Sounding Board: Our Obligations to Foster Respectful Dialogue

Right now on campus, our newest Scots—the Class of 2028—are beginning their Macalester journeys. They’re participating in preseason athletics training, unpacking suitcases, making Target runs, and meeting new friends whose world views are very different from their own. Collectively, the Class of 2028 holds citizenship in sixty countries and speaks forty-nine languages. Among our first-year students, 21 percent are international, 16 percent are first in their families to attend college, and 40 percent of domestic students identify as people of color. The entering group of students also represents a broad variety of faith traditions, political viewpoints, and cultural practices.

Across 150 years of Macalester history, creating an intentional community of thinkers and doers has been woven into the fabric of our identity. We believe we are stronger because of the diversity of perspectives on our campus. We aspire to cultivate an environment at Macalester to which every person brings not only their life experiences but also the individual spark that makes them unique.

As I reflect on the turbulence experienced on college campuses across the country over the last year, I’m thinking deeply about what our students need from Macalester this fall and beyond. We know we will continue to face significant challenges as we strive to affirm the importance of freedom of expression, prepare students to engage actively in civic life, and uphold our responsibility to ensure that campus spaces are respectful and welcoming—especially when we passionately disagree with one another.

Forming a supportive campus environment doesn’t happen by accident. Living and learning together in community requires open-mindedness, patience, compassion, courage, humility, and kindness. It sometimes involves navigating vehement disagreements about important issues. To make it work, we ask every member of the community to accept the personal obligation to practice deep listening, extend grace, and consider multiple perspectives.

Sadly, it seems these are not tools that students consistently acquire in the K–12 system, nor are they seeing them modeled in society. More and more, students arrive on campus without meaningful experience practicing how to work through disagreements in healthy and productive ways. It’s our goal to help the Class of 2028 understand the responsibilities we all share in creating the community we want for ourselves and for others.

Effective and respectful communication across ideological and other differences is vital to a quality liberal arts education— and to success in life. At Mac, we believe teaching these skills is as important as teaching students how to write papers or present capstone research. So, we’re building opportunities for our newest Scots to explore and develop these skills, in and out of the classroom, as soon as they arrive on campus. This year, Orientation sessions include:

• “Supporting Members of Our Community,” which emphasizes the importance of care, communication, and respect, and how we hold one another accountable to community standards;
• A “This Matters at Mac” session that explores principles of equity, inclusion, and justice as they relate to creating a sense of belonging for all; and
• Residence hall meetings during which students are introduced to expectations for living in community with others, including conversations about how to approach conflict and communication.

To make sure Macalester is a leader in this work to build skills for dialogue across differences, we are involved in numerous national and regional programs. Last spring, we joined the College Presidents for Civic Preparedness national initiative, which brings together campus leaders who are committed to preparing today’s young people for effective participation in our democracy. Several faculty members are engaged in deepening their skills on how to best support students in these efforts, and how to incorporate this work into their pedagogy. We’ll continue our Critical Dialogue Series (led by the Lealtad-Suzuki Center for Social Justice), and our Congress to Campus program, which brings former elected officials to campus to discuss issues from different perspectives. In a new initiative this fall, we’ll partner with the University of Northwestern in a Reduce the Rancor project, a statewide campaign led by Braver Angels to reduce hostility and increase respect in public and private life.

Our goal through these initiatives is to create pathways for every member of our community to practice the messy, uncomfortable, and crucial work of advancing pluralism. I believe we are capable of having complicated conversations, with both courage and kindness—this fall, and for years to come—as our students carry their Macalester experiences with them into communities and workplaces around the world.

Dr. Suzanne M. Rivera is president of Macalester College.

Learn more about our work: macalester.edu/life-at-mac/ dialogue-across-differences