Why Is the Retention Rate Slipping? Pt. 2

As explored in the part 1 of this article, most students of color that I interviewed shared the similar feeling of just being a quota for Eastern Washington University. The university seems to not address issues of what life outside of campus is like. As most students that attend Eastern will attest to, life outside of campus is just as important as life on campus. Whether you are a commuter from Spokane, live in Cheney, or live in the dorms, you will eventually have to venture off campus at some point for living necessities,

As demonstrated by a partner project "Food Insecurity at EWU," fresh produce and just generally healthy food can be hard to find on campus, if found at all. There is no place for students to buy fresh fruits and vegetables on campus. The food pantries are free for EWU students, but seem to offer primarily canned food. The food pantry is cool because the university is addressing the fact that college is expensive and causes enough students to be poor enough to not be able to afford food, so they created a social service for students.

One Eastern sophomore in an interview we had mentioned that "it's really frustrating having to drive into Spokane for so many things. I drive in for groceries and gas is less expensive in Spokane. Its so much wasted gas and its a huge bill just paying for a commute."

So what is life like outside of campus in the surrounding areas? Well, as demonstrated by the diversity density heat maps on the homepage, Cheney and Spokane are unsurprisingly more white than campus. If people of color feel as if campus isn't inclusive enough even with a high racial diversity population, outside of campus has to be even worse. With a drastic amount of less diversity, inclusitivity isn't at the forefront of Spokane's mind.

In Washington, there are 28 tracked and active hate groups in Washington as of 2018 according to splcenter.org. The Southern Poverty Law Center states that there are 3 just in Spokane county and 13 statewide which includes potential activity in Spokane. Northern Idaho has at least 4 active and tracked hate groups in 2018, according to SPLC. That is a total of 7 known chapters just in the local area surrounding Eastern. Now this is an underestimate, there are many not-tracked and unlisted hate groups in the Spokane area that SPLC does not list, such as the "Three Percenters" whose logo you might find on stickers on cars and trucks in the area represented by three white pillars ("III"). You can find more information on hate groups under the "Local Hate Groups" tab on this website.

This hate isn't quarantined from campus and it finds its way on one way or another. In February of 2018, a hate group called "Identity Evropa" hung flyers around Eastern Washington University promoting white supremacy. In November of 2019, anti-abortion, evangelical, trio appeared on campus. One member of the group is a convicted child murderer, Jake Eakin (https://tinyurl.com/t6ucgpw). They spread messages of discrimination and hate for all of campus to hear while local police gave them a safe space right in the center of campus to preach. For more information on these two events, look at the "Hypocrisy on Campus" section of this website.

It is possible, and seems to be true when talking to people of color on campus, that Eastern Washington University does not feel like a safe school to attend if you are apart of a community that these local supremacy groups target. In light of recent protests on campus, it also appears that the university does not live up to the inclusitivity that it promotes. Why would a person of color want to continue attending Eastern when they feel that they have been lied to about the culture and atmosphere on campus?