College's unions participate in Convocation day strike

Photo courtesy of Sarah Ann Figeuroa ’28
Mount Holyoke College staff and students protested outside the College’s front gates during the SEIU 32BJ and UAW Local 2322 unions’ joint labor strike.

By Karishma Ramkarran ’27

Copy Chief

On Tuesday, Sept. 2 the College celebrated Convocation, an annual tradition that recognizes Mount Holyoke’s students and faculty. Although the theme of sustainability through community marked this year’s Convocation, students did not fail to notice the absence of Mount Holyoke’s essential dining and maintenance workers from the celebration.

As part of a joint demonstration of labor power by the College’s workers’ unions, SEIU 32BJ and UAW Local 2322, Mount Holyoke’s dining hall, facilities staff and housekeepers participated in an unfair labor practice — also known as ULP — strike outside the front gates. In an act of solidarity, the striking workers were joined by students and community members as early as 5 a.m. with picket signs.

The strike followed a series of failed negotiations between the unions and the College that occurred throughout the summer over new contracts, which are agreed upon every three years. It has not been the first time the College’s workers have held rallies in front of the main campus gate; in-between contract meetings, rallies were organized on April 24 and May 13 of this year.

New and returning students on campus began organizing as early as Monday, Sept. 1 to support the strike. The Instagram account Students for Staff Collective Bargaining – @mhcsscb on Instagram – posted a series of action items for students to carry out on Convocation day. These action items included attending a “reverse boycott” wherein students filled up the dining hall before Convocation from 8-10 a.m., boycotting the barbecue on Skinner Green after Convocation, and protesting at the rally at the front gates at 4 p.m. In Blanchard Hall, fliers encouraging student involvement in the strike were posted on community boards and on tables.

At 9:20 a.m. on the day of Convocation, Carl M. Ries, vice president for finance and administration and treasurer, sent the student body an email with the subject line “Update on Campus Operations: Union Strikes.” The email was an official acknowledgement of the strikes from the College. Ries wrote that the College was “committed to minimizing disruptions to [students’] campus experience during the strike” through “developed contingency plans,” which referred to the movement of the Convocation cookout from its original location on Skinner Green to the Dining Commons. The cookout after Convocation was available only to students, many of whom boycotted the event because the College replaced striking dining workers with temporary workers.

Sally Durdan ’81, the Chair of the Board of Trustees, began Convocation by acknowledging Labor Day, which had been celebrated the previous day, Sept. 1. Prior to the College’s official land acknowledgement, Durdan said, “We will open today’s celebration by acknowledging the essential work of our facilities, dining, and housekeeping staff.”

Durdan’s remarks were cut off by the chants of students demanding that the College “pay their workers.” The Board of Trustees, along with President Danielle Holley, stood up for the student protest, with some individuals clapping along. Vic Klapa ’26, who started the Students for Staff Collective Bargaining Instagram account, used a megaphone to amplify their support for the striking staff.

Klapa addressed the Board of Trustees on stage, “Mount Holyoke College, it is shameful that an institution that prides itself on being progressive refuses to do the bare minimum of giving your workers a minimum wage.”

Encouraged by the cheers of fellow students, Klapa continued, “You pride yourself on women’s empowerment, yet you underpay jobs mostly staffed by women. How is that feminist?”

Holley, who had taken the podium, said, “I just wanted to let you know I was just outside with our workers who are striking … and I want to let you know how much the College really does appreciate and care about our workers.”

Holley was met with more shouts from the crowd: “Pay them then,” and “Six months is too long.”

In response, Holley told the students that the College was working assiduously to obtain a fair agreement for the workers’ contracts, especially on the subject of a livable wage. “We will meet all the demands regarding the living wage, that is not a question,” Holley said.

“I am pro-labor myself,” Holley continued, “I have lots of people in my family who are union workers, I’d never imagined it would come to this day.”

“I sincerely want to come to an agreement with all of our unions in a way that respects labor … and I think you will see when we are completed with this process that is exactly what we will do,” Holley said.

