The Record Editorial Board argues that the College and the campus community must be proactive in preventing racist incidents and addressing racism in our community.
The College promises to support students who have felt targeted in any way. However, it must first focus on building transparency and accessibility into the reporting process.
Divestment is not just about pulling money out of fossil fuel companies; it is also about sending a message that monetary gain acquired through fossil fuel extraction is unethical, the editorial board writes. Until the College signals this to the broader public, it will not have truly divested.
As the College acknowledged last year, academic stress and pressure play an outsized role in students’ well-being. For this reason, the editorial board asks faculty members to consider how they can better support students’ mental health.
CSS officers should not be in student dorms unprompted, the Record board writes. Monitoring students in their living spaces violates the only real sphere of privacy they have on a small, residential campus.
Pointing to the low risk of outdoor COVID transmission and the increasing safety of campus, the editorial board calls on the College to let students gather outdoors in groups of up to 25 for the remainder of the semester.
On Tuesday, May 11, Williamstown voters will determine the Town's approach to racial justice for years to come, the Record board writes. With two Select Board seats being contested, the Town election offers an opportunity to make the Select Board more progressive.
By requiring students to get vaccinated, the Record board writes, the College would send a clear message: We care about the health of our community. We care about the pursuit of knowledge. And we care about acting on that knowledge to do what is right.
Students are not being given the transparency we need to feel comfortable in the environment in which we live and work. The administration’s lack of clear communication has forced students to hunt for information needed to make appropriate decisions for our health, to understand how the College conducts investigations into public health guideline violations, and to navigate the increased presence of CSS in our living spaces.
We need action now. While hiring two professors is a commendable start, the editorial board calls on the College to commit to establishing a concentration in Asian American studies.
The party at Wood House was a grave and potentially harmful mistake that has had massive implications for student life and College policy. For the sake of the College community, the Record asks students to hold both themselves and each other accountable; the administration to send a strong, consistent message about the consequences of COVID-19 guideline infractions; and CSS and the deans to provide greater transparency in their investigations and disciplinary actions.
The Record is taking the unusual step of publishing an editorial now, rather than with our weekly issue on Wednesday, in recognition of the extraordinary risks that our community is facing after Friday night’s party at Wood House. We call on the College to act now by suspending athletic practices, recognizing the transmission risk they pose. We ask professors to make their classes temporarily remote. And we urge the students who attended the party to do the right thing.
As we reflect on all of the ways that the semester was successful and express gratitude to those who made it so, we also want to point to one area in which the College can do better.
Editor’s note: This editorial mentions instances of sexual assault, sexual harassment, racism and anti-Semitism.
The racial harassment of a Black student. A photograph of Hitler hung in a station...
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120 unmasked students gathered near Poker Flats on Sept. 8.
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They didn’t ask the students.
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Last week, students circulated a petition calling for a boycott of classes taught by the English department that do not “engage critically with minority issues.” The petition came directly following...
Given the substantive lack of composting options in and around the College and Williamstown as a whole, we at the Record believe that the College and town should develop a more holistic solution to managing...
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When students from the Afro-American Society occupied Hopkins Hall on April 4, 1969, the Record published an editorial that day responding to the students’ demands for, among other things, the formation...
Creating space for minoritized students
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Williams College claims as its mission, “to provide the finest possible liberal arts education.” Achieving this lofty goal depends not just upon the students and faculty, but – crucially –...
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In recent weeks, a faculty petition has circulated, recommending that the College adopt the Chicago Statement, a series of policies regarding disinvitation of speakers penned by the University of Chicago....
Last week, the College’s theatre department cancelled its fall show, Beast Thing, in response to students’ concerns about the play’s potentially traumatizing content and their experiences in the...
On Nov. 6, Massachusetts voters will decide on three ballot initiatives, the third of which aims to repeal anti-discrimination protections under the Commonwealth’s law for transgender and gender non-conforming...
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Last week, Storyboard, the student-run group that puts on Storytime, announced that it will be suspending Storytime in order to consider the purpose it serves in the College community and how Storytime...
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