Six panelists expressed excitement – as well as concerns – when discussing the Obama presidency during a Jan. 16 program sponsored by the Multicultural Center, Phi Beta Kappa, the Council on Civic Engagement and the Office of Civic Engagement.
“It’s not done, but it’s started. Americans have started to make good on a bad check,” said the Rev. Keith McDaniel, pastor of Elon First Baptist Church, recalling Malcolm X’s proclamation that black Americans were written a bad check. “We’re on the road to solve it.”
Panelists Jean Rohr, assistant professor of education, Leon Williams, director of the Multicultural Center and Ashley Hairston, assistant professor of English all agreed.
“His election is a symbolic gesture to the rest of the world, that America understands that if we’re going to be a leader on a larger stage, we have to make some adjustments,” McDaniel said.
Much of the discussion centered on a shared belief in the need for educational reform for those at the bottom of the socio-economic ladder. Rohr said she agrees with Arne Duncan, Obama’s pick for Secretary of Education, in his belief that education is the most pressing civil rights issue of our time.
“If you look at students who are dropping out, who are at the bottom of achievement issues, you see that they are predominantly minority,” Rohr said. “If it is the civil rights issue of our generation, we really need to pay attention to that component.”
Williams said that he sees the only way to solve the problem of the racial divide or the “two Americas” as being a process that begins with not only the top, at the institutional level, but by adjusting the educational system for those at the very bottom.
The panelists shared a strong belief that the climate of political and social engagement experienced in the last election cycle needs to continue. Daniel Shutt, president of the College Democrats and Nick Ochsner, Chairman of the College Republicans, both said they saw a tremendous surge of involvement that they hope continues through nonpartisan discussion and dialogue.
“I look happily toward the transformation of our country,” said Hairston. “I look forward to the inspirational rhetoric, what it means to be the ‘we’ in ‘we the people.’”
– Bethany Swanson ‘09