A staff member at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire sued her employer claiming that she was demoted from her position in the school’s diversity office for “being white.”
According to the New York Post, staff member Rochelle Hoffman was previously promoted to interim director of the university’s Multicultural Student Services office. After this change occurred, allegedly, the school’s former Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity and Student Affairs Olga Diaz was told by students that a white woman should not be in the position (via NYP):
“You hired a white woman as the Interim Director?” one student was cited in a federal complaint against the university.
Per the complaint, another student asked, “Do you personally feel white staff can do as effective a job as a person of color, within a space for people of color?”
Hoffman said she felt compelled to resign last year after eight months of intense hostility and staff questioning her “legitimacy” after being promoted to interim director of the campus’s Multicultural Student Services office, the complaint states.
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“Despite Hoffman’s exceptional qualifications, however, students, faculty and staff opposed her appointment to Interim Director of MSS solely because she was white,” the complaint claims. “It was exclusively Hoffman’s identity as white that was the issue; criticism was about her race and color, not her qualifications.”
In a statement to Fox News, the university said: “As is the case with all pending litigation, UW-Eau Claire will not offer a statement or comment on the lawsuit. UW-Eau Claire does not discriminate based on race in any employment decisions.”
According to Wisconsin Public Radio, Hoffman worked at the university's Bluegold Beginnings for six years before the promotion. The office served “underrepresented, low-income and first-generation college students.”
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"The affinity model that had been in use at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire was premised on the idea that for a student to be well served, they needed to be assigned a coordinator of the same ethnic background and that a white person could not adequately support a student of color," the lawsuit reportedly claims. And, she allegedly faced retaliation after filing an earlier complaint with the university.
Hoffman reportedly “pleaded her case” with Republican state Sen. Patrick Testin.
"I think it is important for good educators to bring light to some of the blatant actions of racial discrimination against white folks that are happening at UW Universities — and contributing to the current hostile environment around the UW System,” she wrote. Hoffman now works as an academic advising coordinator for the university.
"This experience dragged out over 10 months and irrevocably damaged my career," Hoffman added. "On a regular basis there are great educators that are told they shouldn't occupy multicultural space, to check their white privilege, passed over for jobs for an outside candidate of color, and reminded they are 'inherently racist' because they are white."
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