At 10 a.m. – the start of Convocation – the SEIU 32BJ and UAW unions held a press conference outside the College’s main gates. Dozens of workers gathered, holding up banners and signs expressing support of the unions. Vehicles passing by the rally honked in solidarity with the workers on strike.

The speakers at the press conference drew attention to the College’s founding values, which include a commitment to social justice and progressivism, in their demands that Mount Holyoke engage in fair negotiations with their workers. The name Frances Perkins — belonging to a Mount Holyoke alum and former U.S. secretary of labor — was evoked in protest of the College’s labor practices.

According to SEIU 32BJ union, over 40% of its workers at the College don’t make a livable wage, which they calculated using the MIT Living Wage Calculator. The living wage calculator calculates a livable wage for an individual using the location in which they live and their family circumstances. It accounts for the individual’s family expenses, which include food, childcare, medical care, housing and transportation.

The union representatives stated that when workers at the College do receive an increase in pay, they receive more responsibilities as a consequence of underhiring. Patrick Burke, president of UAW Local 2322 which represents around 25 of the College’s housekeepers, said, “Mount Holyoke has $1 billion; workers are asking for 1/1000 of that.” The union alleged that the College had been negotiating contracts in bad faith — particularly by threatening to cease negotiations if workers went on strike — which is against the National Labor Relations Act.

Several political representatives in the area attended the press conference to demonstrate their support of the College’s striking workers. State Senator Adam Gómez spoke about the strike as part of a greater fight for justice and democracy. “It is crucial that we stand together to support the heart of the institution: The worker,” Gómez said.

Rhonda Saletnik, a housekeeper for Pearsons Hall, said, “The College wouldn’t be working if we didn’t work.”

At 4 p.m., students flooded through the front gates to join the rally and express their solidarity with the union workers. Ben Grosscup, an American songwriter and activist from western Massachusetts, performed familiar classics with a pro-union twist for the crowd, including “(Strike) Around the Clock,” “We’re Not Gonna Take It!” and “Fight for Justice.”

Students who attended were given picket signs by union organizers, along with music sheets so they could sing along with Grosscup. The rally frequently erupted in cheers for the unions on strike — SEIU 32BJ and UAW — along with slogans like “Solidarity forever,” “Union strong,” and “The people united will never be defeated.”

In an interview with the Mount Holyoke News, student attendee Maeve McCorry ’28 said, “Students need to understand that these workers are valuable, not just because of the labor they provide for us, but because they are human beings … who deserve dignity.”

In a conversation with Klapa about their motivations behind the protest during convocation, they said, “Labor rights in general is something that has such a personal meaning to me. I was raised by a mom and a grandma who were both immigrants. They worked in factories. English wasn’t their first language. And we grew up working class.”

They continued, “They didn’t work at unionized jobs, so, I have metal fillings in my teeth. And there were times in my life where I wasn’t able to access insurance for certain months because that [wasn’t] allowed in my mom’s contract.”

Among the rally attendees were Mount Holyoke faculty pledging support for their fellow workers at the College. Mary Renda, a professor of history, spoke of being “proud of SEIU and UAW for standing up” and continued the general theme of Frances Perkins by stating that “[Perkins] worked to ensure people had the right to unionize.”

According to Kevin Brown, the executive vice president of SEIU 32BJ, all 200 members of the unions at the College participated in the strike. Brown told the crowd that the College had not believed its workers would strike during Convocation, and the loss of labor had led to a couple managers running the dining hall for the entire day.

Brown spoke against the College’s labor representatives, stating that they did “evil, illegal things” during negotiations. The strike was intentionally held on Convocation day, an annual College tradition, to “give the College a lesson.” After the rally students returned to the Dining Commons in the act of another reverse boycott. A speaker declared that resuming regular work the next day was an act of voluntary labor, which would be taken back if certain conditions weren’t met, or if any striker was fired by the College.

Holley, in an email addressed to the student body, shared more resources and information regarding negotiations between the unions and the College. “Mount Holyoke has been in active negotiations with representatives from both SEIU and UAW and has made offers that include significant wage increases, added holidays, enhanced benefits and new opportunities for professional development,” she wrote.

