UPDATED: April 24, 2018 at 10:02 p.m.

Marissa Willingham, a staff member in Syracuse University’s Office of Multicultural Affairs, grabbed the microphone near the end of a Monday night Student Association-sponsored forum in Maxwell Auditorium. She commended students for attending the town hall, held just days after the Theta Tau fraternity’s permanent expulsion from the university.

At the forum, some students shared stories of discrimination they said they’ve experienced during their time at SU. Willingham said she’s heard similar stories before.

“Working in the Office of Multicultural Affairs, this is nothing new,” Willingham said. “I hear this on a daily basis. Our students feel so much oppression, microaggression, biases coming at them, and they don’t know how to deal with it.”

At the town hall, attended by about 100 campus community members, student leaders from five organizations fielded questions about diversity, on-campus segregation and the now-nationally circulating Theta Tau videos published by The Daily Orange in the past week.

The videos depict people at a Theta Tau-sponsored event using racial and ethnic slurs and miming the sexual assault of a person with disabilities. The university suspended and eventually expelled the fraternity for its involvement in the creation of the videos, which sparked protests and campus-wide dialogue about institutional discrimination.

“I think it’s important to recognize that the video captures everything that we’ve been wanting to say and everything that we’ve been feeling,” said Taryne Chatman, a representative of the Student African American Society and a panelist at the forum. He criticized the gradual release of the videos, saying he believed it caused some to relive trauma.

The D.O. released a recording of the first video on Wednesday night, and released a second video on Saturday. Chancellor Kent Syverud said in campus-wide email Sunday he was concerned the further exposure of “hateful content” would cause “further hurt and distress” to the campus community. Syverud attended the SA forum but left early.

Taryne Chatman, a representative of the Student African American Society, was one of the five panelists at the Student Association-sponsored forum Monday night. Alexandra Moreo | Senior Staff Photographer

Most of the discussion at the town hall centered around diversity and inclusion issues.

Hanz Valbuena — a panelist at the forum and co-founder of the online publication The International, which caters to international students— said he feels international students are often segregated from other members of the campus community. As a sophomore in the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Valbuena said he notices signs of that segregation in some of his classes.

“In many of my classes, where it’s production classes, international students, especially Chinese international students, always … produce productions that are about depression amongst international students, that are about segregation amongst international students,” Valbuena said.

Sadia Ahmed, vice president of the university’s Residence Hall Association and a panelist at the forum, said she believed segregation at SU starts in students’ freshmen experience.

“Not every single freshman is treated the same way,” Ahmed said. She said she feels athletes are prioritized, and white students. All other students are treated worse, she said, adding that international students are at the “very bottom.”

One student, who spoke up during an open-question period near the end of the town hall, said she felt SU’s first-year forums were a “joke,” and needed to be improved.

Tori Cedar, a panelist and leader of InclusiveU, a program that gives collegiate opportunities to students with disabilities, said the forums are “very cookie cutter.” She suggested the forums include members of organizations such as the Muslim Student Association and InclusiveU.

“I think we need to do a better job with breaking down conversation and talking about real stuff,” Cedar said. “I think we need to start bringing people into these forums that actually have knowledge and real experience on topics.”

Several SU administrators attended the Monday forum, including Syverud, Vice Chancellor and Provost Michele Wheatly, and Dolan Evanovich, senior vice president for enrollment and the student experience.

Brian Konkol, dean of Hendricks Chapel, presented pre-written questions to the panelists before opening the forum to comments from the audience. Konkol asked the panelists, among other questions, what gave them hope.

Chatman said he was hopeful that everyone at the forum wanted change.

“I think there are certain people in this space that are more willing to go after the change than others,” Chatman said. “And some are, like, here to hear but not to listen.”

Chatman said he spoke up in 2014, during protests on SU’s campus organized by THE General Body. THE General Body, a coalition of student organizations, organized an 18-day Crouse-Hinds Hall sit-in to protest topics in a 45-page list of grievances and demands.

Cedar also said she believed everyone at the forum wanted to change the campus community. It was the people that didn’t attend the town hall, she said, that need to be convinced to change SU.

“Not everyone is reachable,” Cedar said. “But we can sure as hell try.”

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MORE COVERAGE:

• Second Theta Tau video shows mimed sexual assault of person with disabilities
• SU will not publicly release names of students in Theta Tau investigation
• Complaints filed against 18 people present at Theta Tau event
• Multicultural Greek organizations find inspiration for activism in Theta Tau videos

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CORRECTION: In a previous version of this post, Hanz Valbuena’s on-campus position was misstated. Valbuena is co-founder of The International, an online publication that caters to international students. The Daily Orange regrets this error.

Published on April 23, 2018 at 11:57 pm

Contact Jordan: jmulle01@syr.edu | @jordanmuller18