Kansas’ Highland Community College can’t fix discrimination without a leadership change | Opinion
Deborah Fox is president of Highland Community College in Highland, Kansas. She is expected to retire at the end of the 2023-24 school year. We see no reason for Fox, who allegedly led a campaign to “make Highland white again,” to remain in a leadership position on campus.
Under her watch, the school has settled multiple racial discrimination lawsuits. Just this week, the United States Department of Justice Civil Rights division settled racial discrimination claims against the two-year community college in Doniphan County.
In the interest of the Highland community, the college’s board of trustees should thank Fox for her service and demand she step down immediately. Would Fox leave on her own accord? Doubtful. Despite evidence of exhibiting racial intolerance, she has remained president of the school.
We reached out to Fox for comment but she did not reply to our messages. Neither did Tom Smith, chair of the school’s board of trustees. In a statement on Highland’s website, Fox wrote: “Our student body is the most important part of the Highland Community College experience. We want to ensure that all students feel welcome to learn, develop, and thrive as they take important steps in their educational journey. Many of the faculty, staff, and Board Members have deep connections to the College and want to pass along that same joy of community to the students. We recognize there is always room for improvement and so we welcome the opportunity to work collaboratively with the Educational Opportunities Section in the future.”
The reasons to doubt Fox’s ability to lead are many. Since she became Highland president in 2019, she has been named in discrimination lawsuits filed by former student-athletes, coaches or employees of the school. Two cases were settled out of court. One is pending in federal court.
Who could forget Fox’s awful comparison of Adolf Hitler’s leadership skills and influence to that of a Black football player’s effect on the Highland team? (“Hitler was a great leader,” she said at the time.) We didn’t.
Fox must go, we wrote after the incident. She later apologized. But today, we repeat our call for a change in leadership.
Last February, Fox told us her contract ran through June 30, 2024, and she has no plans to leave the position. She is expected to retire this summer, according to a recent announcement by the school.
Reform is required at Highland, an encouraging development school that removed Black students from campus for disciplinary reasons at a higher rate than white students, according to the Justice Department.
In prepared statements federal officials said all the right things. But did they let Highland officials off the hook?
Under terms of the agreement, neither the DOJ nor Highland officials admitted that Black students were being forced out of Highland.
Black students sued for discrimination over hairstyles
To deny minority kids were being treated unfairly by school officials would be naive. Three legal settlements tied to racial bias in three years sends a horrible message that Black and other marginalized students aren’t welcome at Highland.
Students like Antoine Thompson, a former Highland football player from Plant City, Florida, were pushed out. In December 2019, athletic department officials told the player he was no longer welcome on campus because of his shoulder-length dreadlocks.
Donmonic Perks Jr. played wide receiver during the 2018 and 2019 seasons. Perks was forced from the school, he claimed in a federal racial discrimination lawsuit. The reason? According to the suit, Perks wore his hair in wicks, a type of dreadlock style worn traditionally by Black men.
Thompson and Perks were two of four Highland student-athletes who sued the school for racial discrimination. In 2020, the school paid each student $12,000 to $15,000 to settle the case.
Attorney Bill Odle represented three women’s basketball coaches who sued the school for trying “to make Highland white again.” That case was settled, too. Odle also represents former Highland employee and football coach Enoch Smith in a federal discrimination lawsuit against Highland.
Olde was encouraged by the DOJ’s settlement. But reform was promised after Highland paid the former athletes, Odle said.
“Not much has changed,” he said.
We knew Black students were being treated unfairly at the school and faced more scrutiny from campus security and Highland police officers than other students, and we said so. Now that the Department of Justice is watching, it is our hope Highland takes the necessary steps to provide all students with a safe and welcoming environment.
But the school’s culture can’t change under Fox’s direction. She has to go.
