A few hours after Wolfe announced his resignation, effective immediately, Chancellor R. Bowen Loftin also announced he would be leaving his post, effective Jan. 1, amid pressure over his mishandling of the racial tensions on campus.
Similar situations at institutions such as Yale University and Ithaca College take place as students continue to protest administrative indifference to racial intolerance on campus. Now, eyes across the country are turning to Mizzou to watch as the story continues to unfold.
Faculty recently staged a walkout in support of a graduate student, Jonathan Butler, who went on a hunger strike to draw attention to the issues on campus.
“We, the concerned faculty of the University of Missouri, stand in solidarity with the Mizzou student activists who are advocating for racial justice on our campus,” a statement released late Sunday night said.
“I think the faculty have been paying a great deal of attention to what the student activists have had to say,” said Ben Trachtenberg, an associate professor in the Missouri University College of Law and the chair of the university’s Faculty Council on University Policy.
But it was perhaps the decision by the Black players on the Mizzou Tigers’ football team’s announcement that they would not “participate in any football related activities until President Tim Wolfe resigns or is removed due to his negligence towards marginalized students’ experiences” that garnered the most national attention.
