The University of Arizona has officially announced the creation of a new cultural and engagement center, a consolidation of six of the universityβs seven cultural centers that comes amid the Trump administrationβs orders to end diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility programs.
As part of the new center, the university will keep the current physical spaces and embedded counselors of the existing cultural centers, officials said in Tuesdayβs announcement, which confirmed the UA plan reported last week by the Arizona Daily Star.
The seventh cultural center, Native American Student Affairs, will be integrated into the Office of Native American Initiatives.
The new center, to be called Student Culture and Engagement Hub, will be a part of a new unit created under the Provostβs Office called Campus Community Connections, which will be led by Jenna Hatcher, a vice provost. Hatcher will serve as a special advisor to new Provost Patricia Prelock, who joined the UA on May 19.
The university has been home to seven cultural centers, including Native American Student Affairs, Asian Pacific American Student Affairs, African American Student Affairs, the Guerrero Student Center, LGBTQ Student Affairs, the Women & Gender Resource Center, and the Disability Cultural Center.
βThe student hub will be led by two directors under the leadership of an executive director who will report to me. Student workers and coordinators will remain in their current roles during the upcoming academic year to ensure continuity of support,β Hatcher said in a university-wide email, without specifying if student workers will retain their roles after the upcoming year.
Each of the cultural and resource centers, or CRCs, currently has individual directors. The centers collectively have about 80 staff members who serve 28,000 students.
Hatcher wrote that administrators worked with numerous faculty, student and staff representatives over the last few months to determine βthe best approach to provide support resources and offer community engagement opportunities that benefit all members of the campus community.β
βWhile we build and evolve this framework, activities, physical spaces, and embedded counselors will remain in place and continue to foster connections and shared purpose across campus,β Hatcher said of the cultural and engagement hub.
Students from the Coalition to Protect Students and Workers hang up signs Tuesday outside of the Martin Luther King Student Center at 1322 E. First St., showing their disappointment in the University of Arizonaβs official announcement that day that cultural and resource centers will be centralized. UA administrators were conducting a meeting with cultural center directors inside the MLK student center at the time.
Prelock and Hatcher will seek input from the campus community to figure out the βbest permanent structureβ for the cultural hub.
βThis new framework is rooted in a collaborative approach that reflects the universityβs values and demonstrates our unwavering commitment to fostering belonging, inclusion and success for every Wildcat,β Prelock said in a written statement.
Since February, faculty, staff and students associated with the cultural centers have organized public statements, a pro-DEIA petition and protests in an attempt to make sure the UA keeps its cultural centers in the face of Trump administration orders to end DEIA or lose federal funding.
The DEIA petition, signed by more than 3,300 at UA, was delivered to university President Suresh Garimellaβs office on March 27.
Garimella did not respond directly to the DEIA petition. He did send a letter to Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen, detailing steps he was taking to eliminate DEIA activities from the UA.
Julian Juan, the director of Native American Student Affairs and a member of the Tohono Oβodham Nation, posted a video Tuesday morning on the cultural and resource centerβs official Instagram page, stating he had just been informed his employment with the UA was terminated.
βThis work, being able to support students, our Native students, to help them achieve their goals, to help them feel like they belong on this campus, has been the most rewarding and beautiful work Iβve ever had the privilege of being a part of,β Juan said.
He had been with the program since 2019 and βhave just grown to love the students, grown to love being able to play a small part of (their) journey, and itβs been such an honor and I felt itβs only right to share with you all the truth,β he said on the video.
A current CRC director, who asked that their name not be used because they fear retaliation, said while they are grateful the current CRC physical spaces, student jobs and coordinator positions will be retained, they are concerned about the workload the coordinators will face after the integration.
βI believe admin underestimates the programming and resources we provide at each location,β they said in a written statement Tuesday. βI also think, after stringing us along for four months, to give directors a short 30-day notice is cruel. So many of us have PTO (paid time off) hours that weβll lose β and who can find a job in 30 days?β
Lynn Nadel is one of more than 60 UA Regents professors and distinguished professors who sent a letter to Garimella earlier this year asking him to defend the universityβs core principles as the Trump administration targets universities with ideological demands and funding losses. Nadel said Tuesday he sees the cultural resources plan as βa compromise solution that buys time to plan collaboratively going forward.β He also said it was a good start for Prelockβs provostship.
But Leila Hudson, chair of the UA faculty, said the announcement βmeans that there is still much critical work to be done to restore the feelings of belonging, support, and safety for all students.β
βFiring Director Julian Juan and subordinating the vibrant Native American Student Association (NASA) to the office of Native American Initiatives (which has not prioritized serving studentsβ needs) ... was a particularly ill-advised move that faculty governance leadership would have strongly opposed had we been included in these important discussions about student success,β Hudson wrote to the Star Tuesday.
βWhile the plan for the preservation of inclusive spaces and adequately staffed counseling services is welcome, students have not been part of the decision-making process. Faculty governance leadership has reached out to both student leaders and the provostβs office to offer facilitation of future discussions,β Hudson said.
