What was intended to be a civil petition requesting to diversify student literary options by including Black authors on a literature syllabus, turned out to be the perfect situation for British publication to create some "fake news". How unfortunate. 
Over 150 Cambridge University students joined together to write a compelling open letter to their English department, hoping to incite positive change. That change would be the decolonization of the reading selection for the term. Students believe it is both fitting and necessary for Black authors to be added to the syllabus and wanted to challenge the institution to be more diverse and inclusive in course material as they are diverse in student population.
One student who took lead on this formal request, Lola Olufemi, has been used to push the fake race news agenda, her face alone being plastered on the covers of newspapers with headlines reading “student forces Cambridge to drop white authors,” inciting a race war that was never intended. 

Supporters of the student-led petition have voiced their opinions of disdain via social media. One, in particular, being a Cambridge lecturer who sided with the students from the beginning. Priyamvada Gopal, a senior English lecturer at the university, told BuzzFeed News she believed the media took a "fairly innocent, responsible, letter from students to stir up a racial panic." Others have expressed similar dissent.

Olufemi even chimes in, retweeting a post from the university itself demonstrating its support of the petition and condemning the news articles attempting to make it a race issue.

Although no change to the literature options for the university has occurred yet, Olufemi and her peers are continuing their mission with little regard for the failed media attention to defame their right and cause. We stand in support of equal opportunity within education and fair curriculum.

Black literatureBlack-educationCambridge University