The Muslim Law Students Association (MLSA) wrote a letter Feb. 28 to Georgetown University Law Center (GULC) administrators calling for action to address one professor’s racist and Islamophobic class conduct.
The letter — which has garnered signatures from 286 Georgetown students, almost 30 student organizations and 24 non-GULC bar associations as of March 3 — asks for increased administrative representation and curriculum changes. The letter describes discriminatory conduct toward Muslim students by Susan Deller Ross, a tenured professor who teaches courses in international and comparative law on women’s human rights and is the director of the International Women’s Human Rights Clinic.
The authors of the letter, which were a group of MLSA members, gathered information from decades of coursework in Ross’ classes, citing dozens of excerpts from the required textbook she authored and exam questions she wrote. The authors wrote that the content they gathered represents a holistic picture of Ross’ racist and Islamophobic beliefs.
The letter requests that Ross’ course curriculum be modified and reviewed by a Muslim expert, according to Hamsa Fayed (LAW ’23), a member of MLSA.
“It is quite clear from our 17-page memo and content of our statement that Prof. Ross is not able to objectively evaluate any question relating to Muslims and their practice without injecting dangerously Islamophobic rhetoric into her teachings/examinations, thus we also ask that she refrain from the use of those topics in her class lectures and examinations,” Fayed wrote to The Hoya.
MLSA’s demands include mandating anti-Islamophobia and anti-discrimination specific training for all GULC faculty, reserving a seat for an MLSA representative on the committee that appoints GULC faculty, and creating a clear and direct internal system for students to anonymously file complaints for the administration to investigate.
Past coursework that MLSA marked as promoting islamophobic rhetoric included a 2020 exam that asked students to advocate for the Hindutva Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), an extremist right-wing party responsible for mass lynchings of Muslims in India and Kashmir.
The exam question distressed and harmed many students, according to MLSA member Maheen Haq (LAW ’23).
“How do you expect someone like a Muslim person to take that exam?” Haq said in an interview with The Hoya. “Members of my family have died and you’d be expected to take this exam and advocate on behalf of a party that has done lynchings of your community.”
Ross said her coursework does not specifically target Muslim students and focuses on international and human rights law.
“My courses and casebook sections concerning discrimination against women in marriage,
divorce, and inheritance cover many statutes, whether they stem from the Catholic, Protestant,
Mormon, Jewish, Muslim, or Hindu religion or from ethnic customs or from cultural beliefs that
women should be subordinate to men,” Ross wrote to The Hoya. “I am not against any religion or ethnicity.”
Being forced to argue on behalf of Islamophobic laws and rules, as the letter states Ross encourages students to do in the clinic, could cause students to begin applying those ideas to their careers and lives, Haq said.
“This will influence your policy choices, it’s going to influence how you do so many different things,” Haq said. “For example, she asked students to advocate against the right for women to wear a hijab, and she taught students how to use international doctrines and treaties to make that argument. That’s just sick.”
Fayed felt as though she had to act against her beliefs and morals in order to perform well in Ross’ clinic, according to a video posted on the GULC MLSA instagram page.
“This all really tore me apart after a while especially since a lot of those stances were fundamentally against my belief systems and my identity as a human rights advocate,” Fayed said in the video. “I was ashamed of myself, ashamed to call myself an advocate for social justice, ashamed to be a Muslim, ashamed that I wasn’t defending myself as a proud Muslim, ashamed of what I had enabled from being silent, ashamed that I feared speaking out because I was the only one in the room that felt this way, ashamed that those fellow students would invalidate me because I was a nobody in comparison to the decorated and accomplished professor Susan Ross.”
Jinan Chehade (LAW ’23), another member of MLSA who raised concerns about Ross’ insensitive course content alongside Haq, said the administration did not provide an adequate response.
GULC prioritizes making classrooms inclusive environments with respectful dialogue, according to William Treanor, dean of GULC.
“We received the letter and have been in touch with the student leaders and individuals involved,” Treanor wrote in an email to The Hoya. “Georgetown Law is committed to ensuring an inclusive campus that welcomes students of all backgrounds.”
MLSA’s letter follows a series of student activism against racist conduct from faculty members at GULC. The GULC administration placed Ilya Shapiro, a prospective administrator, on administrative leave Jan. 31 pending investigation from the Law Center following racist and sexist tweets about President Biden’s pledge to nominate the first Black female Supreme Court justice. The decision followed a Jan. 28 statement released by the Georgetown Law Black Law Student Association (Georgetown BLSA), urging GULC to to rescind Shapiro’s job offer, commit to a more thorough hiring process, properly staff the Office of Diversity and Inclusion, ensure the representation of Black students when it comes to hiring decisions and fund an endowment to support Black GULC students.
