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The Daily Tar Heel

Letter: Response to editorial on Spellings’ past

TO THE EDITOR:

We write in response to your Jan. 25 editorial “Spellings could become a positive force at UNC.”

On Nov. 29, 2015, the two of us wrote and delivered a letter on behalf of ourselves and other faculty affiliated with the Program in Sexuality Studies at UNC-CH.

The letter was addressed to Chancellor Carol Folt, Provost Jim Dean and the members of UNC-CH Faculty Council. It was signed by 31 other faculty affiliated with our academic program.

The letter was necessitated partly by Margaret Spellings’ reported comments to the press on Oct. 23, 2015, the day that her appointment as President of the UNC system was announced. The Daily Tar Heel had filed this account of those Oct. 23 comments:

“Have her views on the LGBTQ community changed since 2005, when she voiced her displeasure with an animated children’s show that portrayed lesbian couples? ‘I can’t comment on those lifestyles,’ she said, noting her issue was with the use of public funds to pay for the PBS television program.”

We took it as our responsibility as faculty to state the need for, and importance of, further comment from Spellings about LGBTQ support at UNC and, in particular, about funding for LGBTQ-related research, teaching and learning.

Our Nov. 29 letter sought the assistance of Chancellor Folt, Provost Dean, and members of the Faculty Council in obtaining confirmation that Spellings will uphold her new position’s responsibilities to all of the university’s students, staff and faculty by fiscally supporting and sustaining LGBTQ academic initiatives in a fully equitable and non-prejudicial manner.

Our letter requested that Chancellor Folt, Provost Dean and members of the Faculty Council call upon Spellings to reassure LGBTQ students, staff and faculty by stating her support for LGBTQ communities and the study of LGBTQ issues at UNC. We also asked whether or not the hope for a “complete sense of equality and belonging” at UNC — a phrase that had recently been used by UNC-CH leadership in a diversity statement on the campus website — extends both to LGBTQ communities and to everyone engaged in the study of LGBTQ issues at UNC.

We appreciate the fact that, as of The Daily Tar Heel’s interview with her last week (“Margaret Spellings unfazed by critics”), Spellings has begun to address the response of faculty, staff, students and alumni to her October comments.

Faculty affiliated with the Program in Sexuality Studies look forward to continuing to lend our expertise to assuring the required support of LGBTQ communities and everyone engaged in the study of LGBTQ issues at UNC.

Prof. Richard C. Cante

Director, Program in Sexuality Studies

Department of Communication

Prof. Ruth Salvaggio

English and Comparative Literature

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