The University of Maryland suspended its club tennis team pending an investigation after the Howard University team said its president found imagery resembling Ku Klux Klan hoods in material emailed before a tournament last weekend.
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The Howard University club tennis team said its president, Toni Rachal, discovered imagery resembling pointed Ku Klux Klan hoods in a Google document that the University of Maryland club tennis team emailed to teams participating in its fall invitational last Saturday and Sunday.
The images appeared beneath the University of Maryland club tennis team logo and replaced portions of the Crossland coat of arms on the Maryland flag, the Howard club said. Howard University is a private, historically Black college in Washington, D.C.
“The imagery is a recognizable symbol of white supremacy, organized hate, and violence,” the Howard club said in a statement Monday.
The university said the graphic targeted Black people and was emailed to club tennis teams at other universities in the region to promote the weekend tournament in College Park, where the University of Maryland is located.
“The University of Maryland is horrified and expresses its regret and sincere apology for the harm that this has caused,” university spokesperson Jordan Dunklee said in a statement.
The university said its police department had been notified. Although only a few club members may have been directly involved, University of Maryland Recreation and Wellness suspended the entire club pending an investigation by the Office of Student Conduct.
The suspension caused the club to forfeit its tournament matches. The university said the club’s student leaders also met with captains of other teams in the tournament to accept responsibility for the club’s actions.
Howard club members confronted the University of Maryland Club Tennis Executive Board after discovering the image, according to the Howard club’s statement. The university subsequently removed the graphic, suspended the club and sent a general apology to participating teams.
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“The HU Tennis Club team firmly believes that what UMD has done to remedy the situation is not enough,” the club said. “True accountability has yet to come.”
The Howard club called for a public apology to Howard University and its tennis team, an investigation into who created the document, sensitivity training for University of Maryland club leaders and advisers, and a donation of tournament proceeds to the National Museum of African American History and Culture.
Patti Perillo, the university’s vice president for student affairs, contacted the University of Maryland’s Black Student Union on Sunday morning, the group said in a statement posted on social media.
“We appreciate the university’s swift response, including issuing an indefinite team suspension and referring the matter to the Office of Student Conduct,” the group said.
The group said, however, that administrative action alone could not undo the effect on Black students.
“Racism disguised as student programming is not an accident or a victimless oversight; it is a direct assault on the dignity, safety, and belonging of our students,” the group said.
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