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Over a year after it was announced, one of the recommendations from the Living Our Values Task Force is now coming to fruition: UTD is getting two new minors. Formed in the summer of 2020 after calls from the Black Student Body for reform, the Task Force developed recommendations for administration to address racial equity and justice issues on campus. One of the recommendations was the creation of an African American and African Diaspora Studies department.

Over a year after it was announced, one of the recommendations from the Living Our Values Task Force is now coming to fruition: UTD is getting two new minors. Formed in the summer of 2020 after calls from the Black Student Body for reform, the Task Force developed recommendations for administration to address racial equity and justice issues on campus. One of the recommendations was the creation of an African American and African Diaspora Studies department.

Crash course: trends in automobile accidents

Anjali Singh spends an hour a day, five days a week, enjoying her commute from Plano to UTD. But after witnessing several recent car crashes along Waterview Parkway, the computer science freshman said that she has become much more vigilant while driving as her commute is starting to feel more dangerous.

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of 2021 than in all of 2019. Moreover, a direct comparison of September 2021 to September 2019 reveals nearly 20% more crashes with injuries, despite a comparable number of overall traffic accidents.

UTD Police Lieutenant Jesus Gonzales, who is responsible for investigating motor vehicle accidents on campus, said that Waterview Parkway is one of the busiest streets near campus. The road is used by thousands of UTD commuters a day to enter and exit campus; as a result, it is a prime

DAVID MORRIS | COURTESY

in African American and African Dispora Studies, Ethnic Studies availible in Spring '22

While A&H already offers minors in Asian Studies and Latin American Studies, other universities in the North Texas area like UNT and UTA have also been offering African American Studies for years.

In addition to AAADS, ATEC is

AAADS, the Ethnic Studies minor complements the work of AAADS, ensuring that the University's curricula are serving a hugely diverse student body,” she said.

“This minor, along with AAADS, addresses the student demand for curricula that reflects the diverse knowledges and histories of our students.” launching an Ethnic Studies minor. Peter Park, associate professor emeritus of the History of Ideas, initiated the discussion about creating the minor years ago, and Olivia Banner, associate professor of critical media studies, co-authored the proposal. Her research and teaching concern race, disability and gender in relation to digital health.

While individual schools have offered courses related to Ethnic Studies prior to this, the minor includes an Introduction to Ethnic Studies course that coheres the disparate courses.

“The formation of the minor also ensures that faculty will stay attentive to the interventions in established fields of knowledge that Ethnic Studies has made in the past 50 years and will deliver these interventions to the students who want to hear more about them,” Banner said. The minor will not be siloed to one school; available coursework will be drawn from four of the University’s seven schools: A&H, ATEC, EPPS and IS.

“The importance of the minor was articulated by the Black Student Body’s letter to President Benson. Although the letter specified the students' desire for

“Prescribed electives for this minor include courses in Arts and Humanities, like arts, literature, history and philosophy; ATEC, like media and technology, including the arts; Interdisciplinary Studies’ American Studies; and EPPS, like sociology, geography and political science, for example,” Banner said. “In conversation with other faculty, the co-architects of this minor presume the formation of the mi-

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