Student Leaders Hold Cornell Accountable

Members of Cornell University's Student Assembly

Beginning in September 2018, undergraduate community organizers and student government leaders mobilized to challenge Cornell University’s extensive involvement in county fairs that permit the sale of Confederate flags.

Their efforts have been documented on investigative reporting platforms and spread like wildfire on social media.

In early May 2019, they successfully passed a hard-fought Cornell Student Assembly (SA) resolution demanding their administration take a number of concrete steps to help rid county fairs of hate-profiteering. Key elected members of the SA who’ve lent their support include President Joe Anderson, Executive VP Cat Huang, and VP of Diversity & Inclusion Colin Benedict.

In the nearly unanimously-passed resolution that you can check out here, the student Fair for All team asserts that “Cornell’s self-proclaimed commitment to diversity and inclusion demands that it help secure anti-racist victories for the people of New York by joining this historic fight.” Further commentary from student stakeholders:

“It seems that every week, Cornell’s campus marred with racial terror — disturbing reminders that this school was not meant for all of its students. White supremacy isn’t an aberration, and it isn’t omething that simply lingers in hateful peoples’ hearts. It is a system being driven and strengthened by institutional actors who ought to be held to account! And as neo-Confederate hate escalates in New York, we can no longer ignore the elephant in the room: the wealthy Ivy League university that refuses to take action at best, and enables ongoing hatred at worse.” -Adam Khatib, SA Resolution Co-Presenter