- Students claimed that Sheng gave no cultural context or content warnings prior to showing the movie.
- Sheng sent an email later the same day apologizing for showing the movie, which he said “was racially insensitive and outdated.” He said he understands he lost his students’ trust due to the incident.
- UM’s School of Music, Theater and Dance Dean David Gier sent an email to the department on Sept. 15 that the incident was being investigated for discrimination by Effort Certification Reporting Technology (ECRT).
- “From the bottom of my heart, I would like to say that I am very sorry for what happened,” he wrote in an email to MLive/The Ann Arbor News earlier this month.
- Sheng is currently a private music tutor, said UM spokesman Rick Fitzgerald. But he is still not teaching his fall seminar class.
- In his first email, Sheng mentioned working with people of color in the past to show he does not discriminate “against any race,” which worsened his position with students and faculty.
- “Professor Sheng responded to these events by crafting an inflammatory ‘apology’ letter to the department’s students in which he chose to defend himself by listing all of the BIPOC individuals who he has helped or befriended throughout his career,” an open letter read.
- However, nearly 700 faculty and staff signed an separate open letter addressed to Gier which called for Sheng’s reinstatement, according to UM’s student newspaper The Michigan Daily.
- UM’s Title IX office for discrimination also reviewed Sheng.
- However, Sheng was notified that the university was dropping the ECRT investigation on Oct. 19. The university did not explain why they dropped the review.
- “The ECRT office evaluates any reported concern which alleges any form of discrimination or discriminatory harassment in order to adequately and appropriately determine whether follow up is necessary,” UM spokeswoman Kim Broekhuizen said.
- However, it will “not be taking any action on the reported manner,” she added.