CNN.com reported last week that a student group at Rhode Island’s Roger Williams University is offering a $250 scholarship to white students.
That’s right. People of color need not apply.
The group behind this award? The College Republicans, of course. And is anyone surprised by that? Is anyone surprised that the group is asking applicants to submit an essay on why they “are proud of their white heritage” and a photo to “confirm whiteness” with their application?
My knee-jerk reaction was to be outraged, to mourn the loss of progress and prepare to step back in time to an era of Jim Crow laws and legal segregation. I had allowed myself be lulled into a false sense of security and I had foolishly let myself believe that society had moved past such public displays of hatred. Save for the outwardly militant racist groups, I naively thought that prejudice and bigotry simmered beneath the surface of only the discontent. I was wrong to assume that this kind of blatant discrimination belonged to generations far removed from ours of open acceptance.
I have a tendency, from time to time, of overreacting to situations before getting the whole story – this was one of those moments. When I finally finished my melodramatic bemoaning of the state of the world and finished reading the CNN.com article, I got it. I understand the message these kids are trying to get across: that giving financial aid based on race is unacceptable in this day and age.
This award is meant to be the College Republicans protest of affirmative action. However, too many people are stuck on the fact that minorities are not allowed to apply, and they’re crying racism. To these people I say, “Get over it and keep reading.”
Forget the fact that the club’s president is a minority and is financing part of his education with a scholarship specifically for minorities. Forget that every article that has been written states that the scholarship is the students’ way of “parodying minority scholarships” in protest to affirmative action. Their message isn’t being fully disseminated because too many people can’t move past the fact that this is a scholarship for whites. People from all corners of the world are having the same hasty reaction that I initially had – only they’re not getting over it and reading the rest of the story.
The College Republicans state on their website (www.rwucr.com) that whites are put at a distinct disadvantage when it comes to scholarships. If their campus is anything like ours, then they’re probably right. There are a multitude of scholarships available to minorities, simply because they happen to have melanin in their skin. Sure, these scholarships often have grade point requirements or require the student to demonstrate financial need, but the award is still only open to students of color.
What about white students? Why are they forced to compete with the entire campus for scholarships when people of color only have to compete with a small percentage of other people of color?
These students have been accused of racism, which isn’t altogether surprising, given the nature of the scholarship and the fact that they’re republicans. But, aren’t scholarships offered to only minorities also racist? And why is it that society only roars its disapproval when it appears that people of color are being slighted? Why aren’t we standing up and saying it’s wrong when a student is given a scholarship and the only requirement is that the applicant be a minority?
Let me make this clear, before people go off half-cocked and accuse me of being racist: I am a person of color, and as a person of color, I applaud the College Republicans for taking a stand against affirmative action. I can say with complete confidence that I am not in college because my race provided me with an extra edge. I didn’t check a box on the application where it asked for race. I am here because my test scores and my activities made me eligible for admission, and I resent anyone insinuating that I used affirmative action to my benefit.
Affirmative action was meant to be a temporary program, put in place to counteract centuries of discrimination and to level the playing field for minorities. The key word there is temporary. It was not supposed to still exist for my generation and the fact that it is still around 40 years after its inception is downright insulting to all people of color. Its very existence implies that minorities are not capable of getting ahead without a little assistance.
People of color are looked down on because of affirmative action. They are accused of stealing jobs that they don’t deserve. It is possible that minorities are worse-off now than they were 50 years ago. 50 years ago, we knew where we stood. Now, there’s nothing but an ever lingering doubt that maybe we got a job because there was a quota that needed to be filled.
This group of students at Roger Williams believes that scholarships should be given out on the sole basis of merit and need; that race shouldn’t be a factor. As much as it pains me to agree with republicans on anything, I can’t find any reason not to.
Emilie Duggan is a Collegian columnist. She can be reached at [email protected]