There's nothing like breakfast with a Trustee of the College to get you thinking about how very temporary we are. Four years is really nothing. We talked about the first year experience, improving the academic community and social situations which need alteration - and then it became frighteningly evident that we won't be around to see what happens anyway.
How relevant are we to the impetus that makes Dartmouth keep changing? Because, despite the efforts of tradition-worshippers, it is changing. Slowly. Even though "mainstream Dartmouth" seems to just chug on through, surviving day to day, unaware of setting a precedent by example. Or maybe we don't think it matters.
But the truth is, we learn by the example of others; and the problem is, that example is one of non- (even anti-) academia, drink till you fall out of third-story windows, uphold tradition at all costs, don't think too much and certainly don't question the Greek system. Most of all, be like everyone else, because that is how we get along. Avoid conflict, because it challenges you to think.
One Trustee admitted that he thought separating first-year students from upperclassmen in "freshmen dorms" might hinder their integration into the community as a whole. But the question raised was whether this community is actually as positive as we want it to be; do we grow as individuals if we learn that going with the flow is the way to do things?
If we gauge the importance of events that are going on around us based upon the lack of enthusiasm we absorb from others, when will we ever learn to take advantage of the programming and other opportunities with which we are provided? I cringe every time someone complains that he or she is not getting an education worth the tuition. The education is here to be had - it's all in what you do with it. And certainly for students who major in apathy, some of their money is going to waste. That's their choice.
Dorms for first-year students would enable several positive things to happen. The energy most of us never seem to recover after the first year can be fed and encouraged instead of snuffed; events in these dorms would have much higher attendance; first-years eager to meet people would get to know more of their classmates; dorm parties would be far more successful and the Greek exclusion policy would not seem like such a big deal; we would, merely through exposure to more people of different backgrounds, learn not to take it for granted that all Dartmouth students are alike; intra-mural sports would rage; resources for first-year students could be centralized; and without the (even unspoken) discouragement from upperclassmen, students would feel free to explore what this college offers on their own.
Most of all - and this is probably my highest hope - the level of discourse and dissent at Dartmouth would improve merely because students would feel that they had a stock in their community, if only through knowing so many of their classmates.
But how do we define a community? What does bind us together, if we don't all have similar expectations and life experiences, if we don't all play hard and party hard, if diversity means age and major to some people and class, color, ethnicity, and religion to others? How can we stand by our Dartmouth peers "as sister stands by brother" if we cannot agree on fundamental ideologies, and if some of us spend our time in art studios and labs while others are practicing a sport or cavorting on the Green?
The answer isn't all that elusive. It's on page iii of the Student Handbook, and it's called the "Principle of Community." It goes something like this: "The life and work of a Darmouth student should be based on integrity, responsibility and consideration. In all activities each student is expected to be sensitive to and respectful of the rights and interests of others and to be personally honest. He or she should be appreciative of the diversity of the community as providing an opportunity for learning and moral growth."
The strongest communities throughout history have been those unified by religion and ideology. We, who represent so many different religions and principles, share only this one, which we agreed to uphold when we matriculated. To be a community, to grow as individuals and to make the most of our short four years at Dartmouth, these principles must be upheld.
Most recently, we have been challenged by the decision handed down by the Trustees that ROTC will continue to exist at Dartmouth. In addition to breaking the College's commitment to equal opportunity, this decision violates the Principle of Community that same Board endorsed 14 years ago. It does so because participants in the program are encouraged to be dishonest, are not allowed - despite personal viewpoints - to be tolerant, let alone appreciative, of homosexuality "as...an opportunity for learning and moral growth."
"It's not my fault." I'm sure every professor has heard this numerous times about papers that didn't get turned in, and certainly we learn from supporters of ROTC that we don't have any responsibility in this matter. But we do - we all do, because we are held to those principles as members of a community, "respectful of rights and interests" and supporters of personal honesty.
We must not forget that we are not the only college which offers an ROTC program. Removing it from our campus would have two definite effects: it would give strength to the only three sentences which bind all of us together as Dartmouth students, and it would send a message to ROTC headquarters that we, a prestigious academic institution, will not support the discrimination within their program. If ROTC begins to lose students because top schools are withdrawing their support, it will have to take a second look.
No, not many other Ivy League schools have taken the initiative to do this. Why are we so afraid to be individuals?
Maybe we learned it from someone else.
