Trustee Letter CEC 12-10-08

December 10th, 2008

Trustees,

On the Hill, there has been overwhelming support for the proposal for the Cultural Education Center; the Faculty passed a motion supporting it, Student Assembly supported it unanimously, and the Social Justice Initiative continues to collect more signatures. Although early proposals suggested that we would wait until an ideal time to build the CEC, the economic situation and the current surplus of empty space at Hamilton lead us to believe that either a full CEC or interim space should be housed in an existing building by the fall semester of 2009. Azel Backus House, Emerson Literary Society, and North and South Court all offer adequate and currently or soon to be available spaces that could be the interim or full CEC. We ask the Board of Trustees make a decision during the meeting in March to provide basic renovations to one of these spaces or allocate another so that the CEC can open in the fall of 2009.

Because we do not know how much you know about our activities at Hamilton, we are including with this letter:

• Our Principles
• Our most recent proposal
• A timeline of the previous steps we’ve taken

We hope these documents help explain you can see how we arrived at our decision that the CEC is an important step toward addressing our concerns with the campus climate and the steps we have taken on campus to pursue this goal. We understand that although the Hamilton Community has endorsed the CEC, you may still have some questions. We invite you to contact us, set up meetings, or communicate with us in whatever forum works best for you. Corinne Bancroft (cbancrof@hamilton.edu) will serve as the administrative assistant, so you can email her with questions or forums for communication and she will find the appropriate student or groups of students to get in touch with you.

As you can see, we have exhausted all the internal venues available to us as students to make these necessary changes at Hamilton. We hope that at your March meeting you will validate the processes that we have chosen by providing leadership on a CEC.

Thank you for your time,

The Social Justice Initiative

This is SJI

Who we are: We are a coalition of Hamilton students with diverse backgrounds and areas of involvement on campus.

What we do: We hold Hamilton College primarily the administration and faculty responsible for educating the Hamilton community about the inequalities associated with diversity in a way that empowers students to engage with these issues intelligently. Further, we hold Hamilton accountable for addressing the inequalities that exist within the community.

How we do this:
Some of our efforts include:
Sponsoring bi-weekly student discussions
Campaigning for a Cultural Education Center
Coordinating cultural organizations on campus
Discussing curricular changes that would truly represent a diversity of ideas
Documenting incidents of mistreatment
Campaigning for a Cultural organizer administrative position

Why we do this: There is a disparity in quality of experience of Hamilton students because of socially marked identities. This is a result of Hamilton’s failure to define, address, and educate on issues of diversity.




Principles by which we operate:

Horizontal organization – SJI operates as a horizontal organization that does not privilege any members above others because we want to unpack hierarchy rather than reproduce power structures that exist outside of our organization.

Transparency – Because the efforts of SJI affect the entire Hamilton community, every member of the community has a right to know exactly what SJI is doing and how it is being done. Everything we do is subject to public examination. We work towards this through meetings open to students, coffee hours open to everyone, and a website will make all our documents available.

Inclusiveness – Our meetings our open to all students and our events are open to anybody who wants to attend.

Relevance – We react to concerns we hear voiced by Hamilton students.

Non-violence – SJI does not attempt to seize or undermine authority from the administration. Rather we hold the administration accountable to execute its academic mission in a way that defines, addresses, and educates on issues of diversity.





Cultural Education Center Proposal

For the past 7 years the College administration has received authorized reports recommending improved space for students from marginalized groups, specifically students of color (Diversity Task Force report, Diversity Strategic Plan, letter from Joan Stewart). The Social Justice Initiative is a coalition of students who came together over a year and a half ago because of perceived problems in the education at Hamilton College. We work to create a positive change in the educational and social experiences and treatment of underrepresented groups at Hamilton. At the same time, we also seek to promote interaction across groups and increase social awareness among all students at Hamilton College.

We work from the assumption that there are power structures within the United States and the world that benefit certain identities over others. We believe that these systemic inequalities are relics based on historic exclusion and oppression that unfortunately still exist today. Although Hamilton’s student body is increasingly “diverse,” the physical campus and curriculum fall short of accurately reflecting the changing demographics of Hamilton, and indeed of the nation. While we represent a relatively new student group, many others such groups have formed with the same concerns as ours; nothing has yet been done to address these concerns. There is a serious need.

Students of color report less satisfaction with their overall Hamilton experience in their exit interviews and are less engaged with the College as alumni/ae (see Institutional Research document). Students who are not the “typical” Hamilton student routinely encounter slurs, ignorance, or simply forms of elitism in their daily lives.

