As another spring comes to UCLA, graduating students try to
ponder and decide where their futures might take them.
However, as some students decide whether their futures lie in
corporations, students of color have a more daunting task.

Of the several thousand seniors who will graduate from UCLA this
spring, many have begun taking active steps necessary to ensure
their success for the years to come.

Every spring quarter it happens again. We are bombarded with a
sea of red and blue shirts asking us to take one of their flyers in
hopes of attaining the highest student positions in the land.

Among the mass of student groups vying for your attention on
Bruin Walk, have you ever noticed the Poor Student Union? Have you
heard the chants of hundreds of students at UCLA proclaiming
“We are the deprived” or someone at UCLA actually
saying that they are not from the middle class?

Only 280 black students were offered admission into UCLA out of
more than 10,000 admits for 2003. And hopefully there will never be
a time when black athletes are the only black students admitted and
given the opportunity to graduate from UCLA.

What will happen to successful black women who graduate from
UCLA?
Will they date and marry black men who might be on a lower
educational and financial level?

The policies under President George W. Bush’s
administration have already given him the title of tyrant; and
unilateral war against Iraq would be the icing on a crumbling
domestic and foreign policy cake.

Many wonder why students of color feel isolated here at UCLA.
The Undergraduate Students Association Council Campus Event
Commission proved why.
Two weeks ago the Campus Events Commission printed a half-page
advertisement in the Daily Bruin for the movie
“Barbershop,” featuring a caricature of the Little
Rascal Buckwheat saying, “Ice Cube is da bomb, O-Tay.”
On the bottom, Campus Events stated that their organization had
“Mo’ soul than fried chicken.”
While I realize the ad might have been in jest, it is clear
proof that we haven’t come as far as some like to point out.

This is the beginning of Black History Month and many students
may consider themselves active Black History participants because
they might reread the “I Have A Dream Speech,” because
they remember George Washington Carver while eating a peanut butter
and jelly sandwich, or because they have “black
friends.”
Then on March 1, students of all colors go back to their lives,
forgetting how valuable black achievements have been to them every
day.

Many conservative students at this campus believe that the
overwhelming majority of professors consider themselves
“liberal,” and are indoctrinating their students with
progressive, anti-war, pro-affirmative action, “save the rain
forest” ideologies.