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Several affinity centers at the University of Idaho have been shut down since the Idaho State Board of Education voted in December to ban diversity, equity and inclusion programming at the state’s institutions of higher education, The Lewiston Tribune reported. The closed centers include the Black/African American Cultural Center, the Office of Multicultural Affairs, the LGBTQA Office and the campus’s 52-year-old Women’s Center.
Some services offered by the Women’s Center will be moved elsewhere, as will its core staff. Its physical office will become a violence prevention space. Students and staff mourned the loss of the Women’s Center at a celebration of its 52nd birthday, which was held shortly after the closure announcement.
“The transition strips away culture and history entirely,” a student and former Women’s Center employee told the Tribune. “We want to be grateful for what is left over and what we are still able to have, while grieving and deeply understanding how dangerous it is to holistically sweep away so many identities and personhood.”
In a brief statement in December, the university said it plans to open “a student engagement center, with a unit specific to first-generation students and their unique needs” in spring 2025.
