New Group Will Respond to Hate Crimes
By Nathan Fisher
Managing Editor

As a result of a collaborative effort between an anonymous group of students and Dean of Students Ann Quinley over the summer break, Pomona now has a hate crime protocol and a new joint student-administration task force to spearhead the college's future response to hate crimes and bias-related incidents on campus. A document titled "Guidelines for Reporting and for College Response to Hate Crimes and Bias-Related Incidents," which has been informally circulating among interested groups since the beginning of the academic year, is now officially in effect and will be added to the student handbook beginning next year.

"It's not a policy; it's a protocol," said Quinley, emphasizing that the new document will not "impose any new requirements...or penalties" on members of the college community.

The document clarifies what exactly hate crimes and bias-related incidents are, and how they are impacted by the First Amendment right to free speech, as well as the college's guidelines for responding to hate crimes and bias-related incidents.

Indeed, the document states that "these guidelines do not alter any College policies...and are designed to address incidents that violate such policies as well as those which do not. It envisions instances of protected (but hateful or intolerant) speech that may generate harm requiring intervention without discipline."

Additionally, the document creates an Incident Response Team (IRT) composed of seven students and seven administrators or faculty members, charged with partial oversight over the new guidelines. The team would also assist the Office of Student Affairs in its response to future incidents.

"[The IRT] would be operating concurrently with J-Board," said Quinley. "It's going to try not to impinge on the judicial process.... This is intended to be completely separate from J-Board."

The guidelines provide that the Office of Student affairs, under the advisement of the IRT, will guarantee assistance to the victim, regardless of whether the offensive act is actionable under the student code by ensuring that "the affected student feels safe in his or her residential environment and will, if appropriate, adjust campus housing, and change course schedules." If necessary, the IRT will "advise about initiating disciplinary action against the offender."

The document explains that "in certain contexts, courts have found to protect much speech and expressive conduct that many in our community would find repugnant, including such things as display of the confederate flag, Nazi symbols, cross burning, and flag burning. Such speech and expressive conduct, however, may be inconsistent with the College's community values and it may present an opportunity for open dialogue, debate and better understanding relating to the scope of protected speech and the role of tolerance in a community."

The IRT will also be charged with reviewing "[incidents that have] occurred and...make recommendations to the Dean of Students about the necessity and the nature of a public response, on the information that will be released in a public statement, and on effective educational programming."

The seven students of the IRT include two students chosen by the ASPC Senate, one student chosen by the Residence Hall Staff and one each from the Pan African Student Association, the Asian American Mentor Program, Chicano/Latino Student Affairs Sponsors and the Queer Resource Center. The administrators on the team will include the Dean of Students, the Dean of Women and two Associate or Assistant Deans of Student Affairs or Campus Life. In addition, two faculty members will sit on the task force. The document does not elaborate on how the faculty members will be chosen.

"I think it's good.... Pomona really took initiative on this," said Daren Mooko, the director of the Asian American Resource Center and a probable administrative member of the IRT. Mooko explained that while most colleges wait until an incident occurs with which it cannot adequately deal before developing a hate crime protocol Pomona's new guidelines are "definitely not reactionary."

At the same time, both Quinley and Clint Russell '03, one of the student initiators, acknowledge that the new guidelines stem in part from a perceived frustration among many students toward a lack of a cohesive administrative response to an incident that occured last fall involving two students and Professor of English Valorie Thomas. Thomas alleged that she was the victim of a bias-related incident and possibly a hate crime. The two students were eventually suspended for one year. Thomas is currently on leave for the entire academic year.

"Given what happened with Val Thomas last year, we wanted students [who are victimized] to feel comfortable knowing the college is going to support them and work with them through the process," said Russell, who was one of approximately seven students who created a Hotmail account in May, which they used to anonymously petition Quinley for changes to college protocol.

Quinley, who said that she had been planning such a clarification for some time, proceeded to explore what other colleges have done and held discussions with other students and administrators.

By June, Quinley had developed a first draft of the current document and emailed it back to the anonymous students for review. The students discussed the draft and sent Quinley their concerns about it. One such concern was the balance of administrators and students on the IRT, where some students felt that they were "surrendering too much control to deans and the college, so we wanted to find a middle ground," said Russell, who took a leadership role in working with Quinley on behalf of the concerned students.

"I had a lot of time on my hands because I was home working at a movie theater, jut trying to make money," explained Russell.

Quinley then developed a final draft incorporating some of the suggestions. On September 30, after a meeting involving Russell and Quinley, the final draft was approved by the Office of Student Affairs and became official college protocol.

"I really credit the students with taking the lead on this," said Mooko.

Some students, however, are less than satisfied with the finished guidelines. "What I've heard is that a lot of students disagree with what's in there. I don't think there's a consensus," said one student close to the original group of concerned students.

Noticeably absent from the IRT is a Women's Union representative, an omission Russell said is due to the already large size of the IRT and the fact that it contains the Dean of Women.

"I think it's pretty much the best we could get," said Merideth Small '03, who will be the QRC representative to the IRT. "I think it's always going to be difficult when you're trying to represent all minority groups on campus but I think the fact that it was [developed] by students and that it is successful at serving a cross-representation of groups is good."