The American Association of University Professors (AAUP) will be releasing a report in early 2022 with the results of an investigation into structural racism and alleged violations of shared governance in the University of North Carolina (UNC) system.  

Earlier this fall, AAUP announced that a special committee will be looking into the UNC Board of Trustees’ widely publicized mishandling of the tenure case of the Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times journalist, Nikole Hannah-Jones. The controversy over her conflict with UNC sparked a national debate related to race and academic freedom.  Hannah-Jones’s work on the ground-breaking 1619 Project has become a lightening rod for highly politicized debates around US history and slavery. 

The AAUP noted that the committee will also consider “the influence of the gerrymandered state legislature on the systemwide board of governors and campus boards of trustees and look at how the use of political pressure has obstructed meaningful faculty participation in the UNC system.”