N.A.A.C.P Dinner
By Crista Schindler
Issue date: 11/13/09 Section: Blogs
This Halloween, I ditched the bunny ears, the lingerie that left little to be desired, and sent my fellow ghouls and gals a rain check for the evening. Instead, I accompanied the N.A.A.C.P. Chapter at Slippery Rock to the New Castle Branch of N.A.A.C.P. Annual Freedom Fund Dinner. As Kristin Fulwylie, Vice-President of the N.A.A.C.P. Chapter at Slippery Rock had voiced, "look at all of us, positive people." Positive it was, as we sat at the doorstep of revolution.
The dedicated development of such an organization on campus began long before I transferred to Slippery Rock University. The very initial innovations would date back to April of 2009. As a member of the organization somewhat after the fact, I can only imagine the persistence and passion of a few like-minded individuals to persuade the university that diversity awareness was an essential component to the quality of a student's academic career.
N.A.A.C.P. would be recognized as an organization on campus in Fall 2009. Despite the success of its recognition, the feat would also be met with challenges. Progress would inevitably be upset by acts of indifference, ignorance, and opposition. That ignorance was a result of exactly what N.A.A.C.P. focused to correct through the power of education.
Even as members of N.A.A.C.P., we too, were striving to learn. During a brief overview of the history of N.A.A.C.P. at the Freedom Dinner, the effects of human suffering could be felt surging through everyone in the room. It did not matter how many decades removed from the past the present was, the pain of the events still existed. Time was not a consolation prize.
In a small banquet complex, I became part of something bigger than myself. It was understood in that moment that the present must be seized in order to change the future. It was necessary to realize that the tangible barriers that seemed to limit us only stretched as far as the surface. If evil flourished as a result of hatred, meaning in the tangible had to be extinguished.
Change is only as radical as the attitudes that oppose it. Allow for the minority to become the equality as former attitudes are deconstructed. Join me in the fight for education and understanding, and help N.A.A.C.P. catalyze possibility into a reality.
The dedicated development of such an organization on campus began long before I transferred to Slippery Rock University. The very initial innovations would date back to April of 2009. As a member of the organization somewhat after the fact, I can only imagine the persistence and passion of a few like-minded individuals to persuade the university that diversity awareness was an essential component to the quality of a student's academic career.
N.A.A.C.P. would be recognized as an organization on campus in Fall 2009. Despite the success of its recognition, the feat would also be met with challenges. Progress would inevitably be upset by acts of indifference, ignorance, and opposition. That ignorance was a result of exactly what N.A.A.C.P. focused to correct through the power of education.
Even as members of N.A.A.C.P., we too, were striving to learn. During a brief overview of the history of N.A.A.C.P. at the Freedom Dinner, the effects of human suffering could be felt surging through everyone in the room. It did not matter how many decades removed from the past the present was, the pain of the events still existed. Time was not a consolation prize.
In a small banquet complex, I became part of something bigger than myself. It was understood in that moment that the present must be seized in order to change the future. It was necessary to realize that the tangible barriers that seemed to limit us only stretched as far as the surface. If evil flourished as a result of hatred, meaning in the tangible had to be extinguished.
Change is only as radical as the attitudes that oppose it. Allow for the minority to become the equality as former attitudes are deconstructed. Join me in the fight for education and understanding, and help N.A.A.C.P. catalyze possibility into a reality.
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