The Center for American Intercultural Studies, which is planned to combine four ISU ethnic studies programs next fall, is slated to leave the integrity of each program intact, said ethnic studies program heads.

All seven members of the American Indian Studies Program resigned earlier this month to protest what they said was the decline of their program and the consolidation of the program with African-American Studies, Latino/a Studies and Asian American Studies, which they said contradicted national American Indian Studies standards.

American Indian Studies Director Sidner Larson said while a stand-alone curriculum is more consistent with national standards, the program could still function effectively in the center in its teaching of issues such as national standards and sovereignty.

“My focus is going to be helping the center to support the individual and unique issues of each of the four ethnic studies programs,” he said.

Larson said the comparative ethnic studies component the center could add to his program should not pose a problem if the core of the program remains focused on American Indian Studies.

“The cores of the programs are designed to be consistent with their own disciplines, and really, there’s no reason that should be any different,” he said.

Larson said that faculty are being hired to fill the American Indian Studies Program — he is now the program’s only faculty member.

Eugenio Matibag, planned director of the center and chairman of the Asian American studies steering committee, agreed.

“Each program director will oversee his own program and each program will maintain its integrity and coherence,” he said.

Matibag said planned comparative components such as an Intercultural Studies major, introductory courses and possible capstone courses will not dilute the individual programs.

He said the consolidation will save the university money because the programs will be able to share administrative costs, although that is not the primary goal of the center.

Hector Avalos, director of the Latino/a studies program, said he is a strong supporter of the merger.

He said the merger will strengthen all of the ethnic studies programs, which are now classified as cross disciplinary programs — many of the similarly classified programs have no relation to ethnic studies.

Avalos said a second advantage of the center is that it could eventually become a department, which would give it the ability to grant tenure.

Twenty faculty members are required to become a department — Latino/a studies is the largest of the ethnic studies programs with five faculty, Avalos said.

“If we can pool all our faculty, we might well be on our way to becoming a department,” he said. “The center is sort of an intermediate step between what we have now and becoming a department.”

Avalos said the university is also willing to hire new faculty for the center.

“At a time when there are budget cuts, there’s a commitment to the center to create new faculty liens,” he said.

Avalos said the curriculum will also benefit because groups cannot be studied in isolation.

He said the idea that the consolidation will take autonomy away from the programs is wrong because the programs are already part of a larger entity, the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

Gary Tartakov, interim director of African-American studies, said he also supports the center, although he hasn’t been involved in the process until very recently, when former director J. Herman Blake retired.

“We don’t see there’s anything we want to do in the future that this should interrupt,” he said.