A mixture of nostalgia and anger was on display Friday and Saturday at the McCormick Tribune Center. Alumni assembled for a series of conferences remembering the civil-rights gains made in 1968 while lamenting setbacks that have developed in recent years.
The two-day forum, called “The Black Student Movement at Northwestern and its Legacy,” was sponsored by Northwestern’s Center for African American History and drew about 200 visitors, mostly African-American alumni who were invited via a circulated e-mail.
“Forging a Path: Black History at Northwestern” was one panel discussion and a film called “Northwestern 1968” was screened that honored an event in May 1968 when black students staged a sit-in to force the university to agree to increase its black and African-American presence. But by the final discussion, “The Black Community Then and Now: Forging Links and Building a Legacy,” the conversation largely turned to problems facing blacks at Northwestern in 2008—and what the gathered alumni could do to help.
“People said they wanted a mechanism to be able to keep in touch,” said C. Cole Dillon (SESP ‘78), who formerly headed the Northwestern Black Alumni Association (NUBAA). “That’s not enough, because keeping in touch hasn’t helped us to preserve the legacy that we thought we left for students.”
The litany of issues cited by the panel included perceived hostility from the administration (including a former refusal to recognize Martin Luther King Day), the repairs needed for African American Student Affairs’ “Black House,” disorganization of multicultural student affairs groups and, particularly, low black enrollment at Northwestern, with only 81 undergraduate students in the class of 2012.
“Who’s at fault for this?” asked Communications senior Zachary Parker, president of black student group For Members Only (FMO). “Is it the students’ fault? Is it the alumni’s fault? Is it the faculty’s fault? Quite frankly, I think it’s all of our faults.” Parker also blamed black student “individualism” for the difficulty in organizing and spoke out against the university for rescinding an honorary degree extended to Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the guest speaker for FMO’s “State of the Black Union” address on November 7.
By the end of the last panel, a notebook was being circulated to gather contact information with the intent of pooling alumni influence and approaching the administration with the alumni’s concerns.
Alumni who attended say they hope the legacy of their success can inspire Northwestern’s black community today. “When we were complaining about these things one by one, we weren’t taken seriously,” said Kathryn Ogletree (CAS ‘71, PhD ‘76), who took part in the 1968 protests. “[Northwestern’s black groups] wanted to know what happened in ’68, what was the intention. I think that can help revitalize them, refocus them.”
“It’s much more difficult to mobilize students who already think that they won something, that there’s nothing to fight for,” added fellow Northwestern alum Dr. John Bracey, now a professor of Afro-American studies at UMass Amherst. “We’re hoping to give people some sense of what’s possible if they organize. All [we] can do is let them know that change is possible.”