A new semester is upon the student body of Plattsburgh State, and many changes are on the horizon. Although the future isn’t quite so far away, the events surrounding the racist Snapchat incident of last semester may be on the minds of some returning students and possibly incoming freshmen.
Some of the student body felt that the administration did not do enough in terms of punishing of the student responsible and addressing the root problem. In response, the administration has taken steps to make a change. Following the protests in February, University President John Ettling came up with a list of “10 tangible steps” to “advance efforts toward an improved campus climate.”
Among those steps was instituting a “Bias Response Team” headed by new University Police Chief Pat Roscoe and Interim Chief Diversity Officer Portia Turco, a multicultural center currently under construction in the Angell College Center set to open in the spring and a Social Justice Task Force that met several times over the course of the summer to discuss the campus’ future.
With these changes in the works and the announcement of Ettling’s retirement over the summer, the campus will have an opportunity to evolve and flourish under new leadership by the 2019-20 academic year. But as this campus has shown, leadership won’t stop this student body from voicing what they believe in. As we wait for the announcement of Ettling’s successor, the students need to remember that we are the lifeblood of this university and our voices won’t ever be stifled.
