This Thursday, I sat down with WSA President Zach Kolodin ’07 to discuss campus issues in relation to the WSA’s Mid-Year Report, which was released on Jan. 28. The report recaps the WSA’s programs over the past semester, notes flaws and shortcomings, and outlines its priorities for the future.
Greg Dubinsky: In the Mid-Year Report, you talk about the WSA having more influence in trustee meetings. Could you elaborate on that?
Zach Kolodin: We’ve always had representation on the board but past executive committees haven’t utilized it in the same way. The real shift is that when a topic comes up that pertains to students, we bring it up and pursue it. We’ve decided to treat ourselves more like full board members and give general opinions and I think that’s really had an impact.
GD: Can you give me an example?
ZK: I think we’ve made trustees more aware of the social and racial tensions on campus. For example, [one trustee] was surprised that we were addressing that. We told them it was no different than the real world [with regard to racism].
GD: Are you dissatisfied with the trustees’ receptiveness on any issues?
ZK: We’re not pushing a specific agenda, so I can’t really say that we’re not being heard about any particular issues. However, there’s a general lack of funds over this five-year period [2005-2009] that is frustrating.
GD: So you are 100 percent satisfied with them?
ZK: I wouldn’t criticize them on any particular point…It’s frustrating to see the faculty come out so strongly for their raises, and for the response to be somewhat lukewarm.
GD: How would you choose between the faculty’s salaries and the endowment?
ZK: I think ultimately we should be supporting faculty at the level that they’re producing. I think we should be in the top third of our peer group, the way they insist they should be. If that means the endowment draw should be a tenth of a percent higher, I support it.
GD: What about housing fines? You talked about a reasonable policy for fines.
ZK: We’re pushing for two things: number one is an appeals process for damage and fire safety. We have some support for that, particularly [Associate Director of Facilities Management] Jeff Miller. However, we haven’t convinced everybody: [Associate Director of Campus Fire Safety] Barbara Spalding opposes an appeals process. So I can’t proclaim victory yet. I won’t accept it not happening because it’s such a reasonable gesture. Number two is more reasonable amounts [for fines]. We have the support of some administrators. Last year, the fines were hiked unilaterally. We’re pushing hard for them to basically be on par with other institutions, which they’re not.
GD: One of the other things that was striking to me in your report was that you want to work to eliminate racial profiling concerns. How are you going to eliminate those concerns?
ZK: That’s a really big issue. I think the most important thing is education—both of students and Public Safety.
GD: How are students supposed to be educated about that?
ZK: Students need to report whenever they are asked for their I—that is,] when they are suspected of being a Middletown resident or are disrespecte—y any campus on the basis of what they feel was their skin color or class or something like that. Because If you don’t report those instances, we can never have the kind of substantiation that things like that are going on, and there will always be deniability unless people report [racial profiling]. When that starts happening, the P-Safe officers that are racially profiling people can be either reprimanded or educated more about that.
GD: Not firing? If the situation warrants it?
ZK: If the situation warrants it, of course that would be an option. I don’t think firing solves the problem. It’s more of a structural problem and not only a personnel one. Education on Public Safety’s side has to come in the form of yearly diversity workshops and more dialogue with the student body and the WSA.
GD: But how are you going to eliminate concerns? Can you ever eliminate concerns entirely, which was the phrasing in the report?
ZK: You can have it as your aspirational goal, but as the WSA, as a student body, as an institution, you can never eliminate the structural racism. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try.
GD: Tell me about the New York Times [readership program]. What’s the status on that?
ZK: Every year that I have been on the WSA, the dean’s office has tried to cut it. Basically, I felt like one of these years we were going to lose that battle. So we’re trying endow it. I think we’ve worked out a compromise that will ensure the survival of the program at least another five years, and alleviate the pressure on the [Student Budgetary Committee (SBC)], but the details haven’t been worked out yet.
GD: Is that through private endowment by members of the trustees, or is that going to be funded by the University itself?
ZK: It’s a dual initiative based on student fundraising and trustee matching.
GD: Any ideas how you are going to spend [the $640,000 now available to the SBC]?
ZK: It’s important to remember that, with inflation, we’re back to the money we had four years ago. The SBC plans to keep the criteria we’ve had in the past, so we hope to more fully accommodate the requests from student groups.
GD: Any thoughts on who the interim dean should be?
ZK: I believe the interim dean should come from within the dean’s office and I shared my opinion with President Bennet. That said, I think there are a lot of faculty members who could be excellent in the role. But if a faculty member is appointed, I hope that will turn into a permanent position so there won’t have to be two transitions. The reason I think the person should come from the dean’s office is continuity, so that the programs started by Dean Maria will continue without disruption.
GD: What do you think about the Campus Climate Log and more broadly Cruz-Saco’s legacy?
ZK: It is a 100 percent improvement over the previous system, which was almost nothing. I think it will continue to evolve and develop as a resource for the campus. The dean of the College office has been really well run and was more productive under [Cruz-Saco] than in the years preceding her.
GD: You refer to “marginalized students” a good deal in the report. Is there a process for determining who marginalized students are?
ZK: No, there’s no process. Let me clarify “marginalized” by saying I tend to think about it in terms of traditionally marginalized groups. That’s not meant to be an exclusive definition, because I think that students could be marginalized in ways that I might not think of immediately. Queer students, students of color, lower class, and to a certain extent middle class students are marginalized at Wesleyan. To a certain extent, women can be thought of as marginalized at Wesleyan. There are not as many women as men on the faculty.
GD: So when you say that you hope to provide more support, what does that mean?
ZK: I’d like to step back a little bit and say that I think the WSA does a great job at a lot of things. We’re well-situated on administrative committees. We’re involved in the decision-making process of the University even if it’s not always clear to students. But the WSA has historically, at least during the time that I’ve been on the assembly, not been as friendly as I’d like to see to students that we traditionally think of as marginalized. I don’t know if [it’s due to] the way we talk about student issues, or if it’s about the structure of our meetings, but in certain fundamental ways we don’t live up to our commitments to represent all students, particularly marginalized students. That’s something I’d like to change; that’s something that’s very difficult to change given the structure of the WSA. I’m looking for new ways to reach out to those communities. We worked with the students that were supporting Silverio [Vasquez ’07]’s campaign and to try to change the Academic Review process, recognizing that there are some structural issues of class and race embedded in that process that we don’t find acceptable. We have to keep pushing ourselves to do more.
GD: What are the issues of race and class embedded in the Academic Review process?
ZK: When a student does not succeed academically at Wesleyan, it’s generally not because the student is not intelligent, but because there are environmental factors working against them—family commitments, difficulty adjusting to the Wesleyan culture, a lack of funds—and those issues have a lot to do with race and class, I think.
GD: You said that it was the structure of the WSA that was presenting difficulties. What did you mean, the “structure?”
ZK: I’ve been told by others that the way we sit in [PAC 002] and the rules of our meeting make it difficult for those who are not part of the WSA to express themselves. On top of that, those rules require people to speak in ways that some people are just not comfortable with. That has a historical basis. That doesn’t mean that marginalized students can’t be successful, but that it might be alienating in ways I might not completely understand.
GD: When are the WSA tours [of dorms] going to happen?
ZK: I’m in contact with Residential Life about putting together that program, but we don’t have specifics yet. It will happen this semester. It seems like ‘snacks’ are poorly attended in the dorms and we want to find a way to get an audience interested in what we have to say.
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