I DIDN’T TAKE A COVID VACCINE. I SHOULDN’T LOSE MY JOB.

As a young Black woman, I struggled to find strong role models in mathematics who looked like me. Now, as a professor of mathematics and the director of the math center at San Diego City College, I understand the importance of inclusion and belonging in higher education because of my lived experience.

Growing up in Southeast San Diego with a single mother who raised three children without a high school diploma, we faced challenges. Just walking to school, I encountered homelessness, crime and drugs. My mother always encouraged me, saying, “I want you to be like me, but better.” It wasn’t until I enrolled in community college that I finally found a place where I felt I belonged and began to believe in myself. In 2016, my mother was so inspired by my academic success that she decided to go back to school and get her high school diploma. Now, she is a student at San Diego City College, where I am a professor. To say I understand the needs and experiences of students at San Diego City College is an understatement.

As a pregnant woman with a high-risk pregnancy, I am facing a new challenge. The San Diego Community College District is threatening me with termination unless I receive the COVID-19 vaccine, which is in stark contrast to many other institutions of higher education that have accommodated their employees’ legal, religious and medical exemptions. Last year, after a decline in enrollment, the San Diego Community College District dropped the COVID-19 vaccine requirement for students, but it has not been dropped for faculty and staff.

On Jan. 19, the San Diego Community College Board of Trustees terminated three employees for noncompliance with the COVID-19 vaccine mandate. On March 2, the Board of Trustees plans to terminate me and five of my colleagues. At the board meeting, I will have only five minutes to defend my life’s work and my livelihood. Why is the San Diego Community College District denying its employees the same civil rights and accommodations it affords its students?

The answer from Chancellor Carlos Cortez is, “We prioritize the health and safety of our employees. We have no intention of changing this policy moving forward.”

During a Board of Trustees meeting on Dec. 15, Jim Mahler, the president of the American Federation of Teachers Union Local 1931 and a supporter of the vaccine mandate for faculty, joked that Chancellor Cortez should be recognized “for his efforts to get into ‘The Guinness Book of World Records’ for the individual with the most contracted variants of COVID.” I was there to speak at the board meeting to defend my career. It was painful to hear how Board of Trustees members laughed and clapped for the chancellor testing positive for COVID-19 multiple times at the same time Chancellor Cortez says that people like me are “posing an unnecessary risk to others” because of my vaccination status.

But Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Protection, said on Aug. 6, 2021, that “what they [COVID-19 vaccines] can’t do anymore is prevent transmission.” And a year later, on Aug. 11, the CDC updated its COVID-19 guidance to approach exposures the same regardless of vaccination status. It seems the San Diego Community College District has painted itself into a corner and is willing to sacrifice the civil rights of its employees.

There is a stereotype that people who are hesitant about vaccines must be red hatwearing White Republicans, which is a sweeping generalization that attempts to erase my deeply held religious beliefs as a Black woman and a Christian. Other faculty members slated for termination come from diverse backgrounds, including a Muslim female doctor of psychology, a Latina single mother and an immigrant who has worked for the district for 33 years. The district is telling us that we no longer belong because of our deeply held religious and moral convictions. Are freedoms of religious belief no longer part of the diversity that this institution claims to embrace?

It’s time for the district to live up to its commitment to diversity, inclusion and equity. By accommodating its employees’ legal religious and deeply held beliefs, the district can create a workplace that truly values and respects all its employees. We should not have to choose between our beliefs and our livelihoods.

It is no longer 2020 anymore, or even 2021, when we knew so little about COVID-19. Gov. Gavin Newsom is ending California’s COVID-19 state of emergency on Feb. 28, and I am slated to be terminated on March 2. COVID-19 vaccine mandates have been struck down in courts, repealed or voluntarily sunsetted. COVID-19 can no longer be used to deny basic human rights and freedom.

I hope that the district will listen to my voice and the voices of my colleagues, and take action to create a more inclusive and accommodating workplace. As a Black woman in higher education, I know the importance of finding a place where you belong and I want to continue to be there for the students I have devoted my life to in the community. Let’s work together to ensure that everyone, regardless of their beliefs, can find that place at San Diego Community Colleges.