To further discuss these matters, Holley invited concerned students to attend a community forum in Chapin Hall on Sept. 3 at 4:45 pm.

At the forum, Holley prefaced the conversation with an explanation of how labor negotiations work at the College: the College’s representatives meet with union representatives to discuss various issues for new contracts. The College’s representatives include their labor counsel Joe McCullough, Associate Vice President for HR Jay Toomey, and the Assistant Vice President of Employee and Labor Relations Mary Simeoli. Holley clarified that she is not present at these meetings.

After she had spoken about several non-economic offers that the College had offered to the unions, Holley proceeded to address the main point of contention among the student body: the issue of a livable wage.

“The clear compensation structure is that we pay people based on market rates, based on benchmarking,” Holley said.

She continued with an example: “[Kitchen assistants] can be paid in a range of $18 an hour, even though we recently advertised for some at $20 an hour. If you look over at Amherst College, they advertise that same kitchen assistant position for $15-$19 an hour.”

“We pay $18 an hour for those jobs because that is the market rate. We actually believe we pay a little above the market rate for kitchen assistance,” she explained.

Holley continued to detail the wage-related offer the College had made during negotiations, which was an 8.5% raise in contrast to the union’s proposed 11.5% raise, which had been agreed upon during previous negotiations three years ago. She also enumerated the ways in which employees at the College are compensated besides wages, including retirement contributions and healthcare.

Before opening the community forum to a Q&A session, Holley spoke of the college’s deficit of $5 billion, mostly due to employee wages and benefits. “But I also want to be transparent with this community. We are at the end of our fiscal ability,” she said.

Holley continued, “I will take accountability for the fact that we should not be here right now, because I should have insisted that this contract was completed by June 30.”

During the Q&A, Gillian Krugman ’27 addressed the forum, “I refuse to accept the notion that their [the worker’s] rights to a livable wage is not within the economic contours that you posited … The administration negotiated in August with one condition: To not strike. This is a blatant disregard to the law.”

Krugman continued, “Just because conditions are worse under other administrations, doesn’t mean our labor conditions cannot change.”

On Friday, Sept. 5, negotiations between the College and SEIU 32BJ had produced a tentative agreement that includes annual raises that total 11% over the three-year contract for all members, with the lowest paid workers receiving between a 13.5% and 20% increase over the same period. The union also secured access to no-cost legal services for civil matters, such as immigration, and policy improvements for non-economic issues such as sick leave, parental leave and holidays.

The College had negotiated the same day separately with UAW Local 2322. The union has secured their members an increase in wages towards the livable wage calculated by the MIT Living Wage Calculator.

In an email sent to the student body on Tuesday, Sept. 9, Holley wrote, “We anticipate these agreements will be ratified by the respective bargaining units within the next two weeks, at which point they will go into effect as outlined in each contract.”

She continued, “Advocacy has always been a part of Mount Holyoke’s story, and effective advocacy begins with a willingness to listen and learn. We have shown that Mount Holyoke is a place where everyone is valued and heard, and we will continue to uphold these principles as we move forward together.”

Madeleine Diesl ’28 contributed fact-checking.

Students celebrate the start of the academic year at Nightfest

Photo by Emma Quirk ’26
Myat Nandi Kyaw ’28, Hailey Brooks ’27, Manu Ribas ’26, Christine Niu ’27 serving popcorn at Nightfest.

By Emma Quirk ’26

News Editor & Photos Editor

Students celebrated the first weekend back on campus with friends and peers at Nightfest. Hosted by the Office of Student Involvement and the Student Government Association on Sept. 6, the event was advertised as including games, music, and more.

While Nightfest was originally going to be held on Skinner Green, it was moved indoors due to rain and a thunderstorm watch in the area. However, in contrast to the gloomy weather, Blanchard Hall was lively, with students of all class years milling about. The entire first floor was filled with people and tables that offered various foods and activities. On one side of the floor was snacks, with popcorn cones, cotton candy sticks, and a “make your own teabag” station. While the Cochary Pub & Kitchen was open, it remained quiet throughout Nightfest as students enjoyed the goodies provided by the event.

