The Pioneer Press (Josh Verges) studies:
The adjunct professor accused of Islamophobia for exhibiting art work at school that depicted the Prophet Muhammad filed a lawsuit towards Hamline College on Tuesday as Hamline’s president conceded the college mishandled the controversy.
Professor Erika Lopez Prater is suing the college in Ramsey County District Court docket for defamation, breach of contract and non secular discrimination, amongst different claims….
David Everett, affiliate vice chairman of inclusive excellence, despatched a Nov. 7 electronic mail to all workers and college students saying an incident had taken place in a web based class that was “undeniably thoughtless, disrespectful and Islamophobic.”
Individually, Dean of College students Patti Kersten known as Lopez Prater’s resolution to indicate the art work “an act of intolerance,” in keeping with The Oracle, the coed newspaper that first reported on the controversy.
And, in a Dec. 9 electronic mail to workers, Everett and President Fayneese Miller stated that “respect for the observant Muslim college students in that classroom ought to have outmoded tutorial freedom.” …
[The complaint argued that the school discriminated against Lopez Prater] by imposing the Muslim scholar’s “interpretation of Islam on all Hamline workers and college students.” …
The article additionally quotes a press release launched as we speak by Hamline President Fayneese Miller and Board of Trustees Chair Ellen Watters, which stated:
Hamline is a multi-cultural, multi-religious neighborhood that has been a pacesetter in creating area for civil conversations. Like all organizations, typically we misstep….
Within the curiosity of listening to from and supporting our Muslim college students, language was used that doesn’t replicate our sentiments on tutorial freedom. Primarily based on all that now we have realized, now we have decided that our utilization of the time period ‘Islamophobic’ was due to this fact flawed. We strongly assist tutorial freedom for all members of the Hamline neighborhood….
We’ve realized a lot from the numerous students, non secular leaders and thinkers from around the globe on the complexity of displaying photos of the Prophet Muhammad. We’ve come to extra totally perceive the differing opinions that exist on this matter inside the Muslim neighborhood. And, we welcome the chance, together with our college students and the broader neighborhood, to hear and be taught extra. We, like our increased training companions, wish to do extra to indicate that tutorial freedom and scholar assist are each integral to the very cloth of who we’re.
