This petition is to address the email sent out on June 1st, 2020 to students at North Central College in light of recent Black victims of police brutality in the United States. Mynk Richardson-Clerk ('20), a Black student at North Central College, faced discrimination, racism, and anti-blackness during her time at the Predominately White Institution (PWI), alongside many other Black students. She played lacrosse at North Central College, and in order to protest police brutality in the U.S., began to take a knee during the national anthem at her lacrosse games. As a result, she faced racist backlash from her teammates, coach, and other members of the North Central College Athletics community and the North Central community as a whole. Below, she outlines her experience, and we join her in demanding that North Central College explicitly and publicly states that Black Lives Matter. In a video posted to her Instagram page, Mynk states the following:

"1. The email would have meant something to Black students and Black alumni if the institution (especially Troy Hammond) had supported me in my protest and actually punished the lacrosse team. Instead, the same girls who gaslit and antagonized me for an entire season got promoted to leadership positions on the team and the Head Coach is still comfortably coaching. Not a single person has been held accountable and the Head Coach has had multiple complaints filed against them. Not just by me. 

2. Yes, an email is necessary to send to the student body, but NCC must also make public statements across any and all social media accounts. NCC advertises black faces on their posters and online posts and accounts, yet they do not publicly acknowledge that our lives matter. Say Black Lives Matter. Say Black students matter, and say it with your chest. If they’re not willing to do that, then they need to remove any and all posts, posters, and marketing material from their website of Black students and athletes. They must stop promoting themselves as a diverse campus that cares at all about Black people. 

3. In these emails, North Central always states what administration has done for campus. The “investments” they’ve made have not been significant. We are not a clearly anti-racist campus. Our campus tolerates and coddles and caters to racists and bigots. Hammond has said so himself. From Hammond down on to the freshmen, it needs to be made crystal clear that Black Lives Matter, Black students matter, Black faculty matter, that Black athletes matter. On top of that, our campus must do better with supporting black students during these traumatic times. 

We should not have to search so desperately for support."

If you are a part of the NCC community as a Black person, a white ally, or a non-Black PoC, please consider joining us in this demand. If you are not part of the community, we still ask that you sign. We refuse to let North Central College continue to tokenize its Black students and other minorities while never saying that their lives matter, that Black Lives Matter.

If you have any stories similar to Mynk's, please share so we can continue to strengthen our demands.

Campaign photo by Noah Cordoba.