was like, ‘Noooo. I’m not…’” Jones was
able to turn this incident into an opportunity
to introduce and reinforce diversity training,
and since that time feels that things have im-
proved.
Mays describes a situation that happened
while shopping on her lunch hour. “I’m
waiting in line,” she says. “I’m dressed pro-
fessionally, and there are a couple of other
people in front of me who write checks —
no problem. I get up there, and I’m asked for
my ID.” She rolls her eyes and sighs in ex-
asperation. “I’m on my lunch break, I’m in a
hurry, I show my ID, but I’m thinking, ‘You
didn’t ask them for their IDs…’”
“The store representative then proceeds
to call Telecheck to verify my check. That’s
when I just lost it. There are times when I’ll
say, ‘OK, I’m going to the mat on this one.’
After I conveyed my concerns, asked to
speak to the manager, went and talked to the
manager, it was, ‘Oh… well, we…’ and
they don’t have a good excuse.”
“When I didn’t get results locally,” Mays
says, “I went to this store’s corporate office
up in Portland and … the corporate office
got involved, came down to Eugene,
talked to the staff, did some diversity train-
ing.”
She smiles and says with satisfaction,
“They also underwrote our NAACP three-
on-three basketball tournament that year. …
I’ve never had any other negative incidents
with them. We call this company every year
now to support our tournament, they’re al-
ways very open to it, they want to send vol-
unteers. So it was really a learning experi-
ence for them as well…”
TODD COOPER
‘There are
times when
I’ll say, ‘OK,
I’m going to
the mat on
this one…’
–Marilyn Mays
Ultimately, both Jones’ and Mays’ situa-
tions ended in a positive way, and each is
determined to remain in Eugene — at least
for now. But doesn’t it sound exhausting to
think that because your skin color makes up
only five or one or less than one percent of
the population, you have to leave your home
every day preparing for some sort of trouble
or other?
College Town
More than once I’ve heard, “If it wasn’t
for the university, I could never live in
Eugene.” The University of Oregon affords
this town an influx of culture and diversity
that it would not otherwise have. But the
UO also contends with issues of diversity
— last winter’s KUGN Voice of the Ducks
fiasco was evidence of that.
John Shuford of the Center on Diversity
and Community says, “In October 2000,
President Frohnmayer gave a rousing State
of the University speech promising that UO
would become a diverse institution. There
have been a number of new diversity initia-
tives since then, with many good results.
But we’re running into a wall of economics
and public perception that hinders fulfill-
ment of that promise… It’s a hard time for
higher education in general, due to the shift
in corporate and foundation interests and
the major economic downturn.”
He says that these realities, and the per-
ception in many circles that diversity and di-
versity issues are “peripheral” or “political,”
make it very hard to create meaningful insti-
tutional changes that will keep UO educa-
‘…if we send out technically competent
but culturally unconscious students,
we have failed’ –Carla Gary
tionally competitive and serving the state of
Oregon.
Carla Gary, university advocate and di-
rector of the Office of Multicultural Affairs,
also has an insider’s understanding of diver-
sity at the UO. It frustrates her on some lev-
els. She says, “We have become exceed-
ingly creative in avoiding the elephant in the
living room. But the longer it goes, the more
space that elephant takes up…”
But she is hopeful. “In many ways we
have stepped to the challenge. We have ac-
cepted that diversity is core to the institu-
tion. We know that if we send out techni-
cally competent but culturally unconscious
students, we have failed.”
Shuford says that within a 30-year pe-
riod, the Census projects a major population
shift in Oregon: In 1995 one in 10
Oregonians were non-white. By 2025, that
number is going to be one in five or greater.
But even now, he says, the UO struggles
to keep apace of the demographic changes
in the state. Both Shuford and Gary articu-
late what is, in theory, the university’s senti-
ment on diversity, and what many students
and faculty seem to agree on: that a diverse
campus is powerful and empowering. It re-
mains to be seen whether financial and ad-
ministrative support will truly cultivate and
encourage that theory. The UO, like Eugene
at large, has had its share of the “revolving
door” phenomenon, where people of color
come and leave when diversity issues be-
come too overbearing.
But there are signs of hope: Gary says
the university has launched a personnel
search for a Vice Provost of Institutional
Equity who will be, according to the job de-
scription “responsible for providing leader-
ship, guidance, and direction for all univer-
sity equity and diversity matters…”
Making a Difference
Elliot Cooke, 30, walks into the coffee
shop for our interview and his black dread-
locks swing a little around his dark face and
beneath a nylon cap fit snug to his skull.
Cooke moved to Eugene from Chicago with
his family when he was 10. He had been a
good student in Chicago, but that quickly
fell apart here in Oregon. “I moved out
here,” he says, “and I’m instantly labeled
ADD, problem child…” School administra-
tion just looked at him, he says, and saw “a
black child from the ghetto of Chicago —
boom — instantaneous ‘He’s going to be a
problem…’”
He bounced through two elementary
schools, struggling mightily as the only
black student around. Things finally came
to a head when he entered Jefferson Middle
School. In sixth grade, he says, “There was
this picture drawn by a student. It was of a
black man hanging from a tree, with a burn-
ing cross and KKK underneath. I’m looking
at it, and I went to the teacher and asked, ‘Is
this what you’re teaching in this school?’He
looked at me and said, ‘It’s freedom of
speech; there’s a right to express that, and
it’s part of your history.’” In frustration with
his teacher’s dismissal, Cook went to the
prinicipal’s office with the drawing, where
he was again rebuffed.
So he went to his mother. And from
there, his mother took Cook and his brother
out of school, and they were homeschooled.
After that incident, Cook says, “Some heads
rolled… some people were fired and the
school became committed to being a
racism-free zone.” He smiles and says,
“And now that’s where I work as a staff as-
sistant.”
Cook and Jefferson Middle School are
just a few rays of hope on Eugene’s racial
APRIL 3, 2003 13