Leah Buletti, News Editor
At a celebration on Tuesday, April 17, UR concluded the first phase of the Communal Principles Project — an initiative launched this past fall that plans to highlight one of UR’s seven communal principles per each coming academic year. To kick off the campaign, the principle of respect was highlighted for the 2011-12 year. For 2012-13, as announced Tuesday, the principle of responsibility will be emphasized.
The remaining five principles are fairness, freedom, honesty and inclusion.
Dean of the College Richard Feldman, who presented each of the principles at the event and delineated why he believes each to be important, expressed his optimism about the endeavor.
“I’m really thrilled about this project,” he said. “The principles tell us what kind of campus we want this to be.”
Despite what she believes to be the positive outcome of this year’s campaign, Academic Program Coordinator for Minority Student Affairs Sasha Eloi believes that more can be done to foster the importance of the principles in the student body.
“It’s something we’re working on and we think it’s progressing,” she said. “We’re trying to get students excited.”
Assistant Director of the Center for Student Conflict Management Jessica Ecock, who worked on a committee that planned the Communal Principles Project, agreed.
“We’re definitely thinking of making it bigger,” she said.“We want to invest time into getting students to know about the principles and to believe them.”
For the kickoff year, a total of $3,000 in grant money was awarded to campus groups that submitted proposals for events based around the principle of respect.
The groups who won, which were announced at the event Tuesday, are as follows: the Chinese Students’ Association and the Korean American Students’ Association for hosting David Choi; Habitat for Humanity for hosting the Shack-a-thon; Chi Phi for hosting Ise Lyfe: “Is Everybody Stupid?”; Women’s Soccer for its No H8 campaign; GlobeMed for its No Theater of the Oppressed Workshops and Production; sophomores Makia Green and Erica Williams for the production of the play “For Colored Girls who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf;” and the Taiwanese American Students’ Association for International Night and the Step-Up Rochester Style with Instant Noodles Crew.
Buletti is a member of the class of 2013.
