Out of the woods

Editorial: Progress and persistence

One year ago, student activists held a demonstration in Smith Union. At its conclusion, they presented an open letter to the Bowdoin community containing a series of 19 “calls to action” for the College’s administration that took a stand on the intersecting issues of climate, sexuality, class, gender and race. This week in the Orient, we took stock of what progress has been made on each of the appeals.
The administration has been taking concrete actions in response to the issues brought up at last year’s meeting. Thanks to campus activists, Bowdoin has made significant strides in grappling with the implications of its historical whiteness, and has started conversations that have led to actual institutional changes. Each move forward is a success when looking at the history of Bowdoin and examining whom the College was originally created to serve. This week, for example, the newly-created BSG position of multicultural representative went into effect. This is a lasting, important action, pursued by student activists, that is a small but significant shift towards making Bowdoin a more inclusive environment moving forward. President Rose’s acknowledgement of racial inequalities on campus was important as well—a naming of a problem that some Bowdoin students have been struggling with, unheard, for years.
But advocacy informed by a desire to make Bowdoin a safe space conscious of the injustices around us needs to continue. Progress made by administrators is not inevitable; it is tied directly to the pressure students are able to exert for change, and their continued and sustained efforts in doing so. Class issues were one of the meeting’s focal points, but were left out of the calls to action, thus taking a backseat in the administration’s agenda.
Each step has been the result of a push from students who want to make Bowdoin a more accessible place for them. Bowdoin cannot rely on the momentum of last semester to keep students working for social justice on this campus. The very structure of a four-year college means that with new students matriculating and young adults graduating annually, we cannot rely on the same faces to be leading the fight each year.
The administrators of Bowdoin have good intentions, but they have certain responsibilities that students do not. Often, their jobs involve upholding the image and reputation of an institution that is most comfortable when progress happens at a slow, gradual pace. Students should not expect administrators alone to lead the charge for institutional advances in regards to race and intersecting issues of identity, especially when many students feel that a movement like this is urgent. Invested underclass students—those directly affected by injustices and their allies—have the responsibility to keep tabs on what has been accomplished and to keep pushing as they progress through their time at Bowdoin.
This editorial represents the majority view of the Bowdoin Orient’s editorial board, which is comprised of Julian Andrews, John Branch, Jono Gruber, Matthew Gutschenritter, Emma Peters, Meg Robbins, Nicole Wetsman, and Emily Weyrauch.

Editorial: Listen and learn

Last semester, it was impossible not to hear about the pain that ethnic stereotyping causes people of color on our campus. So why did it happen again?
On Wednesday night at the Bowdoin Student Government (BSG) public comment time, students from across campus described the emotional harm that ethnic stereotyping at a tequila-themed party caused them. Some described how they felt a joke was had at the expense of their culture’s complexity and richness. Others said that they feel excluded from the campus community as students of color, and that events like this and their aftermaths reinforce that sense of ostracization. A first year said that he regrets coming to Bowdoin in the first place. The pain in the room was palpable.
It is alarming that we have had three prominent incidents of this kind in just over a year. Each time, a similar dialogue has been sparked in response. It’s frustrating that the same conversations keep happening with many of the same participants, a disproportionate amount of whom are students of color. It speaks volumes that most of those in attendance at the tequila party weren’t at Wednesday’s BSG meeting to hear the responses of those affected by their event. This is one of the reasons why we are stuck in this cycle of offense and re-offense.
There are some rules you can break that will only harm yourself—from something as common as drinking hard alcohol to more serious offenses like plagiarism. There are some standards of conduct at Bowdoin that you may not agree with. You might think that the Social Code’s phrase “conduct unbecoming of a Bowdoin student” is too vague to mean anything.
However, the fallout from the tequila party isn’t about breaking rules or your relationship with the administration. It’s about basic empathy. It’s not about finding a loophole in the College’s codes of conduct, and it’s not about a debate over political correctness. It’s about respecting your peers as human beings and acknowledging what makes them feel unwelcome in our community.
If you’re confused about why people are mad, take the time to figure it out. Listen to what your peers are saying, learn from past mistakes, recognize that this behavior has a historic and political context and stop throwing these parties. This behavior is demeaning to your peers and it must end.
This editorial represents the majority view of the Bowdoin Orient’s editorial board, which is comprised of Julian Andrews, John Branch, Jono Gruber, Matthew Gutschenritter, Emma Peters, Meg Robbins, Nicole Wetsman and Emily Weyrauch.

Editorial

This piece represents the opinion of The Bowdoin Orient editorial board.

February 19, 2016

Earlier this month, the Bowdoin Outing Club (BOC) reported a budget deficit of $18,000 to the Student Activities Funding Committee (SAFC). The BOC is not technically in the red: the $18,000 it has overspent does not push it past its 2015-2016 operating budget. Without additional funding, though, the BOC will have to alter its plans for the remainder of the academic year. The number of trips per weekend will be reduced, less financial aid will be offered and students will be forced to supply their own transportation for some trips. Many worry that the repercussions of this could affect more than just those seeking to get away for the weekend. As Bowdoin Student Government (BSG) President Danny Mejia-Cruz ’16 said last week, “The BOC is one of the crowning joys and major selling points of the College and we don’t want them to go stagnant.”

Since this information became public, some have questioned how an oversight of this stature could occur. Part of the problem is circumstantial; the BOC receives their operating budget while the previous year’s expenditures are still being calculated. This means that any debt from the previous fiscal year is repaid with the next year’s operating budget—i.e. there’s little consequence for going over budget year after year.

However, the other part of the problem is procedural. The BOC receives the bulk of its money from the SAFC, a committee of eight students, who are responsible for determining how much money to allocate to “student-run” clubs, according to the BSG website. It gives operational budgets to 18 student-run organizations including $2,000 to the Bowdoin Food Co-op, $6,617.96 to the Men’s Ultimate Frisbee Team, and $24,010 to the Orient. This funding alone marks the College’s financial contributions to these student groups. However, there are several clubs that receive additional funding outside of the SAFC whose chief leadership responsibilities rest on non-students. These clubs—among which are the McKeen Center and the Outing Club—are inherently unlike “peer” organizations that request funding.

The SAFC gave the BOC over $69,000 for its 2015-2016 operational budget, but the BOC also received significant funds from an endowment, and a separate budget for the salaries of its non-student staff.

The issue is not the amount of funding the BOC has at its disposal—it is that with three non-student staff members holding its top leadership positions, the BOC is hardly a student-run organization. The BOC operates at a level of organizational complexity that is beyond what the SAFC was designed to oversee, and they should not be considered among student-run organizations. The SAFC’s responsibility should be focusing on clubs that are truly and fully student run. When the SAFC is tasked with the funding of organizations that are so massive in their operational capacities and so integral to the College’s image, it is forced to take on a task too large for a small group of students. The SAFC is not at fault—it finds itself in a difficult situation out of its control.

Given the confusing relationship the BOC has with the SAFC, it is clear that this funding model is flawed. Without funding large organizations such as the McKeen Center and the BOC, the SAFC could focus on the small student-run clubs—The Quill, Taiko and Club Tennis— that it is best-suited to work with. It would be able to devote more of its time and resources to allocating its funds properly among those clubs, while Bowdoin could recognize the McKeen Center or BOC as the large College-funded programs that they should be and deal with their funding separately and accordingly.

This editorial represents the majority view of the Bowdoin Orient’s editorial board, which is comprised of Julian Andrews, John Branch, Jono Gruber, Matthew Gutschenritter, Emma Peters, Meg Robbins, Nicole Wetsman, and Emily Weyrauch.

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