ethan Weisbaum of J Street U, and Miranda Mlilo of Students for Justice in Palestine.

The students offered opinions about the absence of the Jewish voice within the demands and weighed in on their groups’ stances toward Israel Fest and the BDS Movement. The demand list calls for the university to encourage discussion about “the Palestinians’ struggles and the Boycott Divest and Sanction movement without fear of consequences by the university administration.”

The BDS Movement calls for boycott, divestment and sanctioning of the State of Israel as a “response of solidarity with the Palestinian struggle for freedom, justice and equality,” according to its website. Some argue that the movement’s tactics parallel those of the South African Anti-Apartheid movement of the 1980s.

It’s been a divisive issue for universities nationwide. During the 2014-15 school year, 19 campuses voted on BDS resolutions, though none were likely to impact university policy, according to the Anti-Defamation League. The ADL is committed to fighting the movement.

“The delegitimization of Israel is at the heart of contemporary anti-Semitism,” the ADL states on its website. “BDS is one of its most visible and dangerous manifestations.”

Reporting by: Angela Jacob

Working at this university — which has a minimum wage of $8.75 an hour, compared to the Prince George’s County minimum wage of $10.75 an hour — takes its toll on Eric Billings, who has worked as a dining services employee for four years.

“Sometimes I’m barely just scraping by,” Billings said. “I asked Chris [Bangert-Drowns, a member of Student Labor Action Project] to pay my rent once and I would pay him back. The money I was making was basically my whole check. It’s crazy — this nickel and dime crap.”

Senior Bangert-Drowns said paying below the county minimum wage pressures students to work additional hours, which is counterproductive to an environment striving for academic success.

“What the university is doing by paying less than the P.G. county minimum is incentivizing students to pick up more hours if they have an on-campus job,” he said. “And if they can’t make ends meet with that on-campus job, they have to pick up a second job off campus. It’s the exact opposite of what we should be doing if we look at this from an academic perspective.”

For Billings, the lower wages combined with his shortened number of work hours has put an even greater strain on his financial situation. Now, he said, he can’t afford to miss any days just to get by.

“Working 20 hours a week and making $9 an hour — that’s not really adding up, especially for people who live off campus,” he said. “That’s really unfair.”

Reporting by: Josh Magness

Founded in March 2014, the Office of Civil Rights and Sexual Misconduct moved from its location in the Reckord Armory to Susquehanna Hall nearly one year ago.

Facilities Management told Title IX Officer Catherine Carroll the office would likely be located within Susquehanna Hall until May 2017. Carroll told The Diamondback she hoped the office's permanent location could be more centrally located and accessible to students.

ProtectUMD requested “[a]n established safe, secure and permanent location for the Office of Civil Rights & Sexual Misconduct at The University of Maryland.”

“I believe the University is working on meeting the demand,” Carroll wrote in an email. “I don't have any other comment.”

Brianna Hill, a senior kinesiology major, said she once went into the office when it was located in the Armory to speak on behalf of her friend. She said it is important to have a permanent location that is welcoming to students so they feel comfortable coming forward during moments of trauma.

“Having a permanent location and staff that are understanding would be a huge step,” Hill said. “With a lot of the civil rights and sexual cases that are involved, not a lot of people are comfortable coming up and speaking about it because of the weight that it has.”

Reporting by: Josh Magness

The coalition is demanding the creation of a dean of students who would: work as a liaison between students and the administration; engage student groups on the campus; be an ally to marginalized groups; and aid in implementing policy changes that students want.

The coalition specified there should be student representation on a search committee for a person with an advanced degree in education administration, experience in diversity and inclusion on an institutional level and preferably, a person from a “vulnerable group.”

There are two existing administrative positions that somewhat overlap with this demand.

As vice president for student affairs, Linda Clement leads an office that focuses on providing students with guidance and leadership, works alongside student groups and chaplains at this university and advises the Omicron Delta Kappa Honor Society and Senior Council, according to the vice president’s office’s website.

Clement, who holds a bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degree, oversees 15 departments, 1,500 employees, 48 percent of the campus land and space and a $180 million budget, according to the website. She also teaches and advises students pursuing master’s and doctoral degrees in the counseling and personnel services department.

Kumea Shorter-Gooden is this university’s chief diversity officer, thereby leading this university’s diversity office.

She is also the associate vice president of this university. Her job description includes “working with UMD’s academic and administrative leadership and advising President Wallace Loh on a number of issues related to diversity, collaboration and community building,” according to the behavioral and social sciences college website.

