More than 100 students attended U.Va. Students United’s event “Disorientation” at OpenGrounds Thursday night. The event was taglined “New Rotunda, same old white supremacy” and was intended to “[expose] the real U.Va.”
The event, which was meant to be a play on the orientation events that first-year students experience before coming to Grounds, began with fourth-year College student Maria Rincon introducing some of the themes that would be covered for the night, highlighting many of the problems that are within the University.
“We exploit our workers, we put our students in a lifetime of student debt, we haven’t addressed gender-based violence and there is still a lot of racial tension between U.Va. and the Charlottesville community,” Rincon said.
Following Rincon’s introduction, third-year College student Anelle Mensah provided the audience with a “Welcome to Grounds Tour.”
Mensah discussed some of the University’s most popular buildings and the history of the people for whom some of these buildings are named. For example, Mensah mentioned Alderman Library, named after one of the former presidents of the University, Edwin Alderman.
“He was actually a pretty good president, but he did not challenge the Jim Crow laws that were put into place to prevent desegregation at U.Va.,” Mensah said.
Third-year College student Kendall King discussed the history of student activism on Grounds. King mentioned that students at the University have been involved in activism for decades, with the first protest being held in 1969 with integration as the core issue. In response, the University created an office for African-American students and hired a dean to help recruit and retain black students.
Students have protested many other issues over the years including the Vietnam War, apartheid and the living wage.
Following the first group of presentations, event organizers encouraged attendees to break into small groups and discuss some of the aspects of the presentations that were most surprising to them.
Molly Sall, a fourth-year Engineering student, said she was most surprised by the history of protesting efforts on Grounds.
“One of the things that was really surprising to me was learning about how we protested against apartheid and that the Board of Visitors actually did something about it, which is interesting because it always seems like our protesting efforts are futile,” Sall said.
After the discussion, a second group of presentations began, focusing on current student activist groups on Grounds and the issues in which they are involved.
The Climate Action Society presented their Sustainability Plan that they hope the University will adapt. Aspects of the plan include cutting carbon energy 25 percent by 2025, increasing the University’s portfolio of environmental purchases, reducing building energy use intensity 20 percent by 2020 and increasing efficiency of University land to limit the need for new construction.
The Living Wage campaign’s presentation, titled “Dirty Dishes: The Truth About U.Va. Employees,” discussed the gap between the wage needed to survive in Charlottesville — $13.72 per hour plus benefits — and the $11.76 per hour wage that University employees actually receive.
“It would cost U.Va. 0.04 percent of its operating budget to pay its employees a living wage,” second-year College student Ian Nakayama said. “It spends a larger portion of its budget on flowers.”
Three other activist groups spoke about the issues that they bring awareness to on Grounds — U.Va. Students United, U.Va. Students for Peace and Justice in Palestine and Dreamers on Grounds.
Fourth-year College student Ibby Han said one of the goals of the event was to counter the University’s “false narrative of happiness” and show that the University is “not as perfect as it looks.”
“I hope that [the attendees] come away with a more balanced view of U.Va. and a deeper understanding of our history,” Han said. “There is a counter culture of activism at U.Va. which I think is often not very well amplified or is misrepresented in the media.”
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