Newspaper Page Text
September 1981
Spelman Spotlight
Page 6
Freshman Register
Aids Newcomers
By Ruby C. Hall
Special Features Editor
Early this summer pre
freshmen were offered an op
portunity never before given to
incoming Spelmanites. The Class
of '85 was given the chance to get
to know their freshmen sisters
before actually arriving at
Spelman. The Freshman \Register,
newconcept with Spelman, was
introduced as a way to let newly
arriving freshmen meet their
fellow classmates who shared
the same interest, majors, and
most of all, the same hometown.
Information such as this can
really come in handy when you
start to miss home.
The Register offers advice to
the freshmen about survival in
the college environment, cures
for homesickness, and how to
treat your fellow classmates
when you first meet them.
All in all, the Register offers
sound advice for freshmen, and
it makes the adjustment to a new
phase of life a little easier.
If you have not picked upyour
Register yet, make sure you do it
soon and get to know your
fellow classmates. You might be
surprised how many home peo
ple you have right around your
own campus corner.
|.. Singing Those;
Freshman Blues
By Valerie Peete
Reporter
While the upperclassmen are
jamming off of “Get It Up” by
The Time, the class of 1985 can be
heard singing those freshman
blues.
We’ve all heard it before.
The money you were sup
posed to get in the mail two
weeks ago never came . . .
You live next door to all night
partiers . . .
Your iron is on the fritz . . .
You lost your i.d. card and
can’t eat or get back into the
dorm . . .
Classes are too easy or too
hard . ..
Your winter clothes have not
arrived and it was 40 degrees
yesterday ... ,
The care package your mother
sent was filled with raisins,
prunes, and dried celery sticks . .
You get your first caller and
found out they called the wrong
girl . . .
When you finally get your first
visitor you have rollers in your
hair and cold cream on your face
and you begin to ask yourself -
what am I doing here? . . .
First of all, let me tell you about
the Freshman Law: Everything
That Can Go Wrong Will.
Nothing seems to work out. Be
patient. Believe me, after a cou
ple of weeks, things will start to
fall into place and begin to look
up. IT WILL GET BETTER! And
then home won’t seem so
faraway after all.
Impressions Of A Black College
By Kiron Kannina Skinner
Kiron Kanina Skinner, a 1981
graduate of Spelman's Political
Science program, was featured
in the August issue of Glamour
Magazine as one of the
magazine's “Top Ten College
Women ’81”. ’
Kiron, a Danforth Compton
Fellow, was also a guest on the
NBC Today Show in July. She
began the Ph.D. program in
Political Science at Harvard Un
iversity this summer. Kiron has a
very active public service career,
with the distinction of being one
of the youngest interns in Con
gress. She interned for Senator 5.
/. Hayakawa in California, and is
also a recipient of the prestigious
Truman Scholarship.
The following is a reprint
which originally appeared in the
October 17, 1979 issue of the
Spelman Spotlight.
Perhaps one of the most
startling questions put to a young
black female from what the Joad
family in Grapes of Wrath
labeled as "the land of milk and
honey,” is, “why did you come
all the way here to go to
college?” Perhaps what is even
more startling is when that
young black female replies, in all
innocence, "I came here to get
the black experience,” and her
interrogator laughs.
Well, that is what has happen
ed to me on many occasions
since I came here as a transfer
student on August 24. I am sure,
however, that mine is not an
isolated cause. There are a
sizeable number of Spelmanites
from California and other
western states. And even though
I can speak for myself, if the
curious interrogator knew the
true status of the "land of milk
and honey,” she would not
laugh,but would beunderstand-
ing. For the west coast, namely
California, is not all that it seems,
and the south, including
southern schools like Spelman,
are no laughing matter. It is here
that the confused interrogator is
getting the best education, mak
ing the truest friends and realiz
ing her most keen potential. The
reason for my rationale is this:
For many years Black
Americans were inclined to
believe that because slavery had
not taken place in the north and
it was the northern
Philanthropists that aided the
race during and after the civil
war, coming west or going north
would provide them with greater
job opportunities, better educa
tion and a more egalitarian way
of life. Quite to the contrary has
been true. In states like Califor
nia the illusion of all these virtues
of life exist, but the reality is
almost totally different.
