In the first of three forums being held by UW-Madison Chancellor John Wiley, students, professors and community members gathered in Memorial Union Tuesday night to discuss campus climate in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
The majority of audience members who spoke said although they were pleased with the fact UW-Madison officials had organized the forums, they were still discontented with how officials are handling the situation.
UW-Madison Dean of Students Alicia Ch??vez was also present.
'We decided to have some forums to just sort of take the temperature of the campus, see what people want to tell us,' Wiley said.
The forum lasted about 90 minutes and addressed a number of concerns brought up by attendees who shared personal observations of discrimination on campus, questioned the actions of the administration, and offered their visions for a university free of intolerance.
One student criticized the university administration for failing to address the concerns of minority communities, especially those of Middle Eastern descent.
'My hope is that our administration will go out of its way to make a climate where people who would be perpetrators of hate speech or hate crimes would feel uncomfortable feeling that way,' the student said.
A student of Moroccan descent spoke about instances when he had been discriminated against because of his Arab heritage. He said people had mocked him by asking if Osama bin Laden or Saddam Hussein were his relatives.
Ch??vez acknowledged that discrimination is a serious issue on campus.
'We do have students who have not gone to class for days because they feel fear, even because people look at them in threatening ways,' she said.
While failing to give specifics, Wiley said 15 incidents of discrimination, both physical and verbal, have been reported on campus and in the surrounding area. He said he also believed many incidents of harassment had gone unreported and urged anyone with knowledge of discrimination to file a complaint.
'There's not much we can do, either proactively or reactively, about things that are either not reported at all or only reported anecdotally,' he said.
Members of the Palestinian Right to Return Coalition spoke frequently and complained that campus administrators were not serious enough in dealing with discrimination.
One student said he wished administrators would have taken a stronger stance against any form of harassment or discrimination on campus.
'We're not saying you haven't done anything, but we're saying you haven't done enough,' the student said.
UW-Madison student Bilal Hamdan agreed.
'I was actually quite discouraged by the reaction of the chancellor, to be frank,' he said. 'I think it was good that the students actually did get a chance to get out and speak their mind to the chancellor about what's going on [during the forum].'
Hamdan added that not enough was being done to combat discrimination on campus.
'Efforts should be intensified, by faculty and administration, to address with compassion towards the issue,' he said.
Other students said they were disappointed in how the ignorance of some UW-Madison professors in regards to Middle Eastern and Islamic peoples showed through in their classes.
The next two sessions will be Wednesday, Oct. 24 at 5 p.m. in Union South and Thursday, Oct. 25 at 4:30 p.m. in Linne Lounge in Witte Residence Hall.
