Epps Invites Leaders to Retreat

Dean of Students Archie C. Epps III and Assistant Dean for Race Relations Hilda Hernandez-Gravelle invited about 40 student leaders last week to participate in a race relations retreat to be held during Orientation Week.

Leaders of undergraduate minority organizations and editors of campus publications are among the invited students. The retreat will address issues of campus race relations raised last spring, said Assistant Dean of Students Ellen Hatfield Towne. "Students expressed a very strong interest to continue dialoguing," she said.

She said she hopes the retreat will foster a tone of "tolerance, civility and respect" among various groups on campus. "We want to begin the year with a coming together both of administrators and students."

Last winter, tensions flared between the Black Students Association and Hillel after a speech by Leonard Jeffries. In spring, The Crimson's coverage of minority affairs was criticized by several minority student organizations.

Yesterday student leaders said they hoped the retreat would establish communication lines that will help avoid tensions like last spring's.

"There's a need for continual, ongoing dialogue between [groups]," said Shai A. Held '94, chair of Hillel.

Held added that the most valuable service performed by a retreat of this sort is allowing students simply to meet each other and know who to reach when tensions occur. "This moves away from crisis management and moves toward crisis prevention," he said. "Crisis prevention and friendship building are inextricably linked."

BSA President Zaheer R. Ali '94 agreed. "The problem is that when there's a conflict, communication breaks down between the groups involved," he said. "Hopefully this retreat will cement a dialogue...that will continue through periods of conflict that may arise."

Hernandez-Gravelle and Epps, who were unavailable for comment, are planning the retreat's program, Towne said. Although the precise activities have not yet been settled on, Towne said they will include workshops as well as a "play side," with a cook-out and volleyball game.

Earlier this summer, Dean of the Faculty Jeremy R. Knowles announced that Epps would supervise race relations programs in the College, including the Harvard Foundation and the Office of Race Relations.