Tyrone N. Butts
APE Reporter
52
Fisk, Wisconsin students connect at annual conference on racism
For three days, students from a predominantly white college in Wisconsin moved in with students from predominantly African-American Fisk University and held an intense series of talks on racism.
The experience was sometimes uncomfortable, the students said, but as their time together came to a close here yesterday, the students said they found more similarities than differences in each other. They said it helped them see their own racial beliefs more clearly.
''This f
rced us to deal with the prejudices we all have,'' said Jhamerra Smith, a Fisk student who participated in the annual spring conference on race relations. ''It forced us to interact and deal
wit
h each other's conflicting ideas. A lot of people think r
acism is one sided, but it goes in both directions.''
For 12 years, students from Fisk and Ripon College in Ripon, Wis., have been sharing dorm rooms and discussing race relations, alternating between campuses every year.
Among the topics discussed this year were health disparities among African-Americans, the environmental hazards of being poor, images of African-Americans in the media and the effect of racism on the American psyche.
''White privilege is something a lot of educated people deny or don't want to confront, but it's still there,'' said Mauro Sacchi, a 2002 graduate of Ripon College. ''But we can do a better job of confronting these attitudes
and accept each other's differences just by interacting.''
But Raquel Gonzalez of Ripon College said she came to Fisk looking for similarities, not differences.
''
We r
eally found
out how alike we are,'' she said. ''We're all just human beings trying to have a better life.''
Jeannin
e Hill of Fisk said most barriers that prevent people of different races from seeing their similarities are self-imposed.
''People isolate themselves so they don't have to confront race, and if you're a white person, you really don't have to confront racism,'' Hill said. ''But we found out we're not all that different and there is a lot of common ground.''
Hazel Joyner-Smith, community outreach coordinator for Fisk's Race Relations Institute, one of the event sponsors, said that the colleges and the students needed to be as creative as possible to keep their dialogues about race going.
''We're keenly aware that what used to take place in the '60s and '70s is not the only thing we can do on this journey we're all taking,'' she said. &#
39;'
We need as much fre
edom as possible to be expressive in our inner-circle dialogues about race.''
************
''But we found out we're not all that different and there is a lot of common ground.'', said
she.
Where did you get this idea, n-gger?
"â┚¬Ã…¡ÃƒÆ’”�šÃ”š¢ Whites from families with incomes of less than $10,000 had a mean SAT score of 980. This is 123 points higher than the national mean for all blacks.
"â┚¬Ã…¡ÃƒÆ’”�šÃ”š¢ Whites from families with incomes below $10,000 had a mean SAT test score that was 46 points higher than blacks whose families had incomes of between $80,000 and $100,000.
"â┚¬Ã…¡ÃƒÆ’”�šÃ”š¢ Blacks from families with incomes of more than $100,000 had a mean SAT score that was 142 points below the mean score for whites from families at the sam
e income level.
The Expanding Racial Scoring Gap Between Black and White SAT Test Takers
<
br>"It
is unacceptable that sexual
ly transmitted diseases, which are preventable and can often be effectively treated when caught early, continue to be found at significantly higher rates among African Americans than the rest of the population," said Helene Gayle, M.D., M.P.H., direc
tor of CDC's National Center for HIV, STD, and TB Prevention (NCHSTP). "We must continue to develop effective prevention strategies and increase our efforts to reach communities at highest risk of infection."
AFRICAN AMERICANS DISPROPORTIONATELY AFFECTED BY STDS
And the ever popular...
For the y
ears 1976-2000 combined -
Black victims are greatly over represented in homicides involving arguments or drugs. Compared with the overall involvement of blacks as victi
ms, blacks are
less often the victims of sex-relat
ed homicides, homicide by poison and workplace killings.
Race patterns among offenders are similar to those among victims, except that black offenders are involved in a relatively large percentage of felony-murders (nearly six out of ten).
Racial differences exist, with blacks dis
proportionately represented among homicide victims and offenders
Now, what was that nonsense about a lot of common ground between humans and n-ggers?