As chief diversity officer, Shorter-Gooden has experience with diversity in academia and held various roles at other institutions.

She previously served as the associate provost for international-multicultural initiatives at Alliant International University and was a professor and the Multicultural Community-Clinical Psychology Emphasis Area coordinator at the California School of Professional Psychology Los Angeles Campus. She was also the student counseling center director at The Claremont Colleges.

Her goals include helping students, staff and faculty members “successfully navigate in and contribute positively to a diverse, global society, while at the university and beyond.”

Reporting by: Alana Pedalino

From a young age, Lilia Hinojosa, a senior theatre major, remembers learning about Christopher Columbus, the man purported to discover America, she said.

But Hinojosa, whose father has indigenous roots from New Mexico, soon became confused by the holiday in honor of Columbus.

“As I got older, I saw there wasn’t anything they were telling us about him that was good or interesting,” she said. “It just seemed like the continuation of a holiday that didn’t even mean anything.”

Columbus Day is still listed as a holiday on this university's calendar and it perplexes Hinojosa to this day.

“It, a) makes it seem like they don’t care, and, b) is sort of a slap in the face because we are here celebrating a man who ‘discovered’ America but it wasn’t discovered – people lived here already,” she said. Columbus’ arrival catalyzed the raping, pillaging and killing of indigenous people, and Hinojosa said “having Christopher Columbus Day makes it seem like you are saying it is okay.”

ProtectUMD is seeking to change references to Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples’ Day on all university calendars. Hinojosa believes this is long overdue, as it would promote better awareness and understanding of indigenous culture.

The Graduate Student Government passed a resolution Nov. 4, also urging administrators to make this change.

“Every time I would ask a teacher when I was younger something about native culture, they wouldn’t have answers because they weren’t taught about it,” she said. “So we can change the narrative from talking about a guy who basically symbolizes genocide to celebrating indigenous heritage.”

Reporting by: Josh Magness

When Karla Casique, a junior journalism major, arrived at this university, she realized the indigenous community “was very small and didn’t have a representation.” There are currently 45 university students and 25 university employees who identify as American Indian or Alaska Native, according to data from The Office of Institutional Research, Planning, and Assessment.

Now Casique, the president of the American Indian Student Union who has indigenous heritage from Venezuela, is pushing for an indigenous studies minor at this university. This is also one of the demands ProtectUMD issued this semester.

Casique said there is currently a handful of classes offered at this university that deal with indigenous cultures — but said she enrolled in one of those classes and found herself let down due to the “sort of racist” way it was conducted.

“I was really disappointed because a lot of people I know who are Native American ended up leaving because they felt that they were being tokenized,” she said. “So that pushed me to reach out even more to other professors who were interested or were already having these classes.”

Having an indigenous studies minor at this university is vital, she said, because it would help raise awareness of the issues that indigenous people still face today.

“In 2016 we still have the Washington football name, the Dakota Access Pipeline has opened up that huge history that indigenous people have gone through, like environmental racism and police brutality,” she said, “so I think it would make a huge impact on UMD and beyond because people would carry on their knowledge elsewhere in whatever career or field they would go into.”

Reporting by: Josh Magness

This university is one that advertises its efforts for diversity, but Karla Casique, a junior journalism major with indigenous roots from Venezuela, said it’s often challenging to find other people within the native community.

“It’s hard coming into a university that prides itself on diversity and then you have to scavenge through everything to find even a grain of your culture,” she said. “That’s obviously really hard as a student because you have to pick and choose what types of identity you are going to be a part of or be involved in.”

The construction of an indigenous cultural center — one of the ProtectUMD demands — would help solve that problem, Casique said.

An indigenous cultural center on the campus would make it easier for students to explore their identity by hosting certain cultural events and participating in rituals like burning sweetgrass or sage before meetings — something that proves challenging in other buildings because it is technically prohibited as it involves lighting something on fire, Casique said.

“It’s really sad because it is a cultural practice and to some people it is a religious practice as well,” Casique said. “If we had a cultural center, with those type of things hopefully we will have an opening to do and we will not feel uncomfortable or weird doing those practices.”

Reporting by: Josh Magness

When the Yanet Amanuel read Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness her sophomore year, she was first introduced to the idea of the prison industrial complex. Her research led to her a discovery: Prison labor has far reaching effects, right down to the table and chairs in all University of Maryland classrooms and libraries.

