The University of Pennsylvania has become the latest in a series of institutions of higher learning that have dug into their past, unearthed significant ties to slavery and begun trying to figure out how to address repercussions of the historical injustice.
In a statement issued Friday, Penn president Dr. Amy Gutmann summarized the school’s journey from the Penn Slavery Project – which reported initial findings last fall – to a recently completed, more in-depth study by a seven-member working group of administrators, faculty and students.
Here’s some of what was included in the study:
“As an academic institution dedicated to uncovering and conveying the truth, the University is committed to advancing research that will enable us to more fully understand Penn’s linkages to slavery,” Gutmann wrote. “On behalf of the university, I thank the working group, accept its recommendations and charge Provost Wendell Pritchett and Senior Vice President Joann Mitchell to partner with the deans of the appropriate schools to continue to illuminate the university’s connections to slavery and its implications for the present and future.”
Pritchett led the working group and Mitchell, who also is the school’s chief diversity officer, was a member.
In line with the group’s recommendations, Gutmann said, the Ivy League school specifically will: support the Penn Slavery Project’s continuing research; support research on how the medical school’s pedagogy, research and medical practices impacted alumni and the lingering effects on medicine; create a university website for research findings and other information; encourage the university’s schools and departments to offer cultural and informational programs to educate the wider community; and join the Universities Studying Slavery consortium to learn from and collaborate with peer institutions.
Penn would be welcomed into the consortium, which has about 40 member schools in the U.S. and abroad, said its co-chair, Dr. Kirt von Daacke, assistant dean and professor in the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Virginia.
