Students gather at Duke to demand change

They want action from university leaders, but so far they said they feel there hasn’t been enough.

Duke students that organized the meeting said they have experienced racism and homophobia at the University. Some students said they feel that the issues have been ignored, to some degree, by university leaders.

“It did feel like it was a lot of them speaking to us,” said Melody Iro, a sophomore at Duke. “So we decided to plan this event today where it was us stating demands, what we want to see happen, change what we want to see.”

"Students are fearing for their safety on campus,” Iro said. “We wanted to give them concrete things we needed as students.”

Students’ demands included required instruction on racism for faculty and students, clear policies and repercussions on hate speech, buildings and monuments on campus be named for distinguished African-Americans, and an administrator tasked solely with handling inequities on campus.

At a similar meeting last week, administrators announced a new task force to investigate hate allegations and a new website to track them.

“It is our plan to look at these things seriously and to figure out where the most important progress is to be made,” Duke President Richard Brodhead said. “Bias and hate have no place in civil society.”

A similar meeting was held at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Thursday night.