#i2amru (I, Too, Am Reinhardt) Volume 1 Number 1 | Page 10

(Photos courtesy of Pam Wilson & Ally Hurd)
comments below the video drove me to make my decision.
“I, Too, Am Reinhardt” was a go.
As days went on, I thought about the struggles minorities have faced in the past and are still facing today. I kept
asking myself, “How are they continually, exhaustingly
overcoming?”
The answer was simple: togetherness. Coming together as
a community to lift up their culture and strive for a better,
more deserving future.
So it was obvious that COMment would team up with
two other major organizations on campus to organize
this huge event. Student Activities Council, the main
college campus event planners, and DREAMS, the society
that promotes positive enlightenment in reference to the
African American community, agreed to be a part of my
team.
The planning that went into “I, Too, Am Reinhardt” was
enormous. I created flyers and t-shirts, budgeted for food,
delegated event responsibilities, made decorations, created discussion questions, and most important of all, met
with the two co-sponsoring organizations to make sure
we had a common goal.
We all wanted this event to speak to the students of
Reinhardt in a way that no other event had done before.
This would be achieved with a two-fold plan:
1) Allowing students who represent a foreign culture to
speak, and
2) Focusing in on the issue of race on Reinhardt’s campus,
through a series of roundtable discussions.
I believe both of these things are what set the event apart,
in the long-run.
The night of the event, I wa s on top of the world.Yes, it is
as cliché as it sounds. There is always a worry that no one
is going to show up to your event. Or maybe that those
who do show won’t truly care about it. However, this
wasn’t the case. After I saw sixty-plus students walk in to
the glass house, my heart was filled.

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Above: Hannah Buckner, organizer of the “I, Too, Am Reinhardt” conference.
Left: Speakers Vanessa Irie (from the Ivory Coast) and Nathan Stamper
(from Bermuda) spoke about their cultural experiences as foreign students.
The event started with students listening intently
to the speakers and ended with students intently
listening to one another.
I couldn’t have been happier. I wish I had been
able to have an ear at every roundtable to listen
and discuss with others about common and differing struggles due to racial, sexual and cultural
diversity. I remember that one table kept discussing even after the event had ended, and this made
me smile.
As I graduate in a couple of weeks, I am leaving
Reinhardt and the Communication program with a
feeling of satisfaction in my soul – one that “I, Too,
Am Reinhardt” gave me.
I’m not sure if I made much of a change, but I
know I started something that students want to
have repeated for years to come.
I think that is what matters most – opening a door
so that many can walk into a new, refreshing and
opportunistic room in the future.

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