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Being an Ally  February 23rd, 2011

An ally is a person who identifies within a dominant identity, yet chooses to aid or fight alongside those who identify with subordinate identities. An example of what an identity can be is how I identify as being a white, straight, male. Those are all examples of dominant identities and the supplement subordinate identities would be a person of color, gay, and female. I now consider myself an ally to all subordinate identities, even though in the past I didn’t give my support. Read the rest of this entry »


What To Do About Class  February 23rd, 2011

Over the past couple of weeks I have been discussing where I identify with social class and how my new identity has changed my outlook on life.  Now the question remains, what am I going to do from here?  Being in an area of privilege, I have the opportunity to serve a community that is oppressed throughout society.  Over the past three weeks I have been reading ad researching various ways to serve communities that are oppressed due to class.  Although breaking the institutionalized classism in America is difficult, starting to slow the growth of classist remarks on a personal level is extremely feasible.

Read the rest of this entry »


Disparities in Education  February 11th, 2011

I am taking a writing intensive course with an emphasis in African-American culture. All of the reading and writing reflections I do are centered on documents written by African-Americans. This past weekend, I was given an assignment that consisted of discussing the ways in which Jim Crow laws affected the lives of White and African-American individuals. As I was working my way through the assignment, I couldn’t help but reminisce about my childhood. This assignment reminded me of how it was growing up in Compton, California and the many things I was exposed to and I saw as normal. Years later, when my family moved to Beaverton, Oregon, I realized that I had been deprived from many opportunities that would help me succeed in school and life. Doing this homework assignment allowed me to answer questions I had about why things were so different between both communities and helped me accept the fact that our country was founded on racism. It gave me the explanation I needed to understand that what I had experienced were the results of the racist foundations of this country.

I grew up in an environment where hearing gunshots, helicopters around the house, getting the house broken into, and sharing my textbooks was normal. I knew that I wasn’t supposed to be in certain neighborhoods at any time. That there was no point in calling the police because by the time they arrived it would have been to late for them to do anything anyways. That was my reality.  At school you were either African-American or Mexican. If your book was not written on and had all the pages on it, you were one of the lucky ones. There was no such thing as a sheltered course (a class that is for English as a Second Language student and is given at a slower paced than a regular course as there is in Beaverton, OR.); we were put in the same classes as everyone else and a bilingual instructor was present to help those learning English understand the curriculum. I never visited a university only Compton Community College. That was my reality at the time.

Upon arriving to Oregon I realized that my school in California was very behind academically. The education I was now receiving challenged my ideas, it taught me to question and not accept everything as true. The school I attended in Oregon trusted me as a student and knew I was there to get an education and, therefore, didn’t treat me like a criminal behind locked gates as they did in California. I was given semi-new or new books, a variety of class options, and teachers that cared and helped me truly learn the material. I was taken on college visits, and constantly asked where I was planning to apply for college, questions that I had never been asked and, therefore, hadn’t considered.  Upon arriving to Oregon State and learning about social justice issues and further analyzing Jim Crow segregation, I realized that the reason my education in Compton schools was so different from schools in Beaverton was because the systems that were put in place many years ago which allowed for “separate but equal” to be acceptable. The ideology of separate but equal allowed for racial disparities to occur, but as one can see in my case, separation was achieved and is still seen in various parts of this country, but equality has not quite come around just yet. There is a lot of work that this country still needs to do and I think it needs to start through education. I like to think I am doing my part by getting educated and sharing what I have learned with others. I like to think that you don’t really know something until you are able to teach it, and it is only then that you know you have truly learned it.

Melissa Rico

Community Relations Facilitator-Westside

The comments shared by the Community Relations Facilitator program are strictly the point of view from the author and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of UHDS. If this article has inspired a desire to dialogue, the author, or another CRF and/or any Resident Assistant, Resident Director or CoOp Director would be happy to participate. Please contact Nina Gassoway (Nina.Gassoway@oregonstate.edu) to assist in making arrangements.


You’re Invited: Soul Food Cafe  February 11th, 2011

On Wednesday, February 23rd from 5:00pm to 8:00pm UHDS will host “Soul Food Cafe:  A Journey through Culture and Cuisine” at McNary Dining Center. Soul Food Cafe celebrates Black History Month and is one of several “Journeys through Culture and Cuisine” that UHDS has hosted over the last few years. It will feature slow smoked Virginia ham, Southern Fried Chicken, Tofu Creole, Collard Greens, Fried Okra, Bananas Foster, and homemade New Orleans -Style Beignets.

Each of these cultural events is an outgrowth of our Diversity Initiative which is a multi-faceted approach to creating communities that are open, caring, and supportive of students from all cultures.  As a department, our Diversity Initiative is aspirational.  We know we have more work to do to create inclusive environments, but we are dedicated and committed to the journey and we ask the rest of the campus community to join us and support us as we travel on our journey.

Working with our campus partners brings great energy to these events and I appreciate everyone’s involvement.  Come join us for at McNary Dining Center for Soul Food Café and mellow out to the blues of the Ty Curtis Band.


In Times of Worship and Fear  January 27th, 2011

In light of the recent attempted bombing of Pioneer Square in Portland, and the resulting burning of a mosque in Corvallis, I question how a person makes the leap from an individual’s actions to holding a whole religion responsible and thus burning a place of worship. As I reflect on the situation, the essay “The Moral Insight” by Josiah Royce comes to mind. Read the rest of this entry »


Changes in Masculinity  January 27th, 2011

Two years ago if you asked me to define what masculinity meant I could have done it relatively easily. I would of described the usual stereotypes of being tough, don’t cry, and to be brave. Today the task of defining what masculinity means to me is much more difficult of a task. Read the rest of this entry »


Learning to Serve  January 27th, 2011

After reflecting on how I identify in the sense of social class, I have started to pay more attention to my access to wealth.  My immediate family is a low income family in a manufactured home neighborhood, aka a trailer park. My extended family, on the other hand, has an abundance of resources. I have been struggling with identifying as lower class, based on my immediate family, or upper middle class with this new consideration of my access to wealth through my extended family. Read the rest of this entry »


Vitamin D: Are You Getting Enough??  January 27th, 2011

The easiest way for our bodies to synthesize Vitamin D is through the sun.  That’s right, the sun.  Therefore, it is not surprising that (in a state where it rains nine months out of the year) many individuals living in Oregon have low Vitamin D levels.

But before you run off to the Bahamas to replenish your depleted Vitamin D stores Read the rest of this entry »


Adjusting your Meal Plan to Meet your Needs  January 11th, 2011

What we eat and when we eat are very personal and each of us has unique dietary needs which means that no single meal plan is going to perfectly fit your situation.

So at the end of fall term some of us had large meal plan balances and some of us used up all of our Dining Dollars and added money to our Orange Rewards account to get through the end of fall term.  Read the rest of this entry »


The End of a New Beginning  January 11th, 2011

This article marks the end of my first term as a Community Relations Facilitator for the residence halls.  Although, with the help of the RA’s great programs have been done within the residence halls, I can’t help but wonder what the rest of my year will look like. Social Justice is not something I can’t just learn or teach and then move on to the next thing in life; it is a process. Read the rest of this entry »