A UNIVERSITY of California Los Angeles accounting professor has been suspended after refusing a request for lenient markings on black student’s final exams.
A group of non-black students wrote to Anderson School of Business Professor Gordon Klein asking him to cancel final exams for black students due to “trauma” they suffered from George Floyd’s death. He refused.
A police presence around Klein’s residence has reportedly increased due to multiple threats after the email exchange was posted online by a student.
The students who wrote to Klein described themselves as ‘non-black allies’ and wrote that due to recent “traumas, we have been placed in a position where we must choose between actively supporting our black classmates or focusing on finishing up our spring quarter” the Daily Mail reported.
The students requested a ‘no-harm’ final exam that would only benefit students’ grades. They added that their letter was “not a joint effort to get finals canceled for non-black students, but rather an ask that you exercise compassion and leniency with black students in our major”.
Their request came after the death of George Floyd and current civil unrest.
Klein refused and some students found his response may have been mocking them.
“Thanks for your suggestion in your email below that I give black students special treatment, given the tragedy in Minnesota,” he wrote. “Do you know the names of the classmates that are black? How can I identify them since we’ve been having online classes only?”
He asked the students what he should do about students of mixed race, if they should receive leniency as well.
Klein suggested that there may be students from Minneapolis – where George Floyd was killed by white police officer Derek Chauvin – and that they might be devastated as well, regardless of their race.
“I am thinking that a white student from there might be possibly even more devastated by this, especially because some might think that they’re racist even if they are not,” he wrote.
He said his teaching assistant is from Minneapolis and that students should talk to her.
The professor ended his response with a quote from Martin Luther King saying, “Remember that MLK famously said that people should not be evaluated based on the color of their skin. Do you think that your request would run afoul of MLK’s admonition? Thanks, G. Klein.”
Students received an additional email from Klein saying outside events “including personal hardship, do not necessarily relieve students of their responsibilities”, the Daily Mail reported.
The email conversations sparked a petition run by students seeking the firing of Klein as a result of his “extremely insensitive, dismissive and woefully racist response to his students’ request for empathy and compassion during a time of civil unrest.” The petition has gained almost 20,000 signatures.
The dean of the Anderson School of Business sent an email to students Monday condemning Klein’s behavior.
“It is deeply disturbing to learn of this email, which we are investigating,” said a spokesperson for the Anderson School of Management. “We apologize to the student who received it and to all those who have been as upset and offended by it as we ourselves.”
Klein has received support from academics such as Kathlyn Patton, a spokeswoman for the Foundation of Individual Rights in Education and Peter Wood, the president of the National Association of Scholars.
“Professor Klein is right,” Wood said according to Daily Mail. “Treating students on the basis of equality is morally, ethically and legally sound. The face that his complaining student had gotten traction with her complaint is disturbing.”