“We talk about slavery and how horrible it was, but it’s still happening,” said the senior sociology major. “If we’re going to stand for one thing that is wrong, I believe we have to stand for all things that are wrong.”

ProtectUMD is demanding the university divest from Maryland Correctional Enterprises, the prison industry arm for the state’s correctional facilities. MCE has worked with this university for more than 30 years, and they sold about $3.5 million worth of furniture to the campus in 2014, The Diamondback previously reported.

A Maryland statute requires the university system to purchase its furniture from Maryland Correctional Enterprises.

As a result, the system “is not in a position to come out and say, ‘You know, we’re going to divest or do things differently’,” said system spokesman Mike Lurie. “It’s just not an option,” Lurie said. Thomas Hickey, director of procurement and real property initiatives for the university system, said the goal of the training is to give inmates job skills that they can use to market themselves when they get out of prison. He said he knows some students feel like MCE exploits prisoners, but he disagrees with their assessment.

“If you actually talk to some of the inmates and ask them what they thought about it, I think you might hear something different,” Hickey said.

But Amanuel said the truth about MCE is not so sunny. Inmates work full days for far less than minimum wage, and most people never look into the system, she said.

“The issue is — is it really rehabilitating or just exploiting?” Amanuel said.

Despite the state statute, Amanuel believes there are steps the university should take now.

Amanuel believes the university should start the conversation by first acknowledging that MCE is a supplier and put out a statement saying they’d like to divest. Then, the school could begin to cut ties with other businesses that buy from MCE.

“Once you start economically affecting businesses associated they no longer want to be invested in it and that makes the state really think, ‘Is this really worth it if these businesses don’t want to buy?’“ Amanuel said.

Total divestment could take years, but Amanuel said she will stick around for the fight. After graduation, she plans to stay in the area to help the students who fill her shoes at the university.

Although the ProtectUMD coalition says it does not prioritize demands, Amanuel said they are working to create a timeline for those that will take longer, and to find intermediate steps in between. In the case of MCE, possibilities include paying inmates higher wages or offering education programs to subsidize their work.

But Amanuel says that won’t solve the root of the problem.

“Ultimately the movement needs to be to completely divest,” she said. “And that will have to do with the state of Maryland.”

If students wanted to continue pursuing system divestment from MCE, they would have to work with the Maryland General Assembly to change the current State Finance and Procurement Article, Lurie and Hickey said.

Reporting by: Lexie Schapitl and Anna Muckerman

At the ProtectUMD walkout held Nov.17, senior Yanet Amanuel took the megaphone to tell people about Maryland Correctional Enterprises, a state-run business that employs prisoners for less than minimum wage. The sociology major said after the rally was over, interest in the issue grew.

“I had a lot of students who either did not know about this or wanted to know what businesses they should disassociate themselves with,” she said.

ProtectUMD is calling for students to divest from companies that invest in the prison industrial complex.

When it comes to changing Maryland’s prison labor industry, Amanuel said education is the biggest barrier.

“The first step is raising awareness which is something we’re really working heavily on this year so that next year is implementing action,” she said.

As the activism chair of Maryland’s NAACP chapter, Amanuel is putting together a town hall event to teach students about the prison industrial complex and ways they can take action against MCE. For starters, they can stop spending money at businesses that are invested in prison labor, she said.

“Businesses are afraid of people boycotting because it hurts their business and that’s the only time I feel like they’ll listen,” she said.

Amanuel said students often feel like a movement needs to be large before they get involved, but she advises them not to wait for a leader. Students should do their own research and make personal choices to divest from these businesses.

“It starts with one,” she said. “Before you could say you didn’t know, but once you know it’s then up to you.”

Reporting by: Lexie Schapitl and Anna Muckerman

Lauryn Froneberger, a senior journalism major who is also president of this university’s NAACP chapter, said she has struggled to find role models in professors who also look like her, as a black woman.

“In my experience, it’s been very hard to find a professor in my major that I can connect with and relate to that is also tenured and I know will be around for a while,” Froneberger said.

Data on diversity in tenure and tenure-track faculty positions at this university showed 3 percent of professors were black in 2011 and 2 percent of current total professors are black. In Froneberger’s case, the journalism college did not have a black professor in a tenure or tenure track position as of spring 2016.

University President Wallace Loh spoke about funding and progress on this exact demand in his State of the Campus address Tuesday.

