Dear Lake Forest College,
I have spent the past four and a half years here growing as a person. Lake Forest has been a home away from home, and I am grateful for the experiences that I have had here that have helped me to become the person I am today. As my last semester is coming to an end, I have really had time to reflect on my time here. I met my best friend and some of the most amazing people while studying here.
Lake Forest College has also been the source of much stress and anxiety for me. In my four and a half years here, I still do not feel as if I truly belong to this community. As one bi-racial student put it, “I couldn’t call myself a Forester… I just happen to be a student at LFC, but I’m not a Forester.”
This captured exactly what I feel. I am a member of United Black Association and Black Women United, but outside of these communities, I do not feel as if this school belongs to me.
There have been many nights when I have laid in my bed talking to my mom telling her the stresses of my day and the ignorance and micro-aggressions that I must endure from my fellow classmates and sometimes even faculty. From being stared at in class, presumably because of my dark skin, to a professor exclaiming that they are “learning the same thing in the jungles of Africa,” I have endured it all.
Many times, I feel as if UBA and BWU are the only places where I can voice my opinion and it actually be heard and taken seriously.
When I asked a student of color whether they feel accepted at this school, they said, “Not the school as a whole, but by certain faculty and students.”This opinion was echoed by another student who said, “I feel like I’m accepted in certain groups; the school as a whole, not that much.”
As I spoke to more and more students of color, the consensus seemed to be that we are not a part of the Lake Forest College community. “The students at large do not care about the black students besides our music and our clothing and to put us on posters and the school website,” said one black female student.
As a liberal arts college that prides itself on its diversity, there is a lot more that can be done to ensure that each and every student feels as if they belong to the College community. I regret not speaking up sooner about the problems that I have had here as a student, as the classes coming in behind me are going through these same problems.
There is no reason that black students should be yelled at from cars passing by. There is no reason that students should be criticized for the way they naturally look. There is no reason that students of color should be made so uncomfortable in a class by their fellow students, and sometimes the professors, because their racial background is not understood.
As a liberal arts college, there needs to be something done to ensure that we are all sensitive to the needs of the students, especially the students of color, if we are ever to move past racial stereotypes and discrimination.
This is my plea, as a senior soon leaving, that something is done to make students of color feel welcome at this institution.
Sincerely,
A fed up student, Autumn Jennings ’16
