LONG AGO, a University admissions officer decided that some trees, some buildings and some kids pretty much can sum up the college experience. The Web page of this Friday's diversity symposium, called "Charting Diversity: Commitment, Honor, Challenge," fits this mold neatly, featuring the generic snapshots of autumn trees, the Rotunda and a multiracial group of students happily debating in the sun.
According to the formulaic press release, the symposium is the University's kick-off initiative to "deepen understanding of diversity and foster new ways of responding to the changing needs of its community." Hopefully, rather than painting its usual Sesame Street picture of racial harmony, the University will learn to open its eyes to what diversity really means at this school.
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A translation of the symposium's vague mission statement is this: The drop in minority applications makes our school look racist. Let's overuse the word diversity so we can brush over this fact.
But diversity means nothing when it's just a buzzword. Why is diversity so important at a school anyway? So that each ethnicity can feel represented? Or so each student selfishly can feel like she's reaping some benefit by basking in the diverse limelight of her peers?
Diversity has come to mean very little at this University. One can observe the varied colors of faces around Grounds, but one also can see that at this school, birds of a feather stick together, whether it's at parties, at lunch or in the Greek system.
It could be beneficial that there are people of different races here, but for the most part they only interact with each other. Since the different ethnicities at the University live independently of each other, current efforts to increase diversity bring no benefit to students.
Instead of focusing on increasing diversity at the University once again, the administration should concentrate on creating interaction between the diverse people who are already here. Instead of creating some kind of bizarre diversity zoo that features an array of independent nationalities for visitors to admire, the University should strive to create a diversity commune of sorts. In that environment, students wouldn't feel confined to their race but would be encouraged to roam and mingle with those of other backgrounds.
It's a big chore to ask the University to harmonize its already diverse student body -- the administration can't just pluck people of different races out of the mix, throw them together in some forced setting and then cheer for integration. It can, however, stop being so touchy about diversity and screaming like Pee Wee Herman hearing the word of the day when racial issues arise.
The goal of diversity shouldn't be to try to create it by finding more minority applicants. It should be to bring together the different cultures already present here and integrate the self-segregated lumps that currently predominate the University. In fact, it makes no difference who attends the University because they all just feed the fire of self-segregation that is burning already.
"Although it's simple to say that the University supports diversity and values it as a priority, it is much harder to articulate what that means in our day-to-day activities," said Karen Holt, director of the University's Office of Equal Opportunity Programs and conference co-chair, in the symposium's press release. "We hope this program inspires and provokes us to look at our practices and interactions, and see where changes and improvements are warranted."
In reality, diversity isn't something many students actively notice or concern themselves with during day-to-day activities. A student's ability to function doesn't rest on how diverse the student body they are interacting with is. Instead, diversity is just the backdrop for the college experience. However, that doesn't mean that it can't help students become more aware and enlightened.
But at this University, where self-segregation prevails, diversity sadly has become about as helpful as the trees and buildings that rest in the background too. So instead of creating symposiums in an effort to find more diversity, we should just try to use what already exists to its full potential.
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