St. Olaf Biology is committed to Anti-racism, Equity, and Inclusion
While today we hope that biological inquiry offers pathways to mitigate racism and injustice, the field of biology has been the source of misinformation used to justify unequal treatment of humans. Socially constructed human races have historical roots in the work of biologists, but we now know they are not biologically based. The boom of human genomic data in the past 20 years continues to show that socially constructed race does not correspond to the genetic variation observed in populations of people on the earth. While race is a social concept, systemic racism continues to harm people of color in countless ways, including negatively impacting health outcomes and creating obstacles to career advancement in the sciences.
The Biology Department affirms the pain that racism has inflicted within our community and acknowledges that the department has played a role in this pain. We share students’ passion for ending marginalization and building an anti-racist, biology community here at St. Olaf.