On the other side of the floor, students could get their face painted or take a picture at the photo booth. The line for photos extended across the entire length of the first floor, as students waited to pose with props. Between the tables, groups of students sat and stood in circles, playing games, eating their treats, chatting with one another, and taking in the activity around them.

The Great Room boasted glow-in-the-dark mini golf. Lively music was playing, and the room was dim except for the golf course and glow sticks that students waved and wore as necklaces. All in all, Nightfest was a vibrant celebration to finish out the first week of classes.

Madeleine Diesl ’28 contributed fact-checking.

Students create ethnographic food documentaries

Photo by Angelina Godinez ‘28

Critical Race and Political Economy Professor Pilar Egüez’s class conducted field visits in Holyoke, where they filmed ethnographic documentaries.

Angelina Godinez ’28

Opinion Editor

Amidst federal pressure for universities and corporations to make cuts to diversity, equity and inclusion programs, Mount Holyoke College staff and students recently came together to form a community that goes beyond a traditional class curriculum. The Colleges Community and Belonging Director Maria Cartagena and Visiting Assistant Professor in Critical Race and Political Economy Pilar Egüez Guevara created the class, Ethnographic Food Documentary, together. Guevara and Cartagena collaborated in making a hands-on, immersive approach not only to anthropology but also to community building. Instead of merely reading about varying identities, this class prepares students with the ethnographic skills they need to do research themselves and ultimately complete the course with a short ethnographic documentary.

Beginning on Feb. 18, the class embarked on its first field visit to Holyoke, Massachusetts, a city rich in culture, history and untold stories. According to Guevara, “Holyoke is underrepresented in terms of research conducted about this community from an academic standpoint.”

Guevara believes that, through the class’ research and film projects, the students can “disrupt and transform narratives about Latinx residents in Holyoke and throughout the country.” In addition to shaping narratives through film and emphasizing the value and importance these community members hold, the students use film to move memories and recipes into tangible documents, allowing them to be passed down, valued and remembered for generations to come.

This immersive field visit was just one of many class visits to Holyoke where the students would meet their film participants over a shared meal, followed by individual filming and interviewing processes.

Throughout the class, students are equipped with ethnographic skills to ensure that they professionally and ethically tell the stories of historically silenced voices through their film. With readings, screenings of films and learning from Guevara’s own personal projects, students have spent ample class time fine-tuning their ethnographic skills. Cross-listed as both an anthropology and CRPE course, it will culminate in a debut screening of each student-produced film in Holyoke.

Although this is not Guevara’s first ethnographic project, she told Mount Holyoke News why she believes such projects and research are important.

“I saw the need to teach courses like this in the context of the widespread, decades-long war waged against traditional knowledge systems, and in particular against traditional foods deemed as unhealthy by western science,” Guevara said. “My team at Comidas Que Curan envisioned teaching ethnography and filmmaking as a way to question negative representations of traditional cultural practices, and create dignified portrayals of the bearers of this knowledge, particularly older women.

“The wisdom that is carried and continues to be alive in communities throughout the world is part of their intangible cultural heritage,” Guevara said.

May 1 will mark the official premiere of four short ethnographic films made by students over nearly three months. The College’s Cartagena is one of the class’s film participants, who is featured alongside Holyoke activist Neftalí Duran, where they advocate for the importance of access to healthy, affordable and culturally significant foods and ingredients in a culture-diverse city such as Holyoke. Cartagena plays a vital role in bridging the gap between South Hadley and the city of Holyoke, and is trusted and beloved not only by students, but also residents of Holyoke. Trust is an essential component of their class and ethnographic research; without trust between the participants, staff, and students, the act of delegating and directing a film within only one semester would have been impossible.

Said acts of trust are emphasized through the three remaining films of the class. One film spotlights the stories of both Ada Fernandez Jr. and Ada Fernandez Sr., past owners of Holyoke’s very own Puerto Rican family restaurant formerly known as Fernandez’s Family Restaurant. Following the death of beloved father and husband Rafael Fernandez, the face of Fernandez’s restaurant, the film shows the unbreakable bond of culture and pride through the family’s values in community, cooking and cultural perseverance. Similarly to the Fernandez family film, a film following Migdalia Lavoy, a Holyoke traditional food expert, shows the importance of cooking in Migdallia’s very own house. This film explores the importance of cooking in relation to culture and hope. Despite not having professional culinary experience, the film shows that Lavoy is what a chef ought to be.

