Picket signs, Facebook posts and forum discussions have centered around a key question in the past week: Does DePauw care?
This dialogue, catalyzed by an opinion column printed in the Feb. 25 issue of The DePauw by junior Ashton Johnson titled "Excuse me, but your privilege is in our way" and a responding letter to the editor written by sophomore Grant Walters printed March 11, took the form of protest, angry social media posting and mediated discussion beginning last Tuesday.
At a campus-wide forum Sunday night hosted by "Love is the Movement" and DePauw Student Government, nearly 110 students, faculty and staff turned out to discuss DePauw's cultural climate and the presence of inequality. University President Brian Casey was also in attendance at the forum.
Many students who attended the forum are also a part of the student coalition called "The Movement," which is a group that "creates spaces for students to discuss critical issues with the intent to organize and systematically approach these issues with administration," said senior Maryclare Flores, an active member of the group.
The Movement has been meeting for two semesters every Friday at 4:30 p.m. in Reese Hall lobby and anyone is welcome to come. The group has had over 120 students in attendance at their last two meetings, attendance far exceeding chair space.
"When Grant Walter's Letter to the Editor came out, that night we had an emergency meeting for The Movement," Flores said. "That was purely for having a space where students could share their feelings and their reactions."
Senior Sandy Tran and junior Cody Watson co-moderated the forum Sunday, turning to a 'fishbowl' style layout instead of the originally planned panel layout. The forum's purpose was to hold a safe space where issues such as race, privilege, class and sexual assault can be discussed freely and without judgment.
"After [Johnson's and Walters'] articles came out on Tuesday, Wednesday during our regular student government executive meeting we really started discussing [these issues] further and discussing the best way to really get everyone's opinion out there and understand this," Watson said. "From that meeting it was decided to do a forum, a student forum, to let people talk."
Watson said he hoped students would walk away from the session Sunday night with a broader understanding of the "DePauw doesn't care" debate.
"Our goal for this [forum] was to get people knowledgeable and [get] an understanding about this [issue]; get the fact that this stuff happens out in the wider scale," Watson said. "Moving forward, our goal is to try to help find a middle ground of 'how do we change things?' and 'what are the structural things that we need to put in place in order to make a better DePauw climate and culture?'"
Caroline Jetton, chair of the Diversity and Equity Committee addressed the ongoing conversations about diversity in an email sent to all of campus on Thursday.
"Responses to these pieces have varied from anger, frustration and sadness to apathy. The Diversity and Equity Committee has been paying close attention to recent developments, as have key members of the administration," Jetton said. "Together we are working toward a concentrated effort to address issues that have been raised. When a portion of our population is affected or feels marginalized, it impacts our entire campus since we are a community."
Representatives of the administration including Casey, Vice President of Student Life and Dean of Students Cindy Babington and Vice President of Academic Affairs Larry Stimpert said in a letter to the editor in Friday's issue of The DePauw that the discussions regarding race, privilege and culture were important for the growth of the institution, though they may be difficult conversations to have.
"The dialogue taking place right now is essential if we are to fulfill our mission as a liberal arts college that asks students to wrestle with complexity and engage in critical thinking and problem-solving," the letter said. "Through these conversations we can - and will - shift cultural understanding and take appropriate and meaningful action."
At the forum, students were able to share their opinion in a calm and collected manner, although many students did get emotional due to the gravity of the topics being discussed.
"I feel the forum went actually pretty well," said junior Dione Gordon. "I feel like it got people's opinions out and it got people talking... It was new people coming into the conversation that I haven't seen [before]."
An issue that many students of color brought up at the forum was that they feel uncomfortable in a classroom made up predominantly of Caucasian students and a Caucasian professor. A solution many students were in favor of would be to have faculty and students go through a 'diversity training,' similar to that of the drugs and alcohol training that first-year students' experience.
The main emphasis at the end of the forum was the need to continue conversation on these issues.
"The first thing [DePauw] can do is to stop generalizations because that can be done easily," Gordon said. "The next thing we can do is just start to have conversations. Stop sitting just at the top [of the Hub], stop sitting at the bottom; integrate where we're sitting and join in on these conversations."
Another discussion will take place this afternoon at 4 p.m. in the Union Building Ballroom.