On March 23, 2021, nearly 400 Washington and Lee University students walked out of class together to demand that the school removes the reference to confederate general Robert E. Lee from its name. They then gathered again on April 2 to protest schoolwide injustices, seemingly galvanized by the Atlanta spa shootings that happened earlier in March.
It seems that the Washington and Lee community has been particularly vulnerable to situations of uncertainty, tension, and injustice ever since the pandemic hit, and ever since the country too found itself at a crossroads – politically, socially, racially, and not only. The divisions and tensions on campus rose as tensions across the country did too.
“I’ve always felt that W&L is kind of a microcosm of the United States,” said senior Jeronimo Reyes Olmedo, one of the organizers of the April 2 protest, “in that there is a very big class disparity, mostly the minorities are the ones that do all the work, but then the administration gets all of the credit and really hams it up.”
But what happened at Washington and Lee exactly?
Below is a timeline showing various events that happened both on the W&L campus since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, and in the United States at large. At first the events might seem like just that – a series of events, however if you look closely enough, all of them are interwoven and can point to the various divisions and differences in priorities among students on campus.
What’s more, some of the national events, such as the murder of George Floyd and the birth of the Black Lives Matter movement, can really help contextualize the unrest and mobilization occurring on W&L’s campus.
As we can see in the timeline, the situation in the country at large and the BLM movement in specific seem to have precipitated the now-even-more-urgent need to change the name of the school.
“I think that it’s predominantly happening now because people feel that after what happened to George Floyd and the nationwide protests – there’s actual pressure now,” said Blake Ramsay, a sophomore who spoke at the name change walkout.
Ramsay believes that even though it might seem intuitive that nationwide pressure means pressure on the school’s Board of Trustees to change the name, that is not the case at all and “they still don’t care.”
Looking back
If we take a long hard look at history, this is definitely not the first time W&L has faced a crucial dilemma that might ultimately define its future as an institution. Up until as late as 1972, the university was entirely male. However, the opposition it faced and the pressure it felt from other institutions across the country, eventually resulted in W&L going co-ed. According to a New York Times article, the university “decided to admit women in the fall of 1985 despite opposition from some of the 3,150 students who put stickers on their cars proclaiming: ‘Better Dead Than Coed.’”
Going co-ed was a divisive decision that turned students and faculty against each other. A similar sentiment is circulating within the W&L community yet again. To some, it might even seem that history is repeating itself.
“It was nothing more than a prep school for really rich white boys,” said Journalism Professor Toni Locy, “They waited until the school was circling the drain and about to go down. Women saved W&L. And we’re at the same kind of pinnacle moment.”
As seen in the timeline above, in June 2020 Locy wrote an article for The Nation, stating that “it is going to get increasingly hard to persuade a generation of high school students who care about diversity to attend a university named after a Confederate general.”
The article debunks the myth that Lee was simply a great educator who created W&L’s famous Honor System and helped the university become the top-notch liberal arts institution that it is today. Lee might have been that, too, however past, present, and future students at W&L can no longer ignore his strong ties to the confederacy and the racist connotation his name carries.
“Change the name”
Despite valuing W&L’s rich history and foundations deeply rooted in traditionalism, rigor, and excellence, a lot of students believe that it’s indeed time for reformation and a profound change in the status quo.
It is a commonly shared sentiment among both students and faculty that the changing of the university’s name is a decision long overdue. The decision, however, ultimately falls on the school’s Board of Trustees, which has been ‘deliberating’ for a long time now.
“They’re treating Washington and Lee like it’s still what it was in 1980 or 1950 even and I think that’s the biggest problem, ” Ramsay said, “yeah, sure, the name Lee probably flies in 1950 when Jim Crow laws existed. But this is a university of 2021 now.”
The walkout was important for students to voice their concerns and present a united front, however a lot of them doubt that it was effective in making the board change their mind. A decision on the name change is still pending, and people on both sides of the debate are growing impatient.
“No one’s going to forget,” said sophomore Silvana Varela. “We’re not too busy to forget that they haven’t given a response yet.”
