The April 25, 2003 issue of The Argus featured a two-page spread of Wespeaks written collectively by 33 students. The title: “It is time for lasting, institutional change.”

The crux of the concern was that marginalized students—marginalized along lines like race, class, gender, sexuality, and ability—were both underrepresented and under-served by the Wesleyan system. The solution that the students called for was a physical space that would act as a home to anti-oppression work in general. What was proposed was an anti-oppression organizing center, which now exists as the University Organizing Center in 190 High Street. This was part of a larger trend in which students who are historically silenced “claim space” in the University for themselves. Both 200 Church and Turath House were born from the same wave of activism and are two relatively recent additions to the list of student spaces like Malcolm X House and Open House.

But demanding space doesn’t just mean physical space. Long before 2003, students had called for symbolic space in the University through representation in the curriculum. The African American Studies Department; the Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Department; and the Disability Studies Course Cluster all demonstrate the importance of symbolic space in making the University a more collaborative, safe, and empowering environment.

These are moments in our history to be proud of and to draw inspiration from. Today, more than ever, we need space and we need to protect space. Alongside the sentiment that activism is not the same as it used to be, there are concerns that the Wesleyan community is too fragmented to function. Identity groups are having identity crisis. The number of active queer alliances has fallen from over ten to just one in only a few years. All sorts of students from all sorts of backgrounds are feeling disillusioned and disempowered–with good reason too. While some groups on campus are thriving, far too many are struggling to even stay in existence.

Although the climate has changed dramatically since 2003, there is a similar sense that things aren’t moving. To borrow language from the authors of those Wespeaks, if Wesleyan were a train, we’d be missing our conductor.

But as long as we–the students of Wesleyan–have a space, any space, no matter how grungy or ragtag, there is a way out of the confusion and disarray.  When the sterile conference rooms of Usdan fail us, we can break ties with the system and gather an army on our own territory–without going through Room Request. In the UOC, as well as in other student-run spaces, we are liberated. In these spaces, we have the freedom to recreate the world (and the University) as we envision it.

More than just a physical space, the UOC represents a forceful carving of space in the collective consciousness of Wesleyan. The hope is that people see the University Organizing Center as more than a meeting place. When we walk into the building, we are challenged by other student groups, by anti-oppression literature in the library, and by old Argus and Hermes articles plastered on the wall. We are challenged to engage with each other in dialogue and collaboration. We are challenged to see each other for the commonalities we share and to think about how our own causes intersect in the larger picture that is the timeline of our world.

With a space like the University Organizing Center, and with the strength of those who came before us, we are challenged to create community.