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Monday, November 14, 2022 I Vol. 119 Iss. 13 INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER • SERVING THE GW COMMUNITY SINCE 1904
What’s inside Opinions
Amid legal battles over affirmative action, the editorial board argues GW should recommit to diversity. Page 6
Culture
Learn about the history of the roller skating community in the District. Page 7
Sports
Check out the newly created collective that allows studentathletes to benefit from their name, image and likeness. Page 8
Officials may require Title IX training for all employees DANIEL PATRICK GALGANO
ASSISTANT NEWS EDITOR
LINDSEY LEARY REPORTER
FILE PHOTO BY RACHEL SCHWARTZ | ASSISTANT PHOTO EDITOR Officials said their decision to increase GW’s acceptance rate and no longer shy away from admitting “higher-caliber applicants” out of the fear those applicants might not enroll once accepted led to the larger freshman class.
Total enrollment continues four-year decline, despite more diverse freshman class: report CAITLIN KITSON
ASSISTANT NEWS EDITOR
The number of students enrolled at GW has continued to fall this school year as part of a four-year decline, a report the Faculty Senate revealed Friday. Jay Goff, the vice provost for enrollment and student success, said 25,939 total undergraduate and graduate students are enrolled this semester, a roughly two percent decrease from last fall when officials tallied 26,457 students. Goff said the dip comes as officials enlisted the largest class of new students since 2018, with 2,985 freshmen and transfer students. Goff said the number of underrepresented minority freshmen who identify as Black, Latino and Indigenous rose from 530 last fall to 642 this semester, while the number of first-generation and Pell Grant recipients rose during the same span by more than 50 and 60 students, respectively. He said while international freshman enrollment is on the rise, officials are still working to elevate international enrollment levels after they faltered under the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, with 150 fewer international freshmen enrolled than in fall 2019. “We’ve attracted one of the largest, most talented and
diverse first-year classes in GW’s history,” Goff said. Goff said 2,985 new students – including 2,941 freshmen and 44 transfer students – enrolled this semester, exceeding last fall’s new student enrollment by about 10 percent and surpassing officials’ goal by about five percent. He said officials aimed to enroll a larger number of students this academic year to offset the pandemic-related dip in GW’s enrollment numbers. The University’s acceptance rate rose from 43 percent to 49 percent between the 2020-21 and 2021-22 academic years, which officials
said was the result of a decision to no longer shy away from admitting “higher-caliber applicants” out of the fear they might not enroll upon acceptance. “The new undergraduate class has 2,985 students and slightly exceeded targets that were set this year,” he said. “This increase also helps us position the potential undergraduate class closer to new student intake levels.” Goff said total University enrollment currently sits at 25,939 students – a two percent decrease from fall 2021 and about an eight percent decrease from fall 2018. He said the decrease is primarily
Nonunderrepresented students
NICHOLAS ANASTACIO | GRAPHICS EDITOR
GWPD ramps up community outreach efforts with series of fall campus events HENRY HUVOS
ASSISTANT NEWS EDITOR
MOKSHA AKIL REPORTER
The GW Police Department has introduced a pair of trademark events this fall to bolster student outreach efforts as part of GWPD Chief James Tate’s push to establish a culture of community policing in Foggy Bottom. GWPD kicked off the school year in September with Raise High with GWPD, an event in University Yard where officers handed students food like free Chick-fil-A and pamphlets about the department, before unveiling Coffee with the Chief, where students can discuss campus issues monthly one-onone with Tate via Webex. More than 10 students said the department’s elevated community engagement efforts have signaled increased transparency from the department, drawing stark differences from a period of limited trust between GWPD and students before Tate arrived at the department in 2020. “The way to determine if outreach efforts are ef-
the result of the pandemic’s negative financial impact on working adults, who are often the students enrolled in part-time degree programs. Goff said officials plan to recruit more diverse and academically gifted students and improve the University’s affordability through ongoing scholarship initiatives for the 2023-24 academic year. He added that officials plan to revive enrollment levels among student populations that decreased during the pandemic, like working adults who enroll in parttime programs, and ensure their recruitment efforts fall in line with GW’s capacity.
fective is by listening to students,” Tate said in an email. “We have to connect with students and listen to their feedback. So far, the feedback we have received has been positive. Students have shared that what we are doing is ‘refreshing’ and ‘new.’” Tate said community outreach has been a “priority” for the department to reform GWPD image on campus since he assumed leadership at the start of 2020 of a department whose leadership had previously hung in question amid fractured student relations. Four months after arriving at GW, Tate called the department’s officer training “woefully inadequate” with minimal deescalation preparation for officers. BSU published a letter in June 2020 with eight other student organizations to pressure GWPD to restore trust with the GW community through no-tolerance policies for racial bias cases and a lower presence on campus in light of heightened criticism against policing following the Black Lives Matter protests. Tate said officers have listened to students through discussion opportunities
and events as part of their outreach. He said more students have engaged with GWPD events and approached the department to file incident reports than during previous years – an “encouraging” sign of comfort and familiarity with the department. Gianna Cook – a senior majoring in English and the president of BSU, who was also a member of the administration that sent the letter condemning GWPD in 2020 – said GWPD has significantly “evolved” in the past two years. She said prior to Tate’s arrival on campus, GWPD wasn’t helpful to community members because of their lack of familiarity with students, but now she said officers are going out of their way to greet students, attend organization events and offer opportunities for students to talk with them about policy. “I think it helps with the representation aspect of knowing that our voices matter,” Cook said. “I would hope that in the next couple of months and just even years after that, that partnership is still the mindset instead of the us-vs.-them mindset it might have been in the past.”
