Five fraternities came together Saturday to attend the first Greek Life Cross Council Diversity Discussion to raise awareness about different issues regarding race on the UW-Madison campus.
The members discussed a wide array of topics, including white privilege, microaggressions, institutionalized racism and the prison-industrial complex.
Members of five Greek organizations—including Pi Lambda Phi, Alpha Phi Alpha, Phi Beta Sigma, Chi Sigma Tau and Lambda Theta Phi—attended the event.
UW-Madison students Stanley King, Kenneth Cole, Devon Hamilton, Cheta-Chukwu Agwoeme and John Schroeder had been in communication to organize the event for roughly two weeks.
UW-Madison sophomore John Schroeder became a member of a Pi Lambda Phi in the 2015 spring semester.
He said he wanted to help his fraternity’s charity efforts concentrate on specific events that would help diversity on the UW-Madison campus, which led him to organizing the event with other campus activists.
“I got involved because I wanted to do something to help eliminate the prejudice that was actually on our campus,” Schroeder said, which he said is something his fraternity focuses their charity work on.
“The prison topic specifically was something I didn’t know a lot about, and I was able to hear more about from the other students who attended,” Schroeder said.
The event concluded with the leaders of the event asking students to stand if they learned something new in the meeting.
“The event was great. By the end of the discussion, most people were standing,” Schroeder said. “I think everyone learned something.”
Schroeder said he hopes to continue attending and organizing discussions to raise awareness of specific topics—such as sexism on campus and the prison-industrial complex—throughout the semester.
Updated at 12:24 p.m.