Loh announced $5 million in committed funding from the Provost’s Office to kick off two diverse faculty initiatives that were created by a joint Provost and University Senate task force over the summer. The committed money includes $4 million for targeted hirings of senior faculty from historically underrepresented groups, and $1 million to fund 20 new postdoctoral fellows, also from historically underrepresented groups. The Provost’s Office will also start grooming them for tenure and tenure-track positions in the future.

Froneberger said this funding does show the university prioritizing this issue and hopes Loh can publicize these efforts further.

“I want him to make students more aware of it and try to involve students in the process,” she said.

Reporting by: Andy Dunn

When senior Lauryn Froneberger toured the University of Maryland as a prospective student, no one told her what that brick building next to Stamp Student Union was.

Once she committed to this university and came back for orientation, she said other students were worried about finding out where they were going to eat and where they were going to sleep.

But for Froneberger, the biggest concern was “where am I going to find a place that I feel safe, where I can find a mentor?”

She brought this up with an orientation advisor, who told her that brick building was the Nyumburu Cultural Center. She later learned Nyumburu housed groups like the Black Student Union and this university’s chapter of the NAACP, among other resources that would help her feel comfortable as a black student on a predominantly white campus.

ProtectUMD is demanding Nyumburu be a required stop during campus tours.

“They don’t just celebrate our black culture – it’s there for students across many different communities. That’s what makes it so rich and so important,” Froneberger said. “It will help with recruitment so much if people know there’s a place for them here.”

A tour route manual from 2016 provided to The Diamondback instructs Images guides to talk about Nyumburu while standing by the Frederick Douglass statue in Hornbake Plaza at the end of the tour.

But Froneberger said she’s worried tour guides skip this step, or only devote a few sentences to Nyumburu lumped along with the other topics they broach. This stop is also where guides are told to talk about Hornbake Library, the career center and tell their “Why I Came To Maryland” story, among other things.

ProtectUMD is also demanding “increased funding” for Nyumburu, though the group does not specify how much.

Nyumburu had an operating budget of $635,765, according to the university’s fiscal 2016 operating budget for expenditures. Froneberger said it’s not enough.

“People wonder, will Nyumburu still be around when we have children and they come to Maryland?” she said. “It’s a sacred place for us, students of color, to go and exist.”

Reporting by: Talia Richman

Senior Erica Fuentes said a Latinx cultural center is not a new request.

“When I was a freshman, I remember it was something that people were actively asking administration for,” said Fuentes, the president of Political Latinxs United for Movement and Action in Society.

Fuentes said this center would provide support to the campus’ more than 2,700 Latinx students.

“It would a space where any Latinx student would be able to go to with any need that they have or any issue that they’re dealing with and they would be able to find some sort of resource there for that,” the government and politics major said.

These resources could include study space for commuters, counselors who understand the needs of the community and a library with Hispanic and Latinx literature. Currently, Fuentes said the closest thing to such a place is the Office of Multicultural Involvement and Community Advocacy in Stamp Student Union.

“There’s only like one staff there that’s really trained to deal with the Latinx community, and it’s a lot for only one staff member to have to deal with,” she said.

Location is important, Fuentes said. Jimenez Hall has been a natural gathering place for the community, she added, and there have been talks of renovating the basement into a center, but the plans aren’t concrete.

“We’re still in the process of trying to partner of with faculty and staff members who would be willing to help us in locating a place that would be feasible in housing a cultural center,” she said.

Reporting by: Anna Muckerman

Anders Tighe has never lived on-campus at this university, but he remembers a “pretty offensive” experience as a resident of a dorm at Calvin College in Michigan.

A male-identifying friend asked Tighe, who is transgender, if he would like to live with him in a male dorm. But the school refused to allow Tighe, who was just starting hormone therapy at the time, to room with his friend.

“The way they worked around it was by putting me in a female dorm with another trans man,” the senior theatre major said. “That was a very solvable issue where I already had somebody who was perfectly comfortable sharing a room with a trans person, and that was still not accepted by the university.”

This university does allow mixed gender housing — meaning someone lives in a room with someone of the same gender, but other rooms in the hall might have members of a different gender — and gender-inclusive housing, which means students share a room with others regardless of their sex, gender or gender identity.

But ProtectUMD’s list of demands includes allowing different gendered roommates through random selection. Currently, the university does not allow random matching for gender-inclusive housing, and instead requires students to have a mutual agreement before rooming with each other.

