As the World Cultures Initiative Committee continues to solicit feedback from the campus, the committee prepares its end-of-the-month report on pluralism and unity at Dartmouth.
The Committee has sought input on the report in a variety of ways; hosting a luncheon in Collis Commonground yesterday and posting a survey on its website.
According to committee co-chair Dean of the College James Larimore, the committee will begin drafting its report at a retreat next week.
He and fellow co-chair Associate Professor of English Melissa Zeiger will compile and edit the various drafts of the report.
According to Larimore, the committee will first release a report listing steps Dartmouth can take immediately to increase diversity. He explained, though, that the committee will meet even after the release of this initial report, to write a report on ways to strengthen pluralism and diversity on the Dartmouth campus.
A total of approximately 40 faculty, students and staff attended yesterday's luncheon.
Those attending the luncheon discussed questions such as, "What do you see as obstacles on this campus to diversity?" and "What do you see as support structures on this campus for diversity?" at their individual tables.
Those in attendance also listened to brief opening and closing speeches by committee co-chairs Larimore and Zeiger.
At the end of the luncheon, one person from each table stood up to summarize to the entire group the discussion at his/her table.
Spokespeople from several tables praised a proposal by Professor of English Peter Travis to require that freshmen take a seminar stressing themes of diversity and multiculturalism.
This seminar would be similar in size and structure to the existing writing intensive Freshman Seminars, but would not replace them.
One girl mentioned the difference between what she described as quantifiable diversity such as measuring percentages of different ethnic groups at Dartmouth and getting people to really get to know each other.
Another student mentioned the tendency freshmen have to associate mainly with their "trippies" from Dartmouth Outing Club trips. However, a disproportionate percentage of the freshmen who do not go on DOC trips are minorities.
Perhaps creating the option of a community service, "un-DOC trip," might bring freshmen of varied backgrounds together, she said.
In his closing remarks, Larimore stressed the importance of having such community discussions.
He said that he had spoken with several students who realized during the luncheon that they were not as alone as they had believed in wanting to make Dartmouth a more diverse place.
Larimore quoted Marian Wright Edelman, saying "When you believe you can't change things, compare yourself to a flea, for a single, determined flea can make even the biggest dog twitch."
During her closing remarks, Zeiger discussed the problems associated with the name "World Cultures Initiative."
While the Committee has always called itself the "World Cultures Initiative Committee," Zeiger explained that she and various other committee members have felt that the name does not describe the committee's purpose as well as it might.
Despite Provost Susan Prager's recommendation that the committee's focus be non-curricular, Zeiger said that the words "world cultures" tend to make people think of the World Cultures distributive requirements.
She explained that the committee chose to stick with the name anyway, since members believed that people were familiar with the name "World Cultures Initiative" because of its use in the Student Life Initiative.
However, since not as many people recognized the name as the committee believed, they probably will change it eventually.