Professor Franz Werro referred to a student Feb. 10 using an anti-Asian slur, prompting the GULC Asian Pacific American Law Students Association (APALSA) and the Georgetown China Law Society (GCLS) to urge the GULC to hold mandatory implicit bias training for professors and to discipline staff and faculty. In March 2021, Black students and faculty at GULC demanded institutional change after a viral video captured professor Sandra Sellers making racist comments about Black students in her course.
In light of recent controversies at GULC, as well as Ross’ course and clinic, some members of MLSA ask that Islam be taught within accurate and objective contexts at GULC, according to Fayed.
“We want her course curriculums to be modified to be more sensitive to POC cultures and the Islamic faith through the use of a Muslim expert to review the curriculum,” Fayed wrote.
Haq said she ultimately decided to forfeit the opportunity to learn in a clinic she is interested in because of the racism she found in Ross’ curriculum. According to Haq, she is not the only Muslim student who was hesitant to participate in Ross’ course or clinic.
Nearly 50% of Muslims living in the United States experienced some form of discrimination in the past year, including being treated with suspicion, called offensive names and singled out by law enforcement, according to 2017 data from the Pew Research Center.
MLSA’s letter also demands that Ross’ grading systems change so that personal biases cannot influence student grades, according to Fayed.
“What we are asking for is simple: removing Prof. Ross from any student evaluation position where her biases and prejudices would negatively affect POC and Muslim students,” Fayed wrote. “The non-blinding grading system does not protect POC and Muslim students at all from Prof. Ross’s inherent prejudices and racism.”
Chehade said that the Islamophobic tactics Ross uses in her curriculum would result in further discrimination if left unchecked by the university.
“It really starts here in the classroom, when we continue to be silent about these blatant forms of racism, when we continue to be passive and say, ‘This is normal,’” Chehade said.
kristin • Jun 12, 2022 at 6:59 pm
Keep erasing – I will keep speaking. It’s time that that her patterns be broadcast – they go BACK DECADES. Deller Ross has no understanding or compassion outside Title VII.
kristin • Jun 12, 2022 at 6:57 pm
My post was removed. I had Deller Ross in two classes in 94 and 95 – both were still horror stories engrained on my mind, even now. I wrote a beautiful long paper on immigration guidelines in the US based on gender persecution and Ross tried to tear it apart – after waiting to grade it for almost a year – and her incomplete – due to her inability to grade – cost me a job offer. Then in her clinic, she drug me all year asking me to do all kinds of extra work because I was disabled – holding my grade over my head to blackmail me to do it. She even shoved me in court, and told me my disability was something that I was “faking.” I should have had her arrested for assault AND filed a complaint for gender/disability bias. Don’t be fooled by her. She uses feminism to advance her own career while she rapes the minds and spirits of students who are different than she is – and fawns over a few select favorites. She falls back on the notion that she is “tenured.” I am not muslim and I would characterize her as a bigot against the disabled as well as in general an intolerant person. She is a self-aggrandizer and creates a lot of harm in her ability to broadcast her name in the supposed “help” she has done for other women. I would guess she has done more harm than good. I congratulate the student above for having the nerve to speak out. Ross is a nightmare and I am sorry to hear her reign of terror continues. She absolutely destroyed my time at Georgetown, never got my recommendations out – and then denied me a fellowship. I have gone on to practice and was even a judge, but still carry her scars.
Kristin • Jun 12, 2022 at 6:21 pm
Ross is a bigot in many ways. I took her clinic in 1995 before she published her book and she took her stress out on us … esp. me. The year before she took a year to grade a paper and look up every single footnote. I am disabled and have an invisible disability and she told me I was “faking it.” She even shoved me in court .. I should have had her arrested. She never finished my recommendations, then denied my entrance to a fellowship. Ross uses feminism to advance herself only and cares nothing about individual women or students. She’s a terror and a nightmare and it’s a shame her reign is allowed to continue. She is, quite simply, a terrible human being.
Ahmad • Mar 25, 2022 at 4:10 pm
No aspect of the comments in support of the professor make sense. Here is an example of why. According to Donald Trump, those persons — especially Blacks who accused him of being a racist — were the real racists. Those who supported him not only agreed, but also supported and defended Trump. Who were these persons? Many were white nationalists.
I believe the students. First, Muslims in professional school tend to aspire to just fit in, integrate into their academic settings, and avoid virtually anything that would bring attention to them. They usually quietly endure institutional insults and encourage other to do the same. They endure harms. They don’t raise controversy. Rarely will they respond with demands, sans instances when they seek to address a material harm.
