Posted by Emily Singer
On Friday, Nov. 2, the Skidmore faculty came together in Gannett Auditorium for the monthly discussion on campus happenings, which included the recent bias incidents on campus.
President Philip A. Glotzbach addressed these incidents and expressed how disappointed he was that these events took place, especially on a campus that is supposed to be welcoming and supportive of all people, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation and religion.
Glotzbach said he does not want another biased incident to occur, and that both the students and the faculty need to make an extra effort towards creating a more accepting campus. He said that there should be room for conversation without the fear of being judged or threatened, and that any type of behavior that is not accepting will not be tolerated.
This led to a discussion of the possibility of changing the all-campus requirement for students to take a non-Western course to have a greater focus on the diversity of any of the categories listed above. Some professors said they believe educating the students would help prevent aggressive behavior.
Glotzbach, along with several other faculty members, stressed the importance of having a safe, open environment for students to live in. He said if there is any type of feeling causing students to believe that they are not in a safe place, something must be done immediately to fix this.
The meeting also touched on a new document called "Policies on Policies", an outline which states the actions that must be taken before new policies are established, and which people must be involved in order to have new policies instated on the campus.
President Glotzbach also announced the College's recent achievements, such as receiving the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education award for using renewable geothermal energy to heat the school buildings. Only four schools in the country received this award for geothermal energy, and Glotzbach said he hopes to have the campus operating on at least 50% geothermal energy by 2020.
The discussion also briefly mentioned student debt and whether students can manage the amount of debt from their college tuition by the time they graduate. It was understood that students from Skidmore College graduate with a manageable amount of debt, and that it can easily be paid off a few years after graduating.