Tobin Shearer, director of African-American Studies at the University of Montana, works last winter in his campus office, where he has written and posted a promise of equality and welcome on his door after what he describes as "a recent uptick" in hate literature and racial slurs directed at some of his students.

The flier advertising a course that Tobin Miller Shearer, director of the University of Montana's African-American Studies program, plans to teach in the spring.

The fake course flier that someone mounted atop one announcing a course on white nationalism being offered in the spring by Shearer.

University of Montana professor Tobin Miller Shearer, director of the African-American studies program, said he noticed something was wrong right away Thursday morning as he passed the bulletin board in the Liberal Arts building on campus.

The day before, Shearer had posted a flyer outlining a new class he is offering in the spring: “White Supremacy History/Defeat.”

But on Thursday morning, another sign — designed to look just like Shearer’s poster — had been put up atop his, this one detailing a fictitious course “Black Nationalism History/Defeat.” ...