The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 43, No. 3 - 88

Kimberly Otchere * Tekita Bankhead * Ayanna Williams

ment methods and initiatives and an increase
in funding for retention initiatives, such as retention programs based out of BNAACC. Each
demand was addressed by a series of town hall
meetings with the Vice Chancellor for Student
Affairs, the Provost for Enrollment Management, including that the baton be passed to
faculty, staff, and other student leaders to carry
the work to fruition.

REFLECTION & IMPLICATIONS
The infrastructure of inclusion, identity-based
student organizations, and mobilization of
resources were important ingredients in the
#BeingBlackAtIllinois movement for change
at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In particular, housing staff responded
with a sense of urgency and concern for the
emotional and psychological well-being of
the effected students and offered culturally
responsive and immediate support through
referrals to campus resources, such as
BNAACC. Since the #BeingBlackAtIllinois
movement began in 2014, student organizers
have experienced restless nights, never-ending meetings with administration and within
the Black community, and continuous efforts
to improve UIUC's racial campus climate.
#BeingBlackAtIllinois became not just a campaign but a movement, which resulted in a
transformative experience for the campus
in addressing systemic social change. The
Chancellor's Committee on Race and Ethnicity (CORE) took on the tedious task of ushering the new U.S. minority general education
requirement through multiple phases and
political bodies, including the Faculty Senate,
General Education Board, and Educational
Policy Committee. After much labor it was approved, and now there is a general education
88

curriculum requirement for undergraduate
students to satisfy a Cultural Studies requirement by taking a non-Western culture and a
U.S. minority culture course. In addition, the
university agreed in December 2015 to commit
$4.9 million to building a new African American Cultural Center. Lastly, the demand to increase the number of incoming Black students
through improved recruitment and retention
methods has also yielded a favorable outcome.
According the UIUC Division of Management
Information (2015), the number of incoming
Black students increased from 356 freshmen
in fall 2014 to 475 freshmen in fall 2015 to
roughly 600 first-year students in fall 2016.
Davis (2005) asserts that if campus movements are to be effective, they require organization, a viable leadership structure,
administrative guidance, incentives for participation, and a means of acquiring resources to
maintain momentum. The #BeingBlackAtIllinois movement began as a web-based airing
of grievances and the hashtag morphed into a
student organization with student leadership
that were able to continue working on seeing
the requests come to fruition. Both students
and staff worked diligently to navigate the political, social, and economic complexities of the
university system. Since some of the demands
required dedicated pressure across multiple
years, staff support was critical to supporting
the participation of younger students in creating longevity for the movement. In addition,
#BeingBlackAtIllinois illustrated the importance of partnerships across staff and students
to sustain participation in the movement;
University Housing staff continued to foster
relationships on behalf of the student activists
with campus partners to secure participation

THE JOURNAL OF COLLEGE AND UNIVERSITY STUDENT HOUSING
The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 43, No. 3

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 43, No. 3
