Hoping to share their views with University trustees on a host of issues, a number of students are planning to attend the trustee luncheon at Dewick-MacPhie dining hall on Saturday, sources told the Daily last night. The state of diversity at Tufts is among the topics students hope to address.
Representatives from campus culture groups are among the students who say they are hopeful that they will be given an opportunity to interact with trustees on an individual basis. The Association of Latin American Students (ALAS) is one such group that hopes to take advantage of the luncheon.
"We want to press our concerns," ALAS President Jennifer Barrios said. She described the planned event as an "attendance," not as a rally or protest. "I am sure everybody has something to say about Tufts, positive or negative," Barrios said.
"The trustees are having an open luncheon at Dewick at 12 noon - people are going to show up," Trustee Representative Tommy Calvert said. "I think probably groups are going, but it's not necessarily a coordinated effort."
However, some culture groups on campus have said that they are not planning on going to the luncheon, including the Asian Community at Tufts (ACT), the Tufts Feminist Alliance (TFA), and the Tufts Transgender Lesbian Gay and Bisexual Collective (TTLGBC).
Many groups said they had heard only recently that the trustees will be in Dewick on Saturday. "We are interested, however, at this point in time, no one is officially going to be representing ACT," ACT co-president Uyen Tang told the Daily last night.
The luncheon comes amidst heightening tensions at the University, after The Primary Source accused former Pan-African Alliance (PAA) President Carl Jackson of stealing "at least one print run" of the conservative campus publication last semester.
Many students - and a number of culture groups - have complained that the Source's content is unnecessarily offensive, and some have even accused it of racism. Source Editor-in-chief Sam Dangremond has reported the thefts to the police and called for the PAA to apologize for its alleged actions.
Breaking from the traditional meeting-laden event, University president Larry Bacow has invited the trustees spend much of their timing touring Tufts' facilities and interacting with students. The 27 attending trustees will tour the Tufts campus this weekend in an attempt to better identify student concerns and reacquaint themselves with the undergraduate experience
