Students Address Race Relations

Discussion between members of undergraduate publications and minority groups can advance campus race relations, student participants in the first official Race Relations Task Force meeting said yesterday.

The meeting included representatives from The Crimson, The Independent, The Salient, the Black Students Association (BSA), La Raza and American Indians at Harvard. Many of the participants agreed that if minority groups sent publications press releases on their activities, and if publications met with minority groups before their comps, the different groups could improve the racial climate at Harvard.

Yesterday's meeting was the first in a series of discussion sessions set up to address interracial interaction and minority membership in mainstream organizations. Yesterday's meeting focused on minority participation in undergraduate publications and coverage of minority activities by those publications.

BSA President Darryl A. Parson '87 said he left the meeting with the feeling that "undergraduate publications really are interested in attracting minority students and are making attempts to do so." He added that the meeting dispelled his former uncertainty on that point.

The Race Relations Task Force, a subcommittee of the student-faculty Committee on College Life (CCL), set up yesterday's meeting, which was sponsored by the CCL, according to Douglas A. Winthrop, who chairs the task force.

As a result of yesterday's meeting, representatives from The Independent and the Salient said they would meet with leaders of minority groups before their next comps in an effort to increase minority membership in their publications.

Representatives from The Crimson already met with members of many minority groups before the newspaper's fall comp.

Salient Editor-in-Chief Thomas A. Firestone '86 said that although he had not previously considered talking to minority leaders about working for the Salient, he did not want his publication to be seen as racist or sexist.

"We want to provide conservativism as a viable alternative," said Firestone. "In no way is conservativism racist or sexist and we want to correct that stereotype."

Winthrop said the meeting also helped to clear up some false perceptions of both groups. He said that many minority leaders were under the impression that "comping The Crimson is impossible with a work-study job." He said that the meeting allowed minority leaders to find out that special Crimson comps exist for work-study students, and that "it is possible" for them to comp.

First in a Series

Winthrop said that the same groups will meet again next month to continue their discussion and to introduce the new officers of some of the organizations to the discussion sessions. The Crimson and the Independent will both elect new officers before the next meeting.

In addition, Winthrop said he plans to bring together representatives from mainstream and minority singing groups like the Opportunes and the Kuumba Singers, respectively.

The Harvard Foundation, a College administrative body designed to foster improved race relations, could play a larger role in the meetings if its official mandate is expanded, Winthrop said. The Faculty Council, the steering committee of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, is considering initiating a review of the Foundation.

Currently, Winthrop said, "the Foundation is not a broad-based student center and has yet to cosponsor" the task force meetings.

Winthrop said he was satisfied with the outcome of yesterday's meeting, which he termed "successful."

"I'm always asking 'Is there a need for this?' and the answer is always yes," he said.

Independent Executive Editor Jennie A. Kassanoff '86 said she hoped future meetings would produce more tangible results and solutions to existing problems. "I hope that as meetings go on, more and more specific things will come out of them, and not just vague generalities.