In the spring of 2007, a new curriculum controversy arose pertaining to DOC as students at TMC began protesting against the administrators of the college. The Lumumba-Zapata Coalition (which had resurfaced with the addition of graduate students) along with other students claimed that DOC had lost some of its original messages, protesting against what they termed a "new and diluted" core writing requirement with a decreased focus on race and the ethnic significance of the individual within society. The protests, including picketing, began with the controversial non-renewal of two DOC Teaching Assistants’ contracts for the subsequent year. Others believed that the coalition was pushing an agenda of political indoctrination that conflicted with the academic goals of the Dimensions of Culture Program and the sensibility of a science oriented campus.