Dear Editor,
The Tufts Daily's editorial on community reps ("Community reps system should be standardized," Feb. 16) misses the mark.
Contrary to the editorial's assertion, the current system is standardized. Any group recognized by the Tufts Community Union (TCU) may petition for a rep, subject to the approval of the student body (not the TCU Senate, as the editorial erroneously said). This, as illustrated in the 2001 TCU Constitution, is far better than the pre-2003 system of representing abstract "cultures": a system which the Senate Culture, Ethnicity, and Community Affairs Committee's proposal would bring us back to. Our predecessors before 2003 couldn't readily define what constitutes a culture (as evidenced by the debate over The Primary Source's 2002 petition for a conservative culture rep). How will we be able to?
The editorial also puts forward the dangerous assumption that a "broad-based" community rep system is required, implying that our elected senators alone can't "represent the range of diversity at Tufts." This implication, offered without proof, is unfair to our senators.
If we think that each non-majority section of the Tufts population needs a special representative, where do we stop? Engineers, Greek life members, Evangelical Protestants, Healthy Living residents, musicians...? In recent memory, no grouping besides the four currently recognized has petitioned for a rep (except for The Primary Source). Procedurally speaking, it's just about as easy for non-TCU groupings to get reps as it is for TCU groups. Where are the petitions? Where are the campus-wide votes? Ask the groups that aren't petitioning.
Under the present system, community reps represent their student groups, which in turn represent populations of students. Take the Association of Latin American Students (ALAS), for example. The group's primary goal is "to meet the needs of the Latino student population at Tufts," according to its Web site. And yet there is confusion about what the ALAS rep to Senate is supposed to do?
This issue is far more complex than pithy statements like "tie reps to the centers and make more reps" or "get rid of the reps." This is why TCU President Brandon Rattiner is convening a task force to examine the broader issue of representing minority views. Hopefully, the Daily's editorial page will reserve judgment until the task force can do its work.
Sincerely,
Christopher Snyder
Class of 2011