The graph below shows the general attitude of W&L students towards the name change, as taken from a survey of about 200 current students. It’s visible that the majority of students are in support of a name change, however it also seems that students are rather equally divided across the two sides of the spectrum, a lot of them choosing to stay neutral.
The March 23 walkout confirmed that idea: a lot of W&L students chose not to attend, weakening the forefront of their fellow students chanting “change the name”, knowing that ultimately, it is not really up to them to decide.
“I feel like there’s definitely a lot of people who support the name change but don’t want to go to a protest because of what that entails for them,” said sophomore Eli Samson. “But I do think the walkout brought a lot of attention to the cause.”
“Abolish Greek Life”
Another example, if not the most outstanding one, of a system on W&L’s campus that feels oppressive, classist, and exclusive to minority students is the Greek System. Deeply engrained in the university’s identity, the Greek System has become a divisive point for both students and faculty, since it has often been prioritized at the expense of other aspects of campus life.
“I think just the sense of Greek Life itself has racist undertones and also makes the campus itself very elitist, which doesn’t contribute to it being cohesive at all,” said sophomore Otice Carder, who himself is part of a fraternity.
In mid-January, a W&L sophomore accidentally sent out a mass e-mail meant to express a group of students’ frustration with the move of sorority recruitment to a virtual format and its re-scheduling to Spring Break, as prompted by COVID protocol. The amount of backlash that followed was quite concerning and resulted in a hostile back-and-forth exchange between W&L students with overtly different views on issues such as the name change. Snippets of some of the e-mails that were sent can be seen below.
“COVID’s really brought out people’s priorities and privilege,” said sophomore Clara Albacete who recently disaffiliated from the Greek System. “I think we saw that very much with the e-mail chain and people’s reactions to the e-mail chain.”
A matter of priorities
It has become apparent time and time again that a lot of W&L students and administration care little about diversity or making minority students feel welcome and included. Or at least not as much as they care about other things, such as Greek Life or maintaining the school’s endowment. This difference in priorities has also become more obvious during COVID and after the series of divisive events on campus. What’s more, the Board of Trustees would be making a direct statement about not prioritizing the presence of students of color on campus lest they decide to keep the name.
“We have maybe 100 students of color on the undergraduate side and we have 1800 kids. That’s pathetic. And it won’t get any better if this university sticks with Lee,” Toni Locy said.
Below is a graph showing what W&L students think about the current amount of both racial minority students and international students on campus. The numbers show that the majority of students will agree that the representation is way too low, however there are still students that think it’s either just about right or even too high. Of course, there is also the not-so-insignificant number of students who have no opinion on the subject.
COVID has a role to play
It is no coincidence that divisions and tensions on W&L’s campus are becoming exacerbated exactly now. It is in times of uncertainty that the things that are important become clear. W&L’s cracks as a community have been exposed, and light is finally shining through. In the meantime, however, students are struggling even more than usual to stay connected.
“It’s a really hard time to try and create unity on campus, because there is no way for us on a large scale to interact with each other, because of restrictions, because of a lot of these things that are outside of students control,” said Eli Samson.
All of this has been particularly hard for minority students. Specifically, those of them that live in Theme Houses on campus, since being stuck there only within their group can intensify feelings of isolation.
“The way the theme houses are set up is a huge problem during COVID, because they are supposed to give this safe space for minority students, but when COVID hits they’re within that community only, and I think that’s a huge problem for the diversity and the interconnectedness of the place,” said sophomore Blake Ramsay.
With COVID shining light on so many issues within the W&L community, there is only one way to enter the new normal – by figuring out what exactly was wrong with the old one and trying to do better.
Moving forward
When asked about what it would take for W&L to move forward, both students and faculty agree that changing the name should be the first step. A lot of them want to see it as an inevitability, even though the decision itself is beyond their control.
“If the school doesn’t change the name it’s not going to change its culture and it can’t change its culture without changing the name,” Jeronimo Reyes said.
The students are looking forward to finally finding out what the board’s decision will be and whether their most recent efforts have had an impact. So maybe, if diversity, inclusion, and equality triumph, Washington and Lee University will walk out and into the new normal with a brand new name and identity, too. Because sometimes, things have to fall apart so that better things can fall together.
For the audio story, see below.
