By Abigail Bates ('26)
In Houghton University’s 2022-2023 academic year, 7% of the student body were black, 2% were Asian, 1% were Hispanic and 6% of the student population were non-resident aliens. The highest percentage of the student body were white (74%) and the majority of full-time staff (89%) were white as well (U.S. Department of Education).
“Most people from Houghton come from small towns, so they don’t really see diversity – I think Houghton is a place where, once you get to know people, you get to know them. But you have to be intentional,” Kenadi Hawkins (‘26), a black American student said. “If you don’t intentionally go up to somebody and get to know them or eat with them, you’re not going to know them and they’ll always have that preconceived assumption about you.”
Hawkins is the vice president of the Black Heritage Club and the Diversity and Inclusion Representative. Black Heritage Club’s President Bethany Tubman ’25, a black American student, was a Mosaic Center Ambassador her sophomore year and the Diversity and Inclusion Representative the following school year. They are both representatives on HU’s Diversity Committee.
Tubman recalled people who left Houghton due to off-campus racism. She said that “people on the outside of Houghton tend to be more aggressive in how they feel towards people” of different cultures and skin colors. Nana Kwame (‘25), a Ghanaian, agreed, recounting experiences with people who were neither students nor employees.
When Kwame first experienced Houghton’s community in-person (he started online in 2020), “diversity wasn’t really a thing.” He said that diversity has been improving, but he feels “like it can be better.”
Vice President for Student Life Bill Burrichter chairs the Diversity Committee. Associated for 35 years at Houghton University as a student and an employee, he stated that while the campus is more diverse today, it remains a challenge for the university.
HU’s Diversity Committee—composed of 1 faculty, 1 staff and 5 students—supports the initiatives of minority-serving organizations: Black Heritage Club, Hispanic Heritage Club and the Intercultural Student Association. The president or designee from each of these clubs serves on the committee along with the Diversity and Inclusion Representative (from Student Council) and a representative from the Kingdom Initiative.
The committee was established from a 2017 diversity task force formed in response to a publicly discussed racial hate crime on HU’s campus. Since the creation of the committee, the Bias Incident Form has become more available on the university’s website and the Mosaic Multicultural Center was opened and then closed in the 2023 Spring semester.
“I think the biggest thing for us institutionally is for us to continue to be curious,” Burrichter said. “Continue to ask questions. To seek to know, to understand. And then a willingness on other people’s parts to share some of that, and to help us understand.”
He explained that the committee’s purpose is to increase understanding and awareness about diversity on campus. In committee meetings, they review initiatives and the institution’s diversity statement. Additionally, Burrichter mentioned that the committee has been positive in increasing communication between HU’s administration and students.
“I think those initiatives are directly because of [Houghton’s] longing to diminish the impact of racism,” Tubman said. “When in reality, you’re not going to be able to stop it. It’s a societal ill.”
Students pushed for the right to participate in the creation of Houghton’s diversity statement, she said. Tubman and Hawkins explained that the committee has looked at diversity statements of several Wesleyan colleges as they work on HU’s own.
“The purpose of the diversity statement is to put this expectation for, not only students but staff and faculty, to say like ‘if you don’t adhere to this, there’s accountability,’” Tubman said.
Students report various concerns, including incidents of racism or potential bias, by emailing Burrichter, Katie Breitigan (Dean of Students and Director of Student Life), Resident Assistants, campus-wide officials or by filling out the Bias Incident Form. HU’s Marketing Department also informs Student Life of posts containing accusations or reports of incidents. HU will then respond depending on each situation and how public the incident is.
Tubman explained that students often feel unheard and uncared for when “accountability can’t be done as publicly as people want it to be, for legal reasons, privacy issues.” Students are then left with unsettled feelings, she added.
“I’ve been behind the scenes for three years now. And I think from a student perspective it can look like nothing is being done,” Tubman said.
Hawkins stated that the student body should know more about the actions taken in response to HU’s diversity, because while diversity is discussed behind the scenes, “a lot of students don’t really talk about it or know about it.”
Tubman explained that although students desire transparency from the university, complete transparency isn’t possible “in a business model, any business model.”
“Even though I am 120% for complete transparency,” Tubman said, “it is not attainable for ethical reasons of the people who are involved. And it makes me very weary to say that, but I think a lot of what I’ve heard from people is that they just wish people would be more transparent…
“I wish people would be more transparent,” she added.
Both Hawkins and Tubman emphasized how much Breitigan and Burrichter care about racial and ethnic minority groups on campus. Hawkins said that it’s important for the committee to know where to start responding to issues of diversity and how to create effective change.
“I think that it’s a lot more of a daunting task than we realize,” Tubman said, “because we are still in America, and we can’t mitigate the oppressions of America.” She explained that a set amount of discrimination, stereotypes and self-segregation naturally accompanies U.S. society. Therefore “it’s really hard for them to know where to start, because it’s like, ‘What is a Houghton thing and what is an American thing?’” ★