University junior Bri Woodside-Gomez joined the ASUO internship class in fall 2009 to get involved in student government. When she began, she felt like part of a group that was working toward a common goal. But she soon developed a strange feeling toward the class. @@http://www.uoregon.edu/findpeople/person/Bri*Woodside-Gomez@@
“When we went up to Salem to lobby, they told us to bend the truth,” Woodside-Gomez said. “After a while I was like, ‘You’re telling me to lie.’”
Her feelings about the class and the people in it began to sour, and it was getting harder to hide her distrust. Students in the class began to form an increasingly tight bond, but Woodside-Gomez found herself out of the loop. Soon, she was completely ostracized.
“It is a good old boys’ club,” Woodside-Gomez said. “Once you step out, you’re done. You feel so alienated by them.”
According to the ASUO website, the internship class is a weekly workshop taught by a representative from the Oregon Student Association — a nonprofit advocacy organization that works on issues such as tuition, financial aid and student retention.
The class gives students the opportunity to learn about how to effectively campaign and become a student leader. The class is open to everyone, and requires an application and interview to get in. However, for some ASUO members, OSA’s involvement with the class is problematic. @@http://www.orstudents.org/@@
When former ASUO president Sam Dotters-Katz was still in office, he removed the OSA member and hired a Graduate Teaching Fellow to lead the class. According to Dotters-Katz, there was a huge backlash after he made that decision.
“I received countless emails explaining the importance of having OSA represented in the office,” he said. “I agree that it is good to have a representative on campus, but not teaching the class.”
Dotters-Katz explained that he found it strange that someone who isn’t associated with the University is giving out academic credit, especially because the course supervisor is part of an inherently political organization.
For Woodside-Gomez, the people in the class all had the same political beliefs, and this created a toxic environment for those who thought differently.
“They have their own network, and if you’re not in it, you’re alienated,” she said. “They’re bullies.”
A former intern, who wishes to remain anonymous, had a similar experience. The intern wanted to get involved but didn’t now how until receiving an email about the internship program. Due to being a student of color, the intern was asked to attend a conference dealing with students of color.
“When I went there, I was horrified,” the intern said. “It was basically an entire day of workshops during which we were told how oppressed we were and how everyone else was prejudiced against us. I immediately felt like the workshop leaders were trying to upset me to fulfill their own political goals.”
The intern stayed in the class, but soon began to disagree with the class leaders. Although the intern completed the required number of hours, the same leaders said the intern would not pass the class. Soon after, the intern dropped the class.
“They basically said, ‘No matter what you do, if you stay in this class, we will fail you,’” the intern said.
The intern also found that the people in charge picked favorites.
“It was always very clear that if you agreed with them, they would be a lot friendlier,” the intern said. “Otherwise, they had this way of being kind of rude to people and embarrassing you in front of other people unless you conformed.”
While some were disappointed with the culture of the class, many enjoyed it and found it held a lot of value. ASUO Sen. Lamar Wise said the class was extremely beneficial. @@http://asuo.uoregon.edu/senate.php?a=30@@
“I was able to learn about different issues that affected students,” Wise said. “Issues that I knew would affect me in years to come, in terms of debt and student autonomy issues.”
Wise, who took the class with ASUO Sen. Ben Bowman, said it gave him the skills needed to be an effective student leader and helped with learning the structures of the ASUO and other organizations associated with the ASUO. He said he had heard people had issues withe the class a few years ago, but he never encountered anything like that.
“I think the people teaching the class have responded to the issues,” Wise said. “Now it is more skill-based and about learning about different communities.”
Wise also attended the conference the former intern mentioned and said it was a valuable informational experience.
“It was a way to explore systems of oppression that do exist today,” he said. “These are important conversations we need to have.”
He said that if anyone has any problems with the class they must be fabricated because he can’t see how anyone would feel uncomfortable being an intern.