Boggs: Missouri, a catalyst for change

I like the University of Toledo. I want to make that clear before anything I say can be misconstrued.

I appreciate the fact that certain things that happen on other campuses don’t happen here.

But with what’s going on at the University of Missouri, we should be having similar discussions about preventing that from happening on our campus.

For those who don’t know, many racist and hate-filled incidents have taken place on their campus, leading to a large uprising by a group of students. There have been cotton balls left outside of the black culture center that represented slavery and white suppression of other cultures, swastikas painted in human feces on a bathroom and other similar incidents. The outpouring of support from others, including many here at UT, has helped the cause of the African American students, but that shouldn’t be necessary in the first place.

Could something like that happen here at Toledo? What can we do to prevent it? These are all questions that need to be asked.

Fortunately for us, it’s something I couldn’t see happening here.

For one, multicultural organizations like the Black Student Union and the Latino Student Union are professional and run well. They should have a great amount of respect from the general population, which should be reflected upon the rest of the students of those cultures.

Another reason it’s unlikely is because of new president Dr. Sharon Gaber, who has a reputation for increasing retention rates and success among multicultural students at other universities. She’s already taken steps to reach out to the diverse pool of students of UT, especially by hiring Dr. Willie McKether to come up with a new diversity plan for the university.

McKether, who’s an adviser for the Black Student Union, the National Association for Black Journalists and the Brothers on the Rise organization, is obviously well-immersed with a large portion of the multicultural general body.

All this is to say, we likely won’t have a lame duck president, which was maybe the biggest issue in Missouri. When their issues occurred, the president refused to react and at least try to stop what was going on. I’d be surprised to see the same from ours.

But UT isn’t perfect either.

For some time now, there’s been a recognizable yet invisible divide between cultures here on campus. It’s something I’ve noticed, something many students I talk to notice, and it’s likely something you’ve noticed. It’s not exactly harmful, but it is there.

I have no problem with people being around whom they know. The more you have in common with someone, the more likely you are to spend time with and be comfortable around them.

I look at it as natural segregation. Segregation is a powerful word, but one that fits the situation appropriately.

While I don’t believe UT is on its way to having a problem anything like Missouri, I do believe we should make an attempt to counteract that possibility.

Whether it’s leaders of organizations coming together to do a cross-cultural event, or one organization going out of the way to bridge the gap and get students with different backgrounds to interact with each other, it should be done.

It’s not the job of the teachers or the administrators. It’s our job.

Keith Boggs is a second-year majoring in communication.