April 28, 2021
Dear L&S students and colleagues,
I spent much of the past week reflecting on the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. Like many of you, I feel that justice has been served with the guilty verdict. Along with that sense of relief, however, I recognize that this is just one case. The tragic stories from around the country over the past week remind us of that. This verdict is by no means the end of the struggle, but I fervently hope that it can be an important next step in bending the “arc of the moral universe” towards justice.
We have each processed this moment in our own way. For many members of our L&S community, particularly our BIPOC faculty, staff, and students, the trial brought back the pain, anger, and frustration that was so visceral last summer. This verdict does not take that away, but I hope it provides some healing. Let it also serve as a reminder for all of us that there is much work to do to live up to our ideals as a nation and as a campus community. I will say again, as I did in a message to our students last June, that it is our collective responsibility to do all we can to end systemic racism and injustice.
I do see reasons for hope. I see and feel that hope in the commitment of our faculty, staff and students’ involvement in community efforts leading to real change. I see it in the work of L&S students advocating to make sure our curriculum helps create a more inclusive and welcoming UW-Madison, while preparing our students for success in a diverse world. I feel hope in the energy and work happening in departments across the College to enhance diversity, equity and inclusion on our campus and in their disciplines more broadly, and in the passion of so many alumni who have stepped up to help increase the diversity of our student body and ensure students’ academic success. I am tremendously grateful for this support. This is the work that we, as an L&S community, have begun.
Now is the time to build on it.
As individuals and as a community, let us take this moment to reflect and begin to heal. Let us turn, with renewed energy, to the work of ending systemic racism and injustice and building a truly inclusive and welcoming community.
Eric M. Wilcots
Dean and Mary C. Jacoby Professor of Astronomy
College of Letters & Science
University of Wisconsin-Madison