Under current university policy, Tighe would not have experienced the problem he did at Calvin College. But as someone who has experienced a different set of rules because of his gender identity, he said he supports allowing random matching for gender inclusive housing.

“I can understand why the administration would have reservations about that because I can understand why there would be people who would try to abuse it — but I don’t care,” he said. “The idea of someone trying to abuse it potentially doesn’t negate the fact it would be extremely helpful and validating, especially for trans students.”

Reporting by: Josh Magness

For Anders Tighe, a senior theatre major at this university, hunting for a gender-neutral bathroom on this campus can be “really difficult.”

Tighe, who is transgender, said he avoids using gendered restrooms for fear of encountering someone who might respond negatively.

“Personally, I only use gender-neutral bathrooms because I don’t want to deal with the potential of there being a problematic person in a men’s bathroom, for example,” he said. “I’ve definitely had situations where I’ve decided to not go to the bathroom and have to pass five different bathrooms just to find a gender-neutral one.”

Currently, this university has 66 gender-neutral bathrooms throughout campus, according to a list compiled by the LGBT Equity Center. These restrooms exist in Stamp Student Union, the Potomac Building and the John S. Toll Physics Building, but not all buildings offer such accommodations.

Tighe supports ProtectUMD’s demand to change that.

“Maybe it feels like a small issue … Like, you don’t think, ‘Oh is somebody going to confront me in the bathroom because of my gender identity?’ But those are things that evidently do happen, as we have seen in recent legislation,” he said, referring to North Carolina’s HB2, which would prevent transgender people from using bathrooms that align with their gender identity.

Of the small number of gender-inclusive bathrooms on the campus, even fewer are multi-stall – something else ProtectUMD wants to see change.

Remi Liang, who identifies as genderqueer, meaning their gender identity does not fall inside the presumed male-female binary, said ProtectUMD’s demand for pushing for multi-stall gender inclusive bathrooms in every building would be a great aid for for nonbinary students on the campus, Liang said, as it would foster a more inclusive academic setting.

“It’s important to have [gender neutral] bathrooms because who wants to hold it when in class?” they said. “It makes it hard to concentrate and it’s annoying. It makes you miss classes as well.”

Starting in fall 2014, Facilities Management has put gender neutral and family restrooms on a campus map. There is a restroom symbol on each campus building with at least one gender neutral or family restroom.

This university is required to put gender-neutral bathrooms into any newly constructed or renovated buildings.

Reporting by: Josh Magness

Brianna Hill, a senior kinesiology major who identifies as bisexual, said LGBT studies should expand from its program within the women’s studies department and become an independent department, as demanded by ProtectUMD.

“It is a long time coming,” Hill said. “I think more people need to be educated in LGBT studies in general.”

However, at this point it’s too early to tell how feasible making the LGBT studies program into a department is, said Robyn Muncy, the interim chair of the women’s studies department, which offers the LGBT studies certificate and minor.

Muncy said with a separate department, there might be too much overlap in course curricula.

“I would think that there would be a lot of duplication in the [women’s] studies department, the way this one [the women’s studies department] wants to be a site of intersectional analysis and activism and LGBT [issues] — presumably doing the same thing [that an LGBT studies department would],” she said.

As a one-time member of Theta Pi Sigma, a gender-neutral “frarority” on the campus, Hill said she learned about the needs of people within the LGBT community — and specifically the transgender community, which she said would benefit from improved LGBT studies.

“There needs to be more [outreach] to and education about this community,” Hill said. “Because I feel safe, I feel fine, but they don’t feel safe and they don’t feel fine.”

Muncy said she would want the opportunity to speak with ProtectUMD to hear student concerns about the LGBT studies program.

“We would just like to see what is it that they think would be better for them and for the study of LGBTQ study and issues if it were an independent department,” Muncy said.

Reporting by: Kimberly Escobar and Josh Magness

The theatre community at this university had grown “handfuls” since last year, when Rad Adler, a senior theatre major transitioned.

Navigating the change was “challenging” and “painful,” for Adler, who is transgender. His professors, he admitted, didn’t always know the right way to react.

“When you take transgender issues, it’s a whole different ballgame,” he said. “Ninety-eight percent of people are just not equipped to navigate a gender transition of someone within their community.”

But the community was open and learned from Adler’s experience, he said. Now, he considers his professors allies.

“I couldn’t have asked for a better welcome,” said Adler, who is not enrolled in classes this semester, but will be returning next semester after taking time off to recuperate from his transition. “I feel like a prodigal son returning home.”

