The efforts made by a coalition of students and community members to delay the search for a new director of the Chicano/a Studies Program seems to have attracted the attention of UNM administrators throughout campus.
Roberto Ibarra, special assistant to the president for Diversity Issues, said he was at Wednesday’s meeting between University College Dean Peter White and the coalition to collect feedback and information for both Garcia and his own work regarding campus diversity initiatives.
Ibarra said he would relay to Garcia the coalition’s concerns regarding the state of the program and its interest in the current search for a new program director.
The meeting included about 20 members of the coalition and several representatives of the steering committee charged with recommending a course of action regarding the search for a new director for Chicano/a Studies.
White explained to the group that the search process has been put on hold so the position’s lone candidate, Dorothy Baca, head of Design for Performance in the Theatre and Dance Department, can make a second presentation to directly address any questions regarding her application for the director position.
White said that after that, the steering committee, which is mostly comprised of faculty members — including some instructors from the Chicano/a Studies Program — will meet and discuss whether or not to recommend Baca for the position.
“I believe in the right of the faculty to pick their own director,” White said, reaffirming to the group that the decision of who the next director will be primarily rests with the steering committee.
In addition, White reiterated to the coalition the importance of having a tenured director. He said the requirement would add credibility to the program and is essential in achieving some of the coalition’s other program goals.
According to the Chicano/a Studies Program, those goals include achieving increased funding, getting some of the program’s current faculty on a tenure-track and establishing a degree program within the program.
Eduardo Hern†ndez Ch†vez, the program’s interim director, told the coalition that before the program can establish a degree or get current faculty on a tenure-track, there must be a tenured director and an increased interest among students and faculty.
Last semester, White said there were only 16 students who had Chicano Studies officially declared as their minors.
White said that according to the Office of Institutional Research, there were 381 total student credit hours worth of Chicano/a studies courses taken last semester. That figure, he said, does not include courses that are cross-listed with the Chicano/a Studies.
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Courses cross-listed with Chicano Studies yielded an additional 30 student credit hours.
In both cases, White said, those figures reflect a very small enrollment within the program.
Despite the program’s current status regarding enrollment and the search for a new director, Ibarra said he is committed to searching for outside sources of funding for all diversity initiatives, including the University’s ethnic studies programs.
He added that he believes it is important to find a quality director, but that attaining tenure-track status for program instructors is also an important area of concern.
Faculty, Ibarra said, are an important component in improving any program or department’s quality.
Baca’s second presentation will be at 3:30 p.m., Feb. 26, in Dane Smith Hall, Room 125.
