Recruitment weekends

Fact: Alaska is cold. Fact: Squirrels can’t live there. Myth: Alaskans refer to the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands as BSAI. Alaskans, squirrels and Duke students alike know that “BSAI” means something completely different in the Gothic Wonderland.

Another common trait of the three groups is that our outer color is highly dependent upon heritage: skin color for humans and fur color for squirrels. The BSAI weekend, otherwise known as the Black Student Alliance Invitational, invites potential students who identify as “having increased melanin” for its festivities. The purpose of this weekend is ostensibly to cater to the interests of the people who attend the weekend.

I did not participate in BSAI, but that was because I am not a Duke student—the only qualification necessary to attend the events. Let’s look at one event that happened to occur that weekend, the “Evening with John Legend” sponsored by BSA and the DUU Speakers and Stage committee. Regardless of who first thought of bringing John Legend for the performance, I’m sure the conversation did not go like this: “Hey let’s bring him because he’s black!” Rather I assume it went like this: “This event is going to be awesome ... it’s going to be LEGENDary.”

Although many people liked the events of BSAI, there were also many that had problems with the weekend. Their objections were twofold. First, why was Duke spending “extra” money on events for the weekend? And secondly, does this promote self-segregation? I think that since these events were open to everyone, it’s not really extra money. Duke is just allocating money to a group that desires to do an event. There are resources available to every student group that wants to host events or programs. This mindset turns a blind eye to everything else that Duke has to offer that could potentially attract specific demographics. Think how many females went to see Tucker Max or how many history majors live in the Smart Home. By the way, we have a Quidditch team, too—how many non-nerds are a part of that?! Some people think these things are enjoyable regardless of (and sometimes in spite of) what their backgrounds suggest they would stereotypically enjoy.

As for point two, whoever thinks that some level of self-segregation, whether conscious or subconscious, isn’t apparent at Duke is kidding themselves. But to that point, this has absolutely nothing to do with BSAI.

Is there a problem with trying to show prospective students what the campus has to offer? For a campus whose black basketball players were idiotically referred to as a bunch of “Uncle Toms,” a display of black culture helps further discredit outsiders who judge the Duke community and show p-frosh the real campus culture.

Self-segregation is a separate situation that can’t be solved by any pre-orientation weekend, but rather requires attention when students actually arrive on campus. Self-segregation is a by-product of people wishing to stay within their comfort zones, but once people acclimate themselves, their comfort zones are defined more by their activities than by their race. Duke does not attempt to create an environment with separate or (un)equal organizations. Social circles are based on common interests and freshman dorms. One could easily point out that it is unbecoming of the University to so openly facilitate this comfort zone of race, but what do you want Duke to do? If Duke didn’t have opportunities for every race, people would complain that these opportunities didn’t exist. Now that Duke does have race-specific programs, people still complain. The University should cater to the interests of each student in his or her pre-orientation experience.

Squirrels don’t play basketball, but I’d guess prospective basketball players would do basketball player things like taking a trip to the practice facility, meeting Coach K, going to a game and maybe practicing with the team. The athletic department wants to show recruits what they might be interested in, why should BSA be raked over the coals for doing the exact same thing?