ProtectUMD’s demand for more support for arts and humanities has been echoed by students like Adler, who have built support systems and learned skills they could not have in other departments, they said.

“The arts ... especially, the performing arts, they teach you that your person has value,” said Christopher Walkup, a senior government and politics and theatre major. “You are worth getting up on stage. Your work should be viewed.”

Enrollment is down in the arts and humanities college, which houses 28 majors and 31 minors and receives the third highest allocation in fiscal 2016 operating budget of this university’s 11 colleges.

University data show a more than 30 percent decrease in enrollment in the arts and humanities college since fall 2010. In the English major alone, enrollment declined 40 percent from 2012 to 2015.

At the same time, students have enrolled in STEM-related majors at record rates. Enrollment has grown by more than 32 percent in the math and natural sciences college and more than 26 percent in the engineering college since fall 2010.

Arts and humanities lost visibility in 2012 when this university switched from CORE, a set of general education requirements in effect since 1990, to Gen Ed, a more expansive updated general education track. CORE required nine credits in the arts and humanities — with at least three in literature and three in arts — but Gen Ed requires only six and has specified no subject areas.

While the university has taken steps to develop arts partnerships, such as with The Phillips Collection, some students feel humanities often take a backseat to STEM subjects and athletics.

While she said she understands the importance of both, junior elementary education Michelle Joseph emphasized humanistic education in post-election America.

“In order to really compromise and move forward, especially when people have such very strong ideas, to be open to reexamining your ideas ... I think the arts and humanities really help,” she said. “If we can’t get that down, hopes of compromise and moving forward are null and void.”

Reporting by: Danielle Ohl

Because of junior Sarah Eshera’s busy class schedule, the Muslim student has a hard time finding a few moments and a convenient space to pray.

“A lot of times what students do is if they have a situation like that -- they’ll pray in a stairwell or a corner which is fine, but in that situation you’re not really focusing on your prayer,” the math and philosophy major said.

Her classes are in the Skinner Building, where she says it’s hard to find even a stairwell, let alone run back to the one designated prayer room, or Musallah, located in Cole Field House. One of the five pillars of Islam states that Muslims must pray five times a day.

“I never have time to go there and pray, so I end up having to pray two of my prayers together,” she said. “If [students] want a quiet area where they can focus on their prayer and they don’t want to delay their prayer, then they should be afforded that.”

Among the list of ProtectUMD demands was that one room in each major building, such as the School of Public Health, the chemistry building and McKeldin, be designated for prayer.

Government and politics lecturer Michael Spivey said it is legal for a public university to provide prayer space as long as members of all religions have equal access, according to the Equal Access Act, which declares public secondary schools receiving federal funding and allowing students to use space outside of school hours for extracurricular activities must allow equal access to all students.

As long as members of all religions are welcome in that room, it’s unlikely to be considered unconstitutional, Spivey said.

Director of the Department of Facilities Planning Brenda Testa indicated that reallocating space might be the issue.

“It would come at the cost of providing that space by taking it away or reallocating it from some other purpose,” Testa said. “In most of our buildings there’s not a square foot of real estate that is sitting around waiting around for another use. That’s a bit of a generalization, but we have a significant space shortage here.”

Eshera said the space doesn’t need many frills, just open space for kneeling. The classroom could be used for lectures at other times and students of any faith would be invited to pray there when it’s designated for that purpose.

“It could honestly be used for any religion,” she said. “Like if any Christian student wanted somewhere to pray before class, they could use it for that too. It wouldn't be exclusive to just Muslims.”

Reporting by: Anna Muckerman and Naomi Grant

Tucked away on the side of a half-renovated Cole Field House is the campus’ only Musallah, or Muslim prayer room. The Muslim Student Association lacks the type of dedicated space other religious groups have, such as the Catholic Student Center or Maryland Hillel.

For MSA’s hundreds of members, that can be a problem.

“We substitute the lack of an actual building by renting out or getting spaces within Stamp or Nyumburu,” said junior Taj Ingram, an MSA member.

Last year, the environmental science and technology major thought of a solution that would allow members of the Muslim community to come together for events and prayer: a shuttle bus to the Diyanet Center of America. Supported by the Turkish government, the center is about 15 minutes away from campus in Lanham. There, the local Muslim community gathers for Friday prayers as well as dinners and other cultural events. MSA members sometimes participate in these events and use the center’s recreational facilities, but Ingram says transportation makes it difficult. Students often carpool.

