Creating Community on Campus

The community that we live in is expansive, consisting of three undergraduate schools, two affiliated schools, and 13 graduate and professional schools. The diversity and complexity of this campus serves its beauty, but also makes it difficult to establish inclusive principles for the community.

Nevertheless, in the spring of 2005, a group of students came together in the hopes of accomplishing that task. The campus had just experienced one of its most horrific bias incidents, the administration had failed to adequately respond, and a group of students assembled to form what would be called Stop Hate on Columbia’s Campus. In an effort to establish mutual understanding of morals and values to be upheld by our community, various students along with key administrators came to form the committee that would develop the Community Principles Initiative.

CPI consists of various parts. There is an educational campaign that focuses on response to bias incidents, a committee that is working on the community summit, and a statement campaign that is working on a statement of principles. The statement, which was unveiled on Oct. 31 on Low Plaza, is a living document. The goal of this document is to reflect the sentiment of our community. Far from being written in stone, this document was unveiled for your criticism so that it can more adequately serve its purpose. CPI has a very strong student voice. When the students who began the initiative were nearing graduation, they recruited new leaders to serve in their stead. This was done to maintain student input. CPI has met frequently this fall, preparing for the Community Summit that will take place on Nov. 9. The Community Summit is open to the entire student body; there is no focus on student leaders, as the voice of the individual student has to be heard if there is to be any type of effective change on this campus.

In CPI each student brings an invaluable perspective to the topics discussed. They can join the different committees based on their interests and coordinate events that will foster the unity of our community. We are proactive about the immediate repercussions and the long term changes. We also believe that the most successful strategy to do this is to be democratic and transparent. We understand that this strategy involves the collaboration of all students in the community, not just those involved in the CPI committees.

This Friday’s summit is part of our effort to build a more united community. There will be a presentation of the current response protocols to bias and hate acts. There will also be open dialogue between students and key administrators. Students will learn the steps they can take after a bias or hate act, how to seek support, and the different ways in which they can get involved both through CPI and outside of it.

Our goal is to bring all students’ views to a safe and secure place where constructive dialogue can occur. Although the dialogue will occur here, it is essential that it will continue to spread through the community. Speaking out, understanding definitions, knowing our campus resources, educating each other, providing support, and maintaining the momentum will be addressed at the summit and will serve as tools to continue this dialogue after it ends.

CPI has made an extra effort this year to invite every student to participate and understands that, if CPI is to succeed, it needs as many voices as possible in the room. No impact can be made without individual student effort to make our private conversations public. It is our opinions and views of our community that need to come together. CPI’s Summit is an important place where this discussion can take place. Every voice matters, including yours.

This article was written by the student organizers of the Columbia Community Summit. For more information, e-mail communitysummit@columbia.edu.