A Virginia-based Episcopal seminary has set aside $1.7 million into a fund to pay back reparations to the descendants of slaves that worked on its campus.
The fund is believed to be the first of its kind made by a college or university in the United States. Virginia Theological Seminary is also creating a team to find the descendants of the slaves who built its campus in Alexandria.
“This is a start. As we seek to mark Seminary’s milestone of 200 years, we do so conscious that our past is a mixture of sin as well as grace,” VTS Dean and President Rev. Ian S. Markham said in a statement. “This is the Seminary recognizing that along with repentance for past sins, there is also a need for action.”
Reparations payments will be handled through VTS’s Office of Multicultural Ministries. The school is unsure how many slaves worked to build the campus before it opened its doors in 1823.
“Though no amount of money could ever truly compensate for slavery, the commitment of these financial resources means that the institution’s attitude of repentance is being supported by actions of repentance that can have a significant impact both on the recipients of the funds, as well as on those at VTS,” said Rev. Joseph Thompson, director of the multicultural ministries department.
VTS’s reparations plan is the first any college or university in the U.S. has attempted, according to William A. Darity Jr., a professor and expert on reparations at Duke University.
