All College Day a space for community dialogue

Michael Ilardi Guest Writer

“Be the change.” This is the mantra for Vassar’s eighth annual All College Day, scheduled to take place on Wednesday, Feb. 20. The quotation, adapted from the words of Mahatma Gandhi, commands students, faculty and staff to engage one another and contribute to the on-going discussion of what forms our community.

“Over the past eight years we’ve looked at All College Day as a moment to pause and think about what it means to be a community,” said Associate Dean of the College Ed Pitman, who chaired the committee that organizes the event, the Campus Life Resource Group (CLRG).

All College Day originally grew out of an incident involving a student group’s racially charged comedy sketch in the spring of 2000. According to Pitman, students from all over the campus banded together to form the Coalition of Concerned Students, a group that demanded that the College not be merely reactive in conversations about race and community.

While the day grew out of discussions on race, Pittman stressed that All College Day is about any issue of community or identity that members of the campus community find relevant.

This year the day will kick off at 10 a.m. in the College Center with the Mural Project, a large canvas upon which any member of the Vassar community can express their concerns in freeform style. Gregg Orton ’08, an intern for the Campus Life Office and member of the CLRG, described the mural as a space to “express [your] feelings or share [your] artistic talents.”

From 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. the Committee on Inclusion and Excellence will hold a conversation entitled “The Fullest Promise of a Vassar Education: How Do We Get There?”

At noon President Catharine Bond Hill will host “Soup and Substance,” a catered lunch where the College “serves the soup; you bring the substance—ideas, thoughts and reflections” on anything that’s on your mind. After the lunch, individuals can head to the Villard Room from 3-6 p.m., where more than 40 campus groups will be tabling on how their activities express the day’s theme.

That evening, there will be a Conversation Dinner to discuss the ideas recorded on the mural, as well as consider topics for next year’s All College Day.

Pittman stressed that organizers “don’t want people to think that we do this on one day and then it’s over.” Accordingly, there will be another dinner conversation on Wednesday Feb. 20, as followed by another in April.

A day of opinions, artistic expression, presentations and free food sounds pretty good, doesn’t it?

Well, yes, but only to those that know about it. Based on student responses, there seems to be a lack of knowledge regarding the day and what it entails.

Upperclassmen may remember seeing past events while passing through the College Center, but the important, conversational elements of the day seem to go unnoticed.

As an event coordinator, Orton acknowledged that “student feedback and opinions help shape future work that CLRG undertakes,” and said he’d like to see more students involved in the conversation events or the Mural Project.

According to Freshman Vice President Elizabeth Anderson, All College Day “has the potential to be a truly great event, but it needs more advertising and an equally enthusiastic response.”

Ultimately, said Pittman, the day is “about defining community—and everybody has a stake in that.”