Some of the colleges will support the affinity by assigning them staff or faculty advisors, while others will actively promote the organizations all around campus for current and prospective students.įor example, Plymouth State University (PSU) has four student groups committed to multicultural issues including the Afro Caribbean Culture Club and the Black Student Union, but no apparent university structure for encouraging or supporting such groups. The level of administrative support for student affinity groups varies depending on a college’s overall diversity strategy. When both the on and off campus culture feels non-inclusive many students have the overwhelming sense to leave.Īccording to Alane Shanks, President of Renga Consulting which specializes in developing diversity, equity, and inclusion strategies, affinity groups are one of the most helpful ways to retain students. “Affinity groups improve the SNHU experience because individuals get to feel supported and not feel like they're the ‘only one’ in the room or an organization,” she said. Jade Smith, president of Southern New Hampshire University’s Multicultural Student Union and head of the affinity group Sisters of the Yam, named from the famous Bell Hooks book on experiences Black women face daily said, “ It can be hard to make connections if you don’t see someone like you.” “We have students of color that come here, that walk downtown, for instance,” said Marlin Collingwood, Vice President of Communications, Enrollment, and Student Life, at Plymouth State University, “they love Plymouth, they love our campus, but they’ll walk downtown and never see another person who looks like them. In 2019, the white undergraduate student populations at the University of New Hampshire, Keene State College and Plymouth State University hovered near 82 percent, while SNHU and Dartmouth are outliers at 58 percent and 50 percent, respectively. SNHU doesn’t publish its in-person demographics, but school officials say that the on-campus diversity numbers would fall in with the other New Hampshire schools - below national averages. That is a particular challenge in New Hampshire’s predominantly white college culture. What has changed is that there is now a recognition of the importance of affinity groups to help students feel at home and a place to lay their hat when they are on campuses,” he said. Cortés Professor Emeritus of History, University of California, Riverside, who specializes in diversity, intergroup relations, and intercultural communication. “In order to participate in a huge thing like a campus you’ve got to be able to participate in small groups and some of those will be affinities according to the kinds of identities you have as an individual. Clubs, sports, study groups, school spirit - all of these can factor into a student’s feeling of community belonging, which can help them stay engaged in school and reach graduation,” writes Kristina Ericksen for Collegis Education, a firm that advises colleges on retention strategies. “Students who are actively involved in extracurricular activities or the student community tend to experience better retention rates. Whether known as peer-led support groups or affinity groups, a crucial strategy in attracting and retaining students of diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds is fostering ethnic-oriented student organizations to provide encouragement and counter feelings of isolation.ĭata and research show these groups can have an impact on retention rates among college students of color by creating a sense of belonging. “That investment and support ensures that people stay and that they persist.” “When you put the investment into the students,” she said. “It was really student-focussed, it was really the women running the group.” The peer-led group was a place where women of color could come together to discuss everything from their cultural identity to current events. Out of those conversations The Women of Color Circle was born. “And it was a small group of women in a predominantly white college, in a predominantly white city, in a predominantly white state without a ton of connections. “I would talk to the women of color on campus and many of them felt like they didn’t have a space to be themselves or anyone to talk to about their experience balancing school, code switching, cultural differences,” she said. It was in that process she heard stories that reflected not only her own experience, but echoed her master’s thesis work studying the impact of peer-led support groups for students of color. Her first order of business, she knew, would be to start building relationships with the students of color on campus. When Kya Roumimper first took on her job as Coordinator of Multicultural Student Support and Success and Equity Education at Keene State College, the job hadn’t been consistently staffed for a few years.
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