Thursday, March 26, 2020
Collegian.com
Vol. 129, No. 51
IN COLLABORATION WITH
With Colorado State University experiencing more and more high-profile incidents of bias, students and University administration are searching for ways to make CSU a more welcoming and safe place for everyone on campus. As President Joyce McConnell and administration roll out ideas like the Race, Bias and Equity Initiative, students continue to push for ways to make CSU inclusive for everyone. PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY AMY NOBLE AND MATT TACKETT THE COLLEGIAN
The past, present and future of bias at CSU Taking a step back to address a campuswide issue By Austin Fleskes @AustinFleskes07
This article was written in collaboration with The Colorado Sun and will be published on both The Collegian’s website as well as The Sun’s. A noose, crudely fashioned from crepe paper, dangled in the soft glow of the fluorescent lights outside of a Black student’s dorm hall: a possible sign of things to come.
A year later, a nervous parent called the police on two Native American students during a campus tour, inadvertently sending them away from a possible college career at Colorado State University. The next year, a swastika appeared, spray-painted on the brick wall of a campus apartment building. During the same month, a photo of students in blackface circulated on campus, stirring
the student body and setting off a cry for the administration to do more to combat these types of incidents. CSU saw a threefold increase in reports of bias in the fall of 2019 compared to the fall of 2018, part of a rising trend on college campuses across the country. But numbers alone don’t tell the whole story. In fact, they raise more questions. Is there actually more hate on campus? Or is there greater awareness of
racially motivated incidents and a greater willingness by students and others to report those incidents? Or is it a combination of factors? And when does an incident rise to the level of a crime? Students, administrators and others are struggling to find answers, but some things are known already: In the past four years, CSU has seen a slew of high-profile racially motivated incidents that made headlines on campus, in the state and na-
tionally, and they led to some students saying they no longer feel welcome or safe. The University began tracking such complaints only recently, separate from incidents that were classified as hate crimes. As frustration and exhaustion on campus grows, The Collegian wanted to dive deeper into the issues surrounding bias and hate.
see BIAS on page 4 >>
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