Student Government recently amended its bylaws to include mandatory diversity training for the legislative and judicial branches.
This bill was authored by University Center for Freshman Year Senator Revathi Menon.
“Louisiana is getting more diverse and LSU especially in the student body,” Menon said. “I want to make sure Student Government is equipped to handle that diversity and be inclusive in our daily responsibilities.”
The need was brought to SG’s attention last March by a group of senators. Initially, the rules of order were amended to mandate diversity training only for the legislative branch. An expansion was proposed upon the training’s successful completion, according to Speaker of the Student Senate Austin Grashoff.
“Legislators decided that it would be a good idea to extend the training to the other branches,” Grashoff said. “With judicial cases, it’s good to know how different cultures, people and students think, feel, understand things and communicate.”
SG is required to have student outreach points, where it visits organizations and introduces itself. Grashoff said the training has caused senators to use outreach points more effectively.
“I have noticed that more senators are branching out more than just going to their own organization saying ‘this is what I do’ and reaching out to organizations that probably would not have been reached out to otherwise,” Grashoff said.
Menon said the amendment process was smooth because there was little opposition and SG is a progressive organization. The only pushback was from those who had already taken the training with other organizations and were required to take it again.
Menon said her primary inspiration to author the bill came from a racial incident at a University football game last semester.
“I felt really bad because there was nothing we could do,” Menon said.
The diversity training itself is now a part of SG orientation. Instead of holding one long orientation workshop, there will be a separate workshop specifically for diversity training. The separate workshop is intended to keep the focus solely on diversity.
“A lot of people are really excited about this,” Menon said. “There needs to be more of a focus on celebrating our differences instead of just recognizing our differences. We need to make diverse students a core part of campus instead of just in the peripheral.”