A 17-year-old struggle inched one step closer to a resolution
early this quarter when the Academic Senate made a commitment to
implementing a diversity requirement in fall 2005.
With the continuous slashes to outreach and the significant
drops in minority enrollment this year, campus diversity has taken
a sharp downhill turn, limiting the scope of cultural backgrounds
to which students are exposed.
And required courses to expand students’ perspectives
““ transcending the narrow breadth of knowledge of Western
civilization repeated throughout the primary and secondary
education systems ““ would be invaluable. The efforts of
several dozen students who built a tent city, camped out on a
campus lawn for three nights, and rallied to bring a commitment to
reality is also commendable.
But the requirement in its currently proposed form is not
adequate, as it could be fulfilled by a majority of the classes
already offered in the curriculum.
Faculty and students must continue to work together to make the
requirement something more substantive than a mere check mark on
the list of required courses.