Professor’s Lawsuit Alleges University Forced Antiracist Trainings About ‘White English’ And ‘Race-Based Dogma’
Kate Anderson on June 27, 2023
A former professor at Pennsylvania State University (Penn State) filed a lawsuit in June against the school and multiple officials for forcing him to attend “antiracist” workshops where he was allegedly discriminated against and educated on the evils of “white English,” according to the court document.
Zach De Piero, a former English professor at Penn State’s Abington campus from 2018 to 2022, filed the lawsuit on June 14 with The Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism, alleging that the school discriminated against him because of his race and his objections to “race-based dogma.” During his tenure, De Piero allegedly was told he should “seek mental health support” by university faculty and forced to watch a video that claimed “white English … kills people of color,” according to the lawsuit.
In October 2020, faculty were told to watch a video titled “White Teachers are a Problem,” which detailed how seemingly innocent things like correcting grammar could actually be a form of violence because “white English … kills people of color,” according to the lawsuit.
The issues reportedly began two years earlier when Associate English Professor and Chair of the English Department Liliana Naydan called out De Piero for not being a registered Democrat in Sept. 2018, according to the lawsuit, which cited him as being an independent. Naydan also sent De Piero and other staffers an email several months later explaining that faculty should always monitor grading for racial disparities.
“Racist structures are quite real in assessment and elsewhere regardless of the good intentions that teachers and scholars bring to the set-up of those structures,” Naydan allegedly wrote, according to the lawsuit. “For me, the racism is in the results if the results draw a color line.”
Professor Zack K. DePiero is suing his former employer, @penn_state, on the grounds of discrimination based on skin color.
“(FAIR) is publicizing and financially supporting DePiero’s case…”
Learn more @insidehighered: https://t.co/wfRDXuxrP1
— Foundation Against Intolerance & Racism (FAIR) (@fairforall_org) June 26, 2023
Following the death of George Floyd in 2020, the university held a meeting for faculty on June 5 with then Assistant Vice Provost for Educational Equity Alina Wong, who is listed as a defendant, according to the lawsuit. During the meeting, Wong talked about “systemic racism” and “police supremacy” and, toward the end, asked faculty to perform a breathing exercise.
“Wong identified white faculty as somehow privileged because they could ‘breathe’ while George Floyd could not,” the lawsuit reads. “Wong identified ‘those of us with privileged racial identities’ who ‘need to sit in it longer’ and she led the faculty in a breathing exercise in which she instructed the ‘White and non-Black people of color to hold it a little longer — to feel the pain.’”
De Piero filed several reports with the administration and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Despite this, De Piero alleges that his concerns were dismissed and that he was told to attend more “‘antiracist’ workshops,” before being given a negative performance review leading to him resigning his position in August 2022, according to the lawsuit.
A Penn State spokesperson told the Daily Caller News Foundation that the university “does not generally comment on pending litigation.”
Wong, Nayden and De Piero’s attorney did not immediately respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.
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