College Shorts

Oberlin Cancels Classes After Hate Crimes

Classes were cancelled at Oberlin College on Monday, March 4 as a “Day of Solidarity” after a string of hateful vandalism incidents during the month of February. Incidents targeting LGBT, black and Jewish communities on campus were reported, the most recent incident being the sighting of a person in a Ku Klux Klan-style outfit on campus.

An all-student email sent to Oberlin students by the administration announced a suspension of formal classes and non-essential activities to “gather for a series of discussions of the challenging issues that have faced [the Oberlin] community in recent weeks.”

Among the reported graffiti were Black History Month posters defaced with the n-word, swastikas found in the college’s music conservatory building and racial slurs tacked to the school’s LGBTQ Community Coordinator office.

In 2011, Oberlin was faced with a similar string of racist graffiti on campus but did not cancel classes.

— The Huffington Post

 

Secretary of Education Warns of Sequestration 

The budget cuts that went into effect on March 1 could end financial aid for thousands of students and force the U.S. Department of Education to reduce payments to contractors that administer the federal student aid program, warned Secretary of Education Arne Duncan while speaking in front of Congress last week. In a hearing before the Senate Appropriations Committee, Duncan said that the “sequestration” – the across-the-board spending cuts that went into effect last Friday – may reduce the Federal Work Study program  and Supplemental Education Opportunity grants by $49 million and $37 million, respectively, resulting in 33,000 fewer work-study awards and 71,000 fewer supplemental grants. Pell Grants would be exempt from the cuts this year, but would be vulnerable in future years. Duncan said the cuts would also result in layoffs within the department, which would cause delays in the awarding of aid and “significantly harm the department’s ability to prevent fraud, waste and abuse in the very large, complex student-financial-assistance programs.”

— Chronicle of Higher Education