Over the course of my almost three-and-a-half years here at Wooster, I have immersed myself in environmentalism on this campus. Currently, I am a leader in Greenhouse, WOODS, EARTH House, Greenhouse’s FreeStore initiative, COWabunga, the Campus Sustainability Committee (CSC) and its education subcommittee and Organic Farming Club. With the exception of CSC and COWabunga, I have been an active member every one of these groups for my entire college career. Through this involvement, first as a member and now as a leader, I have come to recognize a striking lack of diversity and inclusion within these organizations.
With all of the above groups (excluding COWabunga, which is a once-a-year initiative, not an actual group), diversity among members has been and continues to be deficient. I would estimate that the number of people of color who have maintained some level of involvement (which I’m defining as attending meetings for at least a couple of weeks and/or going on at least two off-campus outings) likely tops out at 40-50 max. And that’s a survey of the entire general membership of all of the organizations listed above, across three-and-a-half years. Narrowing my parameters to only those who have held leadership positions, and I can say with certainty that the number fits on a single hand (and that’s including myself).
Here, I’m not trying to blame people of color for not being involved in these groups. I understand as well as anyone that college students’ schedules are packed full, and not everyone can be involved in everything that they care about. What bothers me is the fact that previously, virtually none of these organizations had made efforts to acknowledge or address this deficiency within the group nor to reach out and try to partner with any diversity-centric groups.
But in this way, Wooster’s campus reflects problems of diversity in the wider environmental movement. A 2014 report on diversity within mainstream environmental organizations came to the following conclusions:
• The 3.2 million members and volunteers of environmental organizations are still predominantly white.
• The recruitment process for environmental organizations is not conducive to the hiring of ethnic minorities, and continues to replicate the current workforce.
• Collaborations between environmental organizations and ethnic minority or low-income organizations are still uncommon.
Though we are not unique in this problem, I think that because we attend Wooster, which has a core commitment to diversity and inclusion, and because I know for a fact that the students in environmental groups also care about these issues, it is imperative that the members leaders and general members alike work to address these shortcomings in whatever ways we can.
Happily, I’ve voiced these concerns and they’re starting to be addressed. WOODS specifically has formed a committee and Greenhouse’s advisor has reached out to me. Though these responses have given me hope, it is important to recognize that these are just the very first steps that need to be made in order to start making real progress towards increasing the inclusivity, accessibility and relevance to everyone (with respect to race, sexuality, gender, income, ability and religion) in our campus community.
Olivia Hall, a Contributing Writer for the Voice, can be reached for comment at OHall19@wooster.edu.