While California may not have
a resurgence oftheKuKluxKlan,
Suzanne G. Wilson is from
New Orleans, Louisiana.
Currently, she is a dual degree
Spelman College and Gerogia
Institute of Technology
engineering major. She
resides in Chadwick Hall.
This past summer Suzanne
participated in a
“precooperative” student
program at Union Carbide
Corporation’s Nuclear Divi
sion facilities in Oak Ridge,
Tennessee. The program is
or small "red neck” towns which
no one of African descent would
dare travel through at dark,
inequity, unemployment, poor
education for minorities and
racism prevails. And even
though these evils exist in
Georgia and other southern
states, the distinguishing fact is
that everyone knows that they
are here. Few people, however,
realize that they are in the west.
(Perhaps on a higher echelon.)
I have often heard it stated that
the key difference between
western and southern states is
that in the west white hatred of
blacks and inequity appear in a
covert or subtle manner. In the
south, the tension between the
designed to encourage Black
students to pursue college
studies in engineering. Sup
ported by the United States
Department of Energy, the
program is aimed specifically
at students who might not
attend college. Suzanne had
the opportunity of working in
the Health and Safety
Research Division at Oak
Ridge National Laboratory.
Get to know your Spelman
Sister!
races is more apparent.
No matter what form it takes,
overt or covert, the underlying
factor is that discrimination exists
no matter where one goes. The
south does not have any special
claim to such injustices, as the
interrogator may be led to
believe.
As a west coast native, when I
think of Spelman College, I wish
to say to the curious interrogator
that she should be happy to note
that this school and college
community at large provides for
her the most secure atmosphere
that she will ever experience in
life. After spending my high
school years and primary years of
college in institutions built by
whites, run by whites, for whites,
I felt a degree of alienation.
Coming to a Black environment
has afforded me the opportunity
to see and feel security,
something unknown and un
heard of by many young Black
women in schools where they
are the obvious minority.
For example . . . walking into
economics class and seeing
nothingbut blackfaces-eventhe
teacher’s! Or walking down your
dorm hall and realizing that
yours is not the only skin that is
brown. Or visiting your
academic advisor and he, or she,
does not suggest you try an
easier major because you are
culturally and academically dis
advantaged as a result of your
obvious handicap — your skin
color. Or being asked to par
ticipate in student government
when you were previously
apathetic towards it because you
knew that it was not designed for
your participation. It is highly
conceivable that when the
curious interrogator laughs, she
takes all of these advantages for
granted, believing that her ex
periences here, as a young Black
woman, are not unique. When
she further asks, “Why didn’t
you go to one of those good
schools in California,” the fact
that she does not know these,
white institutions’ true
ramifications becomes lucid. It
is even highly conceivable that
she failed to realize that the
Bakke case originated at the
University of California.
What warrants more concern,
however, than certain in
dividuals’s naivete to the true
circumstances of life on the west
coast, is that life here at Spelman
is temporal. After her four years
of security and attention,
employment or further educa
tion maytaketheSpelmanitetoa
western white institution or
maybe a southern one. And for
that young woman who smirked
when she was told, "I came here
for the Black experience," and
who has herself experienced
most of her academic life the
care and concern characteristic
of black schools, she will be
illuminated to the grave reality
that it was here, in the confines
of this small university center,
that she came closest to reaching
her land of milk and honey.
COLLEGE POETRY REVIEW
The NATIONAL POETRY PRESS
announces
The closing date for the submission of manuscripts by College Students is
November 5
ANY STUDENT attending either junior or senior college Is eligible to submit
his verse. There is no limitation as to form or theme. Shorter works are pre
ferred because of space limitations.
Each poem must be TYPED or PRINTED on a separate sheet, and must
bear the NAME and HOME ADDRESS of the student, and the COLLEGE
ADDRESS as well.
MANUSCRIPTS should be sent to the OFFICE OF THE PRESS.
NATIONAL POETRY PRESS
Box 213 Agoura, Ca. 31301
Do You Know Suzanne Wilson?