“We have to ask who’s available right now and start driving back and forth,” he said.

David Allen, the executive director of the Department of Transportation, said he hadn’t heard of this need before, but DOTS is “happy to work with students to meet their needs.”

Allen says adding stops to pre-existing bus routes makes the most sense. Ingram has already thought of that. His came up with a route that involved making the Diyanet Center a stop on the old NASA Goddard shuttle route.

“It was supposed to be six minutes extra on the route, but they canceled the route entirely,” he said. “So the feasibility of it might be a bit less than what it was in the past.”

It all comes down to the budget, Allen said.

“To increase service we would have to cut something or stay within the constraints of the current shuttle budget,” he says.

Ingram said there may be other options. He envisions a more private service like Nightride that could take students to the center one evening a week.

“It doesn't have to be a continuous service,” he said.

Reporting by: Anna Muckerman

Behind the demand for more classes pertaining to Muslim culture is senior Aiyah Sibay. But the English major said she’s not necessarily pushing for more classes, so much as a different type of learning.

“[On] this campus, we do have classes on Islam, we do have classes on politics in the region,” she said.

Sibay said the classes this university offers tend to focus on conflict and war in the Islamic world, while ignoring the artistic and cultural contributions of Arab and Persian people.

“We need to change the way we’re being introduced to these regions,” she said. “We don’t have any classes in the English department that study the literature of a region that’s so rich for its literature [and] rich for its art.”

For Sibay, the significance is personal. Although she was born in the U.S., Sibay identifies with her Syrian heritage, and it fuels her to advocate for her religion and culture.

“What happened in my country in 2011 put a lot of anger,” she said. “A lot of my activism comes from a place of anger.”

To begin raising awareness for her cause, Sibay formed the Kahwa wa Kutub literary group to study Middle Eastern and North African works of art and literature. Sibay isn't sure her club will last after her graduation, so she's hoping for a class as a more permanent place for students to learn about these topics.

“Trust me,” she said. “Just one class on Arabic literature or Persian literature changes completely the way that people think about the region."

Reporting by: Anna Muckerman

Two of the demands from the ProtectUMD campaign can be traced directly back to April 2015, when one movie spurred a passionate, at times vitriolic debate at this university that touched on issues of Islamophobia, free speech and the politicization of art.

That spring, Student Entertainment Events made a late change in its lineup of free movie screenings for students, choosing to replace Jupiter Ascending with American Sniper because of the former film’s box office and critical failure.

This decision was met with backlash, and within days of its announcement, a Change.org petition demanding SEE pull the movie had gained traction online. The Muslim Students Association, one of several student groups that voiced concerns against the movie, sponsored the petition.

The petition stated that the film “dehumanizes Muslim individuals, promotes the idea of senseless mass murder, and portrays negative and inaccurate stereotypes.”

Two weeks after the petition emerged, SEE decided to postpone the screening to the following fall in hopes they could better plan an event that included a discussion afterward to facilitate an open dialogue about the issues presented in the film.

The story went national, with Fox News and other outlets decrying the postponement as a limit on free speech. The MSA received the brunt of the online anger, with anti-Islamic messages and threats flooding their social media pages. While many of these comments came from people who did not attend this university, some of the student body was undoubtedly angry about SEE’s decision as well.

More than a year-and-a-half later, these two ProtectUMD demands are evidence that scars from this dilemma still remain. The demands call to “prevent situations similar to the “American Sniper” situation from happening again” and for SEE to “have better judgement when choosing to show movies that perpetuate false narratives and stereotypes of [Muslims].”

“In the wake of this event, I will say that, frankly, our cause for concern, our alarm and awareness, has gone way up … There are fears, very real fears, in our community,” university student Naeem Baig told The Diamondback in April 2015. At the time, Baig was a sophomore finance and marketing major and served as The Muslim Student Association’s public relations director.

Catalina Mejia, president of SEE, said she remembers the group being caught off guard in 2015 about the reaction the group received from both sides. Since the incident, SEE has changed the way it deals with potentially controversial topics and events, especially movie screenings.

“As an organization, after the American Sniper situation, we make sure we’re going above and beyond what we thought we were already doing,” Mejia said. “We pride ourselves in thinking about all types of diversity, not just racial diversity but also diversity in thought.”