To address students needs, we have proposed a Cultural Education Center, a physical and intellectual space on campus that will advance intercultural communication by putting the experiences of people from marginalized groups at the center. As cultural theorists like Dr. David Stovall have argued, historically white institutions do a good job of creating a comfortable and ‘safe’ campus for the majority of the students; the whole campus effectively becomes ‘white’ space. The consequence is, however, that this norm of elite whiteness once again marginalizes students from underrepresented groups. Although all students are ostensibly welcome all over campus, students of color and other underrepresented groups do not feel equally welcome. The Center will not be an exclusive space but rather an inclusive one that starts from those histories. The Center will be a dynamic place with speakers, arts events, and workshops that will be open to all. We hope to ensure that they are well attended by many from different areas of the campus. Attention to social dynamics will be key; we hope to stimulate conversations by sponsoring informal gatherings after events. The presence of magazines and coffee should help attract students and others to the Center even if there is not an event. It will also serve to help Hamilton recruit students in the future, when the demographics require that we be attractive to the so-called “Majority minority.”

Because it will be open to all, with a director who is trained in these issues, the center will actively recruit attendance at its events. Thus, it will have the potential to improve the education of all Hamilton students. Many students study other cultures on campus or study abroad. The Center will provide a place for them to continue their education when they leave the classroom or when they return to campus from their studies.

The Center will be a vibrant place where open and honest conversations around difficult issues are facilitated; workshops can help train leaders of such conversations. Events featuring music, art, and speakers from diverse cultures will spill over into gatherings, and magazines, books and films can increase students’ familiarity with the world beyond the hill. Most importantly, it will be a place of academic excellence because it will nourish a diversity of ideas.

Please contact us with any questions, comments, or concerns by emailing sji@hamilton.edu.

Needs:
• A meeting space for fifty people that has furniture that resembles Glenn House, Opus1, or Christian Johnson Browsing Room.
• A lecture space for programming that would have seating for 60-75 people, but a capacity of 100 people. We envision a layout similar to the Red Pit, having removable seats.
• A lab with 6-8 desktops and a printer this would be a designated computer area (this could exist in the resource room).
• A resource room to house historical documents of the multicultural organizations, as well as books, periodicals, and articles pertaining to issues of diversity both on campus and off.
• The Womyn’s Center would have a designated room in order to replace their space in North Court.
• Classroom/ conference rooms to host luncheons/dinners for speakers, also serve as additional meeting or academic space for students.
Note: All rooms should be smart classrooms.

These needs can currently be met by existing spaces on campus including but not limited to the Azel Backus House, Emerson Literary Society, and North and South Court.

Arguments for a Cultural Education Center

• There is a problem on campus; students from underrepresented, ‘marginalized’ groups that have been historically oppressed feel unwelcome at Hamilton.
• Students need a space in which to discuss issues of diversity and the tools to do so; we need to learn how to relate to others from cultural backgrounds different from our own. We need to create not only a ‘comfortable’ space but an encouraging environment for discussions and education about diversity.
• The CEC would have transformative educational power in terms of making students aware and sensitive to these issues, and in helping all students (regardless of whether they are aware) continue their education in these important areas.
• Hamilton College’s public statements articulate a commitment to diversity.
This commitment lacks follow through, however. For years different task forces have suggested that we need improved space for students from underrepresented groups (cultural education space) and a position to make our efforts at diversity coherent (chief diversity officer) (Kirkland Project 2000, Diversity Task Force 2004, SJI 2007-8). The College has never funded either of those initiatives. As a result, we still lack a central resource for cultural education.
• Students from all ethnic backgrounds feel uncomfortable and lack the tools to talk about issues of race and diversity. Due to this lack of dialogue, most students from historically underrepresented backgrounds feel either ignored or tokenized.
• This Cultural Education Center space will be fundamentally different from all other spaces on campus. This space will not merely celebrate underrepresented identity groups on campus, but it will also provide a forum for encouraging the campus community to engage with the issues. We envision an intellectual as well as a social space. In addition to providing a conference room and a small reference library for students, the Cultural Education Center will be a resource center for both students and professors in the pedagogy and critical theory of difference. Programming led by a director, educational initiatives, discussions open to the entire Hamilton community, and a dedication to providing a space for difficult but important dialogue about issues of privilege and oppression will contribute to achieving this educational goal.
• The education and discussions taking place in and because of a CEC would prepare students to become citizens of the global world. As a liberal arts college, Hamilton is ideally placed to produce graduates able to communicate with and work with people who differ in background, ethnicity, perhaps in fundamental values. The proposed CEC can help Hamilton to achieve these goals.
• We would all benefit from having a Center that could sponsor education, training, and conversations around race, class, gender, sexuality, ability. By learning how to talk to one another, students would learn to become better informed citizens of the world.
• A CEC will attract students not only from non traditional groups, but also those who are interested in a more pluralistic learning atmosphere.
• The CEC would benefit students from the dominant groups: these students increasingly come to college seeking a diverse institution and are disappointed if they don’t find it. On tours, a lot of prospective students about ask diversity. Most tour guides give answers that even to them seem hollow. This building would be something concrete that can prove the college's stated goals of diversity.
• Students who study abroad, those who study in departments with strong cultural components (World Politics, Comparative Literature, Anthropology, Sociology, Economics, History, Languages, etc), and those who do not receive this education in the classroom need a physical and intellectual space that can serve as a co-curricular resource so this cultural learning does not need to stop when students return from abroad or when their class periods end. This physical exhibit space, tangible library and central location would be an excellent educational resource to all students and a draw for prospective students.
• Many schools in the same category as Hamilton in terms of type of college and academic prestige have already built multicultural student centers, including Colgate, Williams and Vassar.
• If the College shows its commitment to its stated goals of diversity with a CEC, current students form underrepresented groups would feel more welcome at the school and more likely to feel attached to the institution as graduates and give back to Hamilton. At the present most alums from these groups feel alienated and do not come back except when invited by multicultural student groups, much less give money to the college.
• A CEC will help with retention of students from underrepresented groups.
• It would be a recruiting device for attracting students from underrepresented groups, students that will soon be a majority of the college-age population.
• The CEC is a proactive step to prevent incidents of harassment or greater tragedy on campus rather than waiting for another incident to occur before acting.

