Dear Academy Students, Alumni, Faculty, Staff, and Board:

We thought it was important to share an update regarding our efforts related to the call for racial justice at Cranbrook Academy of Art. On June 3, we stated our commitment to create a more diverse and equitable community at the Academy in an open letter to our students, alumni, and staff, and to provide a safe space for sometimes difficult yet enlightening conversations.

Last week, our Artists-in-Residence collectively sent a letter to students, pledging to prioritize questions of diversity and equality through proactive policies and to create change by examining and dismantling systemic racism and implicit bias within the pedagogies, curricula, and recruitment. Thank you all for the important feedback you provided, and we appreciate your patience as we meet internally to formulate some action steps for ourselves as we move forward. Self-reflection, both personally and collectively as an institution, is critical to creating fundamental and lasting change.

We are outraged by the killings of Rayshard Brooks, George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Tony McDade, Timothy Thomas, and so many others, and we demand justice and reform. Their lives mattered. Black Lives Matter.

We acknowledge that systemic racism has been part of the Academy’s history, as it has been for higher education, the art world, and American society for generations, and we have not done enough to dismantle it in meaningful ways. We need to and will educate ourselves, and we are taking immediate steps to create a more diverse institution.

We understand the urgency of this moment. Working closely with our Artists-in-Residence, we will bring in a racial justice facilitator this summer to guide the conversations and help us develop a plan for racial justice on campus with tangible next steps. This work will continue into the fall and include students, staff, AIRs, and Board members. In addition, a racial justice committee will be formed, composed of AIRs, staff, students, and outside participants. This group will examine ways to create racial justice in all aspects of the Academy’s programs and operations and help us all gain a deeper understanding of the issues.

In addition to the plans that will emerge from this collaborative process with the entire Academy community, we commit to the following:

Focus on BIPOC visiting artists and scholars. We have opportunities to bring important conversations and perspectives to the campus through the Visiting Artist program, the Critical Studies Program, the Professional Practices program, guest reviewers, and other special programs. We will continue and increase our efforts to invite diverse voices for these programs.

Reexamine the Academy’s hiring practices. We commit to including people of color on all search committees going forward, and to making a concentrated effort to actively reach out to BIPOC candidates, encouraging them to apply for all Artist-in-Residence and staff positions.

Continue to provide support for the Director’s Fellowship Program. These twelve full-tuition merit fellowships, which began in the 2019-20 academic year, were created explicitly with the goal of creating a more diverse community of talented students at the Academy and are distributed across all of the Academy’s departments. They continue for the 2020-21 year, and we commit to sustained funding going forward.

Increase the involvement of students in Academy administration. In April 2020, we began meeting weekly with the co-presidents of Studio Council to have a more direct connection to the ideas, recommendations, and concerns of the students. We found these meetings to be extremely beneficial, and we look forward to continuing these conversations to increase transparency and give students a broader voice at the Academy. We seek additional opportunities for student input and discussion as well.

Diversify the Cranbrook Academy of Art Board of Governors. In recent years a focused effort has been made to create a more diverse and inclusive Board. The current Board is committed to continuing this responsibility.

These commitments are a beginning, but there is so much more work to do. With the assistance of the racial justice facilitator and through the work of the racial justice committee, our goal is to have a specific plan in place by the fall.

We know that we are an institution that exists in a place of privilege. It is our responsibility to use our position to inspire and make change. And it must start within our own organization. We must and will do better.

We are learning, we are listening, and we will continue to take action. You have our word that we will not stand silently by and continue to accept systemic racism, inequity, and intolerance. We will put in the work and dedicate the resources.

Sincerely,

Susan R. Ewing, the Maxine and Stuart Frankel Director of Cranbrook Academy of Art
Judy Dyki, Director of Academic Programs and Library, Cranbrook Academy of Art