All event ideas now go through an extended proposal process, Mejia said, that involves the SEE board discussing what potential issues the event could bring about, what student groups might be affected in any way or how someone unfamiliar with SEE and their events might perceive it.

“We want to make sure we’re being our own devil’s advocate in terms of how things could be interpreted,” Mejia said.

Mejia and other SEE members stressed how open they are to all kinds of feedback about their events, especially from students. They view it as the lifeblood of their decision-making process. Mejia said she is confident that this fact, in addition to the increasingly strict planning process they now employ, will make meeting this demand a very real and highly likely possibility.

Khaled Nurhssien, a junior communication major and current MSA member, agreed both demands could and should become a reality.

“I think [these demands] are ridiculously easy [to accomplish]. They’re very easy. All it would take is consideration on the part of the SEE board,” he said. “It doesn’t even have to be a longer process than they already have — it just requires that the person who’s making decisions to keep in mind the effect of the movies he or she is choosing. That’s all it requires.”

Reporting by: Michael Errigo

Sarwat Kazmi has a dining plan, but she’s gone months without using it.

“Because there seems to be such limited halal food options for Muslim students, it’s just easier for me to bring food from home,” the sophomore government and politics major said.

The term halal refers to the types of food, specifically meat, that has been prepared in accordance with Muslim law. For the most part, Kazmi also adheres to zabihah standards, which is a series of rules regarding the preparation of meat, including killing an animal in a clean, respectful way.

“If it’s zabihah-halal, then it was slaughtered with the blessing that we say,” Kazmi said.

Dining Services spokesman Bart Hipple said Dining Services does offer halal foods.

“All of our fresh chicken is halal certified, which they love,” he said. “We have additional meat options that Chef John can purchase at the local halal store.”

But Kazmi said the process for getting halal meals isn’t convenient. Once a week, she has to fill out a sheet for the coming days worth of meals.

“That was fine for the first couple weeks but I kind of grew tired of it,” she said. “It was almost a chore to go there at a certain time when there’s so much going on already this semester.”

Kazmi said she asked Dining Services for an exemption from the required meal plan for students who live on campus but was turned down. Now, her mom brings her food that meets both zabihah-halal standards and is safe for her food allergies.

“The dining options – they’re minimal in terms of what’s halal and what’s not,” Kazmi said.

Dining Service’s nutritionist Sister Maureen Schrimpe says about 15 students have requested halal meals this semester.

“We meet with them individually to discuss their many options that we have or can have,” she said.

Kazmi understands the demand for zabihah food may be small, but she says there are other solutions to make Muslim students’ lives easier. She said it would be helpful if ingredients in dishes were labeled better.

“There’s been a couple times where I was eating mac and cheese and it turned out that there was bacon in it,” she said. “I don’t eat pork so that’s a bit unnerving.”

Hipple said, "Not all of our meat [is halal], but we can give people an easy guide to determine what [is].”

Even so, Kazmi says it’s not enough.

“For the most part, I will just go with vegetarian, just to be safe,” she said.

In an ideal world, Kazmi says, Muslim students could have something similar to the Hillel meal plan, where Jewish students can eat specially prepared food in their own dining hall. But if the need is not great enough, she said she’s fine with a revamping of the current system.

Reporting by: Anna Muckerman and Rachel Kuipers

Senior Aiyah Sibay, a Muslim student of Syrian heritage, said she sees a need for counselors who are well-versed in and sensitive to the fears and alienation many Muslims are currently feeling.

While Muslims have experienced hate and discrimination for years, the senior English literature major said the election of Donald Trump has “emboldened” these attacks. This has amplified the anxieties of many Muslims on campus and nationwide, particularly those who wear a hijab or cap that serves a visible mark of their religion, she added.

“I can’t imagine the fear that they’re walking around with,” Sibay said.

The Counseling Center provides free mental health services at this university.

A Counseling Center official declined to comment on the demands. The center’s website provides additional details on how it currently supports diverse student groups.

“We strive to provide services and programs that are inclusive and give voice to these varied experiences by providing a safe place to be heard, appreciated and accepted,” the Counseling Center’s website states. “Staff members in the counseling service have expertise in providing therapy, campus outreach, and consultation that welcomes and celebrates human diversity.”

The center’s website has a section dedicated to resources it offers, including group counseling sessions women of color or LBQ [sic] groups, specific walk-in times for certain populations such as students of color or foreign-born students and a collection of links to various resources for these groups.

Reporting by: Anna Muckerman and Andy Dunn