The prestigious lawn rooms, once a place for a UVA class to house and display the best of its students, have been co-opted by a vocal activist class. One student living there, angry with the administration for not restructuring the school’s Academical Village—part of a Unesco World Heritage site—in light of her temporary ankle injury, affixed a “F— UVA” sign to her door and listed the reasons the school is awash in bigotry: “UVA operating costs—KKKops, Genocide, Slavery, Disability, Black and Brown Life.” Within a week, probably half the students living in the lawn rooms had the same “F— UVA” signs and systematic-racism banners pinned to their doors. That is their right, but I wonder why so many of the students selected as the university’s top scholars and leaders believe displaying obscenities on their doors, simply because someone else did, will lead to productive dialogue and improved race relations.

Thomas Jefferson wanted UVA to create statesmen to lead our republic. But critical race theory is divisive, and its teachings don’t prepare my generation to lead a diversifying America. It engenders distrust and tribalism, and leaves no room for forgiveness. It’s a “F— you” sign to people who believe progress and healing is possible, expressing a preference for wallowing in past misdeeds and keeping us in eternal cycle of discrimination.

— Katherine Hennessy, University of Virginia, math