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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (June 12, 1989)
Campus racism is returning, officials say By Aril it* Del- rain and Cindy YVostrel SihII Reporters According to representatives from numerous Nebraska colleges and universities, racism is following a national trend by re igniting and becoming more visible on campuses. At the Hilton Hotel May 24, nine representatives met with the Ne braska Advisory Committee (NAC) to the l S. Commission on Civil Bights m an open public lorum. len V\( members asked the representa tives to express what incidents ol racial harassment and v iolence have happened on lheir campuses and then suggest possible solutions to increase the reporting ol such incidents and how to end attacks. Cary Hill, NAC’chairperson, said the lorum, "Bigotry and Violence on Nebraska College Campuses,” was designed lor the N A(' to get inlorma tion and suggestions from the repre sentatives "We have no conclusions; at this point, we arc merely a fact-finding unit,’’ Hill said. Elizabeth Millar, a graduate stu dent at the University of Nebraska l.mcoln, said she has been assaulted because of her race. Millar, who is black, said she was hit over the heat! by a white woman last tail in the Nebraska Union. She said the woman, whom she had never met, apparently was of fended by a statement Millar made to a newspaper reporter earlier in the year. Millar said she reported the inci dent to the campus police, but the woman was only cited. I NL Vice Chancellor lor Student Allairs James Griesen. who spoke later in the day. said he had not heard ol the incident. Millar said she also has been ac cused ol "stealing" another woman's boyfriend and singled out in a class lor being absent one day. being a minority you have to double think. Anything you do, people will say Un-hull, that black person did n llstolhc point that you have to be more mature than they nntoleiant people) are," Millar said Mart.ee Metzger, mtrapersonal v tolence uiuiiseloi to resilience halls at l NE, said she has seen religious intolerance in dorms this past holiday season when Christian students co erced Jew ish students to participate m Christmas lestiv mes. Metzger said racial and bigoted incidents against gays and lesbians. blacks and other minorities are be coming more visible and violent. Because of this, she said, students she has talked to do not want to talk about, let alone report, the incidents. Jack Ka>, chairman and associate prolessor ol speech communications at UNI., said It e sees racial bigotrv in the speeches Ins students give in class. But Jimmi Smith, director ol Multi-Cultural Affairs at IJNI.. said ‘ there has been been a definite de crease in physical violence on cam pus.” He said that compared to IdbK. when physical attacks on racial mi noritv students were at a high, racial violence is almost nonexistent, he said. “(But) I think that there is lots ol room for growth” in the treatment ol minorities, Smith said. “There is still suspicion that there is something else operating than merit in job decisions,” he said. Dora Olivarez-Bahr, president ol Developing Realistic Educational Activities for Minorities (DREAM), said racism is so subtle that it’s diffi cult for students to identify it. If they can detect it, they often don’t know where to report it, she said. Ascension Hernandez, civil rights analyst for the central regional divi sion of the U.S. Commission on Civil R ights, said the N AC needed to know if the universities had places for stu dents to report incidents ol racial violence or harassment. All, except Griesen, could not name a specific place and person to contact to report the incidents. Griesen said that at UNI. students should talk first to the class instruc tor. If that fails, they should file a complaint with Brad Munn, affirma tive action officer, he.said. Donald Burger, conciliation so cialist for the Community Relations Service (C’RS) of the U.S. Depart ment of Justice, said later in a tele phone interview that there isn't a place for Nebraskans to report inci dents ol discrimination. Burger said cases from Nebraska are usually reported directly to CRS bv students, college officials or po lice duels. At the open forum. Burger said his organization monitors crimes moti vated bv the victim's race, color or national origin. He said that ol the racially motivated incidents that have hap pened m the last three years in a four state region ol Kansas, Missouri, Iowa and Nebraska, only three took place m Nebraska. student phone prejix changes I' rum staff reports Students living on the University of Nebraska-1.incoln campus have new phone prefixes. The new prefix was changed from 472 to 436. All residence halls and most fraternity and sorority members now have 436 prefixes. According to the UNL Telecom munications Center, the university made the change because they were running out of possible 7-digit com binations beginning with 472. Administrative offices will con tinue to use the 472 prefix. The prefix switch cost nothing, according to telecommunications. Burger said possible Masons for a lower reported number of eases in Nebraska could be the low number ol minorities m the stale, lack of follow through b> the police, little encour agement lor students to report mci dents or little racial tension m Ne braska. CKS will ti) to establish several "control campuses" at several Ne braska campuses, liurger said. CKS will compare the number ol racially biased acts at these institutions with schools in Iowa, Kansas and Mis souri, he said Kay suggested that faculty and students develop a "communicative dimension" about racism. "We need to know how to com municate about racism," Kay said. According to Kay, people possess an ‘ ostrich mentality" in which they rinn'l n'lmri r:iri:il vinli'nn* they (ear being found out by those w hom they report. Students and faculty, he said, must learn to talk about racial bigotry and learn how to deal with ihe growing problem. Students also must be en couraged to report acts of racial vio lence, he said, i Gricsen said he wants to make the UNI. stall more sensitive to the frus trations of minorities. Minority and non-minority stu dents may perceive an action differ ently, he said. Faculty and students who aren’t minorities must be aware ol possible minority perception, he said. “My own belief is . . . there is a very low incidence ol discernible racism (at UNU),” he said. Hernandez said that even though the commission invited many Ne braska universities and colleges to the forum, only UNU, the University ol Nebraska-Omaha and Metropoli tan Community Colleges of Omaha were able to send representatives to the forum. Hernando/ said itii-r»' vi>r-d reasons why some inslitulions wcrc n i represented. Some were unable to I md someone to represent the institu tion alter school was out, no incidents of tension or v iolence had been re ported on their campuses or publicly presenting information was not pos sible at the time. Hill said the information pre sented at the forum was tape recorded anil is being written up into a report by the commission's central regional office located m Kansas City, Mo. i he report is due to come out in ^0 to 60 days. The report then w ill he returned to the committee for review and pos sible lollinv-up interviews with the presenters, 11 Ml said. After that, the report, along with two others on the same topic from Missouri and Kansas, will be sent to the I S. commission for further re view . he said. "We wanted to pick a topic that was similar toother states’ so that we could compare (our information) with theirs," Hill said. ii aiso nas more 01 an impact n (the information iconics from several sources," he said. Hill said u is difficult to say that racism in Nebraska is a big "prob lem." He said many people have their own perceptions of how to de fine the word problem. "As people become more equal in numbers and having the same oppor tunities, then people that have under lying prejudices . . . become more visible," Hill said.
