News

You have likely seen the email from the Acting Provost and Vice-President Academic, the Vice-Provost (Equity & Inclusion), and the Chair of Senate with details about the Scholar Strike initiative. This is a labour action/teach-in/social justice advocacy movement, taking place from September 9-10, 2020. We fully support this event highlighting the ongoing systemic injustice and police brutality and violence in the US, Canada and beyond.

We understand that some of our faculty members will be able to participate fully in this strike. If so, please consult with your Director to discuss mitigating any operational impacts of your participation. Please ensure that any such impacts are communicated, in advance, to those affected; this communication should also outline alternative plans, if required. Students who wish to participate fully in the 2-day strike are asked to please inform their instructors prior to any classes missed.

Other programs may have specific obligations that prevent some from participating in complete strike action for the full two days. In this instance, each of us (faculty, staff and students) can commit to doing at least ‘one thing’ on September 9 and 10 to support the #scholarstrike call to action. This could include:

• Signing up for Dalhousie’s College of Continuing Education’s new program Interrupting Unconscious Bias, that will be launched soon, and available free to the Dal community, beginning on September 14 (details below).
• Visit https://scholarstrikecanada.ca/schedule/ for a comprehensive list of ‘Digital Teach-Ins’ — public discussions with respected leaders as part of 2020 Scholar Strike Canada. In the Faculty, we will be suspending our social media activity for two days to amplify #scholarstrike messages.
• Plan to attend sessions such as A “Night In” with Ecojustice Warriors on Thursday, September 10 with keynote speaker Dr. Ingrid Waldron, Author and Founder, The ENRICH Project, or the Scholars Strike Nova Scotia: Teach In for Black Lives, co-hosted by Dr. OmiSoore H. Dryden
• Consult additional resources: Racialequitytools.org, Anti-colonial solidarity primer: https://bloomnetwork.org/anti-colonial-solidarity-primer, U of T anti-black racism reading list: https://onesearch.library.utoronto.ca/anti-black-racism-reading-list, Robyn Maynard’s book Policing Black Lives – an examination of the history and practices in Canada, Ibram Kendi’s book: How to be an Antiracist

However you choose to participate, we respect and support your efforts to confront systemic racism in Canada and beyond. For more information on what our Faculty is doing to combat anti-Black racism and support our Black students, faculty, staff and community members, please see this statement.