Responding to Arguments Against the Cultural Education Center

• Why should these groups get their own space? Isn’t that a lot of money for just a few people? Multicultural groups already have unique sources of funding, their own space in the ALCC, and plenty of events, why should they get more?

While the CEC would house only a few organizations, its educational and programming resources would be available to the entire student body.
Furthermore, the Womyn’s Center is being torn down, Rainbow Alliance only has a closet, and the ALCC is not large enough for big group meetings and has no programming component.

There is no space currently at Hamilton with the same mission statement as the CEC. It’s not getting more, it’s getting what has never been offered in the first place.

• Wouldn’t a Cultural Education Center just promote self-segregation?

The CEC isn’t meant to be used by just a small group of students but rather the entire campus; anyone can make use of it resources. Everyone will be welcomed and invited. Self-segregation would happen if two conditions were met: 1) the CEC were not open to everyone and 2) students who don’t identify as part of a ‘marginalized group’ made a choice not to come. Since the first condition is met by the inclusiveness of the CEC, any ‘segregation’ would be due to students making a choice not to come and therefore not a process of self-segregation.

It would not be a place where marginalized students go to hide themselves, but rather it would be a place for forming strategic coalitions across class, race, sexuality, gender and national boundaries.

• How would a building do anything to combat oppression?

Building a Cultural Education Center would be a signal from the administration that they really care about these issues, and not just in order to attract a statistically more diverse student body. The Cultural Education Center would bring groups together and allow them to work with a program director; space to collaborate and programming to help us in our mission make the CEC more than a just a building.
Furthermore, space is power. This is illustrated by the relation between a decision to end private housing at Hamilton and the experiences of women here. A recent study by Professor Chambliss shows that the most satisfied group at Hamilton is white women with good grades. The experiences of women have been much more positive since Hamilton got rid of privately-owned Greek housing in 1995. This change in buildings made a huge difference in the experiences of a large group of Hamilton students.


• A building would cost a lot of money, especially considering the financial crisis.

We are not asking for a new building, we are asking for small renovations to an existing structure. Furthermore, Hamilton is a very rich school. Recently lobster was served for lunch in the Little Pub and a helicopter was used to dry off the football field.
People feel comfortable asking for expensive renovations to athletic fields when these too are used primarily by only a small number of students. Perhaps field conditions affect whether or not students want to come to Hamilton, but a CEC would also be a tool for recruiting students to come here and would pay off in the long run.

• How is it different from the multi-million dollar student center?

The Cultural Education Center’s mission includes more than just providing a space to study and relax; it also includes programming, education, and a forum for discussion of challenging ideas.
Hamilton has already tried and failed twice to create a student center (Bristol and Beinecke); the Cultural Education Center is a fresh idea with a plan of action for how it will improve the campus climate.

• Isn’t everyone oppressed in some way? Isn’t it ignorant to say that only some of us feel ‘uncomfortable’ at Hamilton? Diversity isn’t just about race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, or class status. Shouldn’t we be more concerned about diversity of individual hopes, dreams, thoughts, choices and morals?

It would be nice to able to live in world where we see people as "people" in terms of their individual hopes, dreams, etc., but given the very auspicious power differences that exist in our society that privileges certain groups over others, to NOT acknowledge "race" or "sexuality" is to deny that racism or heterosexism exists. It's like the let's be color blind argument... we can only claim to be color blind when we are all on an equal playing field. There are historical hierarchies in play that make the feel of ‘discomfort’ one that must be dealt with at an institutional rather than interpersonal level.