Officials said GW is preparing to offer mandatory Title IX training to faculty and staff pending the approval of proposed federal regulations from the Department of Education. President Joe Biden’s administration’s proposed changes would mandate all faculty and staff attend Title IX training instead of just Title IX Office employees, broaden the legal definition of sexual harassment and discrimination at colleges and universities to include protections for LGBTQ+ students and bar discrimination against pregnant students and employees. Charles Bendit, the chair of the Board of Trustees Audit and Compliance Committee, called a 20-percent faculty participation in voluntary Title IX training at GW “unacceptable” during the Board’s meeting in May. While ED has not published a timeline for the implementation of the final Title IX changes, updates to federal Title IX regulations under the administration of former President Donald Trump took the department about a year and a half to implement after introducing them because of public comment and ED revision. Caroline LaguerreBrown, the vice provost for diversity, equity and engagement at GW, said the federal government only requires that Title IX Office personnel receive training on how to deal with accusations of discrimination and sexual harassment, but under the new rules, all University employees will be required to complete training on sex-based discrimination under Title IX regulations. “In the coming weeks, the provost’s office will work with our deans to reinforce and ensure full participation in preventing harassment and discrimination, which includes all the necessary
timeline content for faculty and staff,” she said. Five of GW’s 12 peer schools – the University of Miami and Boston, New York, Tufts and Syracuse universities – already have mandatory training for their faculty and staff. Officials required incoming GW students to complete both virtual and in-person Title IX training courses and an online sexual assault prevention module this fall. Laguerre-Brown said the Title IX Office will be able to respond more broadly to different types of gender discrimination under the Biden administration’s proposed Title IX changes. Under the potential updates, the definition of sexual discrimination would now include acts of sex discrimination on the basis of sex stereotypes, sex characteristics, pregnancy or related conditions, sexual orientation and gender identity, according to ED’s website. “All of these additional protections are currently covered under the University’s broad anti-discrimination policy, but not currently under the Title IX policy,” Laguerre-Brown said at the Faculty Senate meeting Friday. Biden’s Title IX policy would reverse the Trump administration’s efforts to reduce Title IX protections, which narrowed the definition of sexual harassment to be any form of unwelcome conduct that is “serious, pervasive and objectively offensive.” Trump’s Title IX policy also required post-secondary institutions to hold live hearings for sexual misconduct cases, where witnesses were allowed to be crossexamined. She said officials formed a Title IX regulations task force in July to review the changes to federal Title IX policy the White House proposed in June and receive feedback from the community on how best to implement it. She said the task force will hold an online forum with community members in the coming weeks to receive feedback about the rule changes. See TRAINING Page 5
Faculty senators vote in support of residence hall in empty campus lot GRACE CHINOWSKY
CONTRIBUTING NEWS EDITOR
SOPHIA GOEDERT
ASSISTANT NEWS EDITOR
Faculty senators passed a resolution in support of building a new 320-bed residence hall at the abandoned lot on the corner of 20th and H streets during a Faculty Senate meeting Friday. The resolution endorses previous plans to construct a residence hall that officials paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, urges the administration to resume planning with “deliberate speed” and recommends the project be placed near or at the top of the University’s spending budget. With 22 yes votes, four no votes and one abstention, the resolution states the new residence hall is critical to attracting new students after the recent renovations of Thurston Hall, which removed 280 beds from the building and “substantially reduced” undergraduate housing. Officials announced plans to build a new residence hall in December 2018 with hopes of finishing construction this fall,
KRISHNA RAJPARA I ASSISTANT PHOTO EDITOR A COVID-19 testing trailer occupied the lot across from University Yard during the previous academic year before officials reassigned three locations on the Foggy Bottom Campus as new testing sites.
but COVID-19 suspended their plans. The 2018 blueprint for the 10-story building feature loft-style common rooms, community kitchens and retail space. A COVID-19 testing trailer occupied the lot across from University Yard during the previous academic year before officials reassigned three locations on the Foggy Bottom Campus as new testing sites. Eric Grynaviski, the chair of the Faculty Senate’s Educational Policy and Technology Committee and co-chair of the senate’s Physical Facilities Commit-
tee, presented the resolution to the faculty senators and said the new residence hall is necessary to provide flexibility for GW’s undergraduate enrollment targets. He also said the new residence hall can provide extra beds for students who may be moved around during any major renovations of other residence halls. Grynaviski, an associate professor of political science, said there’s a “necessity for anchoring” the H Street lot to campus, providing dining options and improving the student experience for graduate students.