This kind of shuffling of the deck chairs is never a good sign.
Hofstra slashes student fellow funding to pay social justice center administrator amid budget cuts
Hofstra University agreed to cut compensation for the lone undergraduate fellow at its Center for “Race,” Culture and Social Justice in order to fund the stipend of the center’s associate director.
The university also cut Director Jonathan Lightfoot’s course-release time in half, from six credit hours to three, as Hofstra required campus units to prepare plans for budget reductions of 5 percent, 10 percent, and 15 percent, according to the Hofstra Chronicle.
Associate Director Veronica Lippencott wrote in an August memo that university officials agreed to reduce student-fellow compensation to fund her stipend. The center’s only undergraduate fellow earns roughly $2,000 per year, while its original 2016 mandate allocated $8,000 annually for student research assistants.
In a joint email to Campus Reform, Lightfoot and Lippencott said the university’s cuts also affected Lightfoot’s stipend, annual course-release time, and funding for student fellows.
Hofstra spokesperson Terry Coniglio told The Hofstra Chronicle that Hofstra asked all campus units, including centers, to develop plans for 5 percent, 10 percent, and 15 percent budget cuts. Coniglio said the university made the decisions to “ensure the student experience remains a priority.”
Lightfoot and Lippencott told Campus Reform that the center serves as a platform for faculty research and programming that “[challenges] white supremacy, empire, fascism, authoritarianism, corporate capitalism, and other systems of oppression.”
Hofstra’s event listings on both GetInvolved and the university’s calendar show no dialogue-oriented events with conservative speakers or right-leaning student organizations.
Hofstra’s public materials describe several units involved in diversity, equity, and inclusion activities and programming. The university has an Office of Equity and Inclusion, Intercultural Engagement and Inclusion, and an Equity Council within its broader diversity apparatus.
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