Second, the professor’s assignments are both unusual and unbalancing. A core principal of legal training is teach a student to, “argue both sides”. This is not just the practice of law school, but also one of its mandates. Related, for examination and papers, students are asked to weigh the merits of both side and reach a conclusion. These exercises can be fun because they stimulate debate and students’ knowledge of a subject matter.
Never, not ever should a law professor instruct a student to argue against the religious or cultural practices of a people — especially if those persons are either Muslim or Jewish. To do so is an abjectly racist practice. For certain, the exercise itself is intended to cause harm.
The student’s response was moderated. They expressed their harm and, “proffered” an occasion for Susan Ross, and indeed GT Law, to make amends. I especially applaud their efforts because, even after being harmed, they only sought that their law school fix things going forward.
Georgetown U Law is now at a place where it can right a wrong. It should suspend Ross from teaching. It may seek to get her placed at a law school in Israel. There, her anti-Muslim speech and practices will be received without controversy. Or they can encourage her affiliated research and advocacy organisations to fire her.
The law should also undergo changes in its hiring practices. It should encourage younger Muslim lawyers to teach at the school. This may lead to the law school fixing the racist biases threat seem to have overwhelmed its Muslim (and, likely other) student populations. It may also result in GT law benefitting. At a minimum, its students would learn how to argue both sides.
Having evidence of Ross’ decade long patterns of harming and speaking against the cultural and religious practices of Muslims, Georgetown need only do the right thing this time around. Have her to step down from ever teaching students again.
LarryC • Mar 17, 2022 at 3:50 pm
This sounds like a personal attack by Haq and Fayed. Do they really think anywhere in America that a university is going to submit a syllabus to a “Muslim expert” for review before teaching. I you think that is going to happen, then GULC or for than matter any American University is not for them. In addition to the separation of church and state there is a concept called academic freedom that allows professors to address issues that are of consequence, and that does includes religions. Religious wars have been the most heinous events in history, murdering people in untold numbers for some infraction against the belief. And its not just wars, it is the day to day religious oppression of those who choose not to comply or voice an opposition. If Haq and Fayed don’t think that is a subject they can intellectually discuss, then perhaps they either don’t have the intellectual capacity to engage in debate, or they are themselves such zealots demanding ‘their rights’ be accommodated they do not belong in the legal profession. GULC has a diversity of students wanting to become lawyers. If Haq and Fayed cannot articulate a position that shows where Ross is violating a law in her teachings, then perhaps they are not suited to the legal profession. I certainly wouldn’t want to find out a lawyer I’ve hired to defend me would let religion or anything else stand the way of a full throated defense.
This foolish complaint should be dismissed. And if the complainants are not satisfied, perhaps they should be as well.
hoyalum2 • Mar 7, 2022 at 1:31 pm
“Students leads charge against female professor (and director of the International Women’s Human Rights Clinic) for teaching women’s rights material” is playing differently in the campus press than one would have imagined.
Of course anyone who was offended by the way Professor Ross teaches her class should be heard. I hope this professor takes this feedback in good faith and reassesses whether she is presenting culturally sensitive material in a sophisticated way.
But of course, the men who run Georgetown should stand up for the right of an accomplished feminist professors to speak about women’s rights, and ignore this outrageous demand to submit her writings to the approval of religious authorities.
And, setting subjective experiences for the moment, the rest of this complaint is absurd. Any decent law student should be able to see through it.
The supposedly offensive exam questions? They’re all extremely normal legal case questions, in which students are challenged to explain how they would represent a particular client taking a particular stand on a women’s rights issue. Yes, some of these stands are controversial, like the French ban on wearing religious dress in classrooms. But don’t Georgetown Law students realize that, as aspiring lawyers, they may need to represent clients who hold controversial positions, even some they may not agree with? Don’t they understand that learning how to do that is … the point of law school?
The answer, I think, is that they do understand, but they are trying to make mountains out of molehills to tar a professor who (understandably) rubbed them the wrong way by loudly and unapologetically standing up for women’s rights around the world. They’re entitled to their discomfort, but if they don’t recognize the regressive precedent they are trying to set, I hope Georgetown Law leadership does.
hoyalum • Mar 4, 2022 at 12:02 pm
When did GU Law become such a rancid pit of hate and racism?
Ben G • Mar 4, 2022 at 11:04 am
I happen to know Professor Ross and know she’s absolutely against bigotry & religious intolerance. When Trump was running for office and proposed the Muslim ban she was horrified. She’s against practices that subjugate & harm women. That’s her passion. Not hatred. The students go speak with her directly about what they see as bias, discuss how they see the issues, and both parties can try to better understand each other. It’s cruel to paint her in this light, as she’s spent her long career trying to better the lives of many people, Muslims included.