T.N.B.
Fisk, Wisconsin students connect at annual conference on racism
For three days, students from a predominantly white college in Wisconsin moved in with students from predominantly African-American Fisk University and held an intense series of talks on racism.
The experience was sometimes uncomfortable, the students said, but as their time together came to a close here yesterday, the students said they found more similarities than differences in each other. They said it helped them see their own racial beliefs more clearly.
''This f
rced us to deal with the prejudices we all have,'' said Jhamerra Smith, a Fisk student who participated in the annual spring conference on race relations. ''It forced us to interact and deal
wit
h each other's conflicting ideas. A lot of people think r
acism is one sided, but it goes in both directions.''
For 12 years, students from Fisk and Ripon College in Ripon, Wis., have been sharing dorm rooms and discussing race relations, alternating between campuses every year.
Among the topics discussed this year were health disparities among African-Americans, the environmental hazards of being poor, images of African-Americans in the media and the effect of racism on the American psyche.
''White privilege is something a lot of educated people deny or don't want to confront, but it's still there,'' said Mauro Sacchi, a 2002 graduate of Ripon College. ''But we can do a better job of confronting these attitudes
and accept each other's differences just by interacting.''
But Raquel Gonzalez of Ripon College said she came to Fisk looking for similarities, not differences.
''
We r
eally found
out how alike we are,'' she said. ''We're all just human beings trying to have a better life.''
Jeannin
e Hill of Fisk said most barriers that prevent people of different races from seeing their similarities are self-imposed.
''People isolate themselves so they don't have to confront race, and if you're a white person, you really don't have to confront racism,'' Hill said. ''But we found out we're not all that different and there is a lot of common ground.''
Hazel Joyner-Smith, community outreach coordinator for Fisk's Race Relations Institute, one of the event sponsors, said that the colleges and the students needed to be as creative as possible to keep their dialogues about race going.
''We're keenly aware that what used to take place in the '60s and '70s is not the only thing we can do on this journey we're all taking,'' she said. &#
39;'
We need as much fre
edom as possible to be expressive in our inner-circle dialogues about race.''
************
''But we found out we're not all that different and there is a lot of common ground.'', said
she.
Where did you get this idea, n-gger?
"â┚¬Ã…¡ÃƒÆ’”�šÃ”š¢ Whites from families with incomes of less than $10,000 had a mean SAT score of 980. This is 123 points higher than the national mean for all blacks.
"â┚¬Ã…¡ÃƒÆ’”�šÃ”š¢ Whites from families with incomes below $10,000 had a mean SAT test score that was 46 points higher than blacks whose families had incomes of between $80,000 and $100,000.
"â┚¬Ã…¡ÃƒÆ’”�šÃ”š¢ Blacks from families with incomes of more than $100,000 had a mean SAT score that was 142 points below the mean score for whites from families at the sam
e income level.
The Expanding Racial Scoring Gap Between Black and White SAT Test Takers
<
br>"It
is unacceptable that sexual
ly transmitted diseases, which are preventable and can often be effectively treated when caught early, continue to be found at significantly higher rates among African Americans than the rest of the population," said Helene Gayle, M.D., M.P.H., direc
tor of CDC's National Center for HIV, STD, and TB Prevention (NCHSTP). "We must continue to develop effective prevention strategies and increase our efforts to reach communities at highest risk of infection."
AFRICAN AMERICANS DISPROPORTIONATELY AFFECTED BY STDS
And the ever popular...
For the y
ears 1976-2000 combined -
Black victims are greatly over represented in homicides involving arguments or drugs. Compared with the overall involvement of blacks as victi
ms, blacks are
less often the victims of sex-relat
ed homicides, homicide by poison and workplace killings.
Race patterns among offenders are similar to those among victims, except that black offenders are involved in a relatively large percentage of felony-murders (nearly six out of ten).
Racial differences exist, with blacks dis
proportionately represented among homicide victims and offenders
Now, what was that nonsense about a lot of common ground between humans and n-ggers?
T.N.B.