Last but not least is Aramis Lopez, a Puerto Rican reflecting on how his cooking is more than just culturally significant. In each spoonful of food, his pride in both Puerto Rico and Holyoke shines, emphasizing that his recipes are not just recipes but an important part of his cultural heritage.

Throughout the course of this class, students got to experience filming, researching, interviewing and editing. Soon both Mount Holyoke College and Holyoke community members will reap the benefits in having a tangible form of media to preserve and represent their hard work, culture and community.

With the help of passionate students and staff, the College’s community can continue to find importance in the seemingly mundane by appreciating not only our cultures, but the ones around us. With classes such as Guevara’s, students are on track to follow her words by “foster[ing] spaces, channels and strategies for cultural appreciation, as opposed to appropriation, exploitation, exclusion, and hate.”

Leah Dutcher ’28 contributed fact-checking.

Editor’s note: Angelina Godinez ’28 assisted with the production of the documentary on the Fernandez’s Family Restaurant mentioned in this piece.

New campus community seeks to alter discourse

Graphic by Echo Chen ’27

CORRECTION 4/29/25: The headline and several statements within this article have been updated to more accurately reflect this HxA chapter’s status as an organization that has not been officially recognized by Mount Holyoke College’s Office of Student Involvement, among other changes. For a full description of these changes, please refer to the complete correction notice at the bottom of the page.

By Karishma Ramkarran ’27

News Editor

Content Warning: This article discusses racism and transphobia.

A new unofficial organization at Mount Holyoke College has emerged amidst renewed discussions about the role of free speech on college campuses.

Elise Schemmel Shapiro ’25 is the co-chair, alongside Professor Cassandra Sever, of Mount Holyoke College’s chapter of Heterodox Academy — abbreviated as HxA — a non-profit organization whose mission statement, according to their website, is to advocate for “policy and culture changes that ensure universities are truth-seeking, knowledge-generating institutions grounded in open inquiry, viewpoint diversity, and constructive disagreement.” As of right now, the College’s chapter of HxA is registered within the national organization itself but is not officially recognized by the College’s Office of Student Involvement.

The national organization was co-founded in 2015 by three academics, including New York University Professor Jonathan Haidt, who advocated that diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives on college campuses had created ideologically intolerant environments. While HxA advocates for institutional neutrality, Schemmel Shapiro described that she believes HxA founder Jonathan Haidt is fundamentally a classical liberal. Haidt has stated that colleges that have espoused DEI missions have cultivated a “hostile climate” to conservative viewpoints. Instead of focusing on racial, sexual, or gender diversity, HxA advocates for viewpoint diversity through institutional neutrality and open inquiry.

In an interview with Mount Holyoke News, Schemmel Shapiro said she sought to create a chapter on campus last semester because of what she sees as a “lack of viewpoint diversity.” She said, “My first semester, I would hear the same [thing] over and over again. I would hear these slogans like ‘cis-white men take up so much space’ ... I was just like, ‘This is really boring.’”

“College is supposed to be a place where you … engage with uncomfortable ideas because that’s what intellectual growth is,” Schemmel Shapiro said. “You’re not going to convince anyone of your position if … all you know about their position is that it’s bad. You need to spend time with them and actually know the psychological mechanisms behind their arguments, and then you can develop your argument to be stronger.”

Members of the national HxA organization have defended controversial statements made by academics and institutions regarding race and political engagement. For example, in an October 2024 post on the organization’s official Substack, HxA Director of Policy Joe Cohn defended statements made by a professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School in which she said, “America would be better off with fewer Asians and less Asian immigration” and that she had “never seen a Black student graduate in the top quarter of the class.” Cohn wrote in response,“As offensive as many may find those views, free expression and academic freedom cannot only protect the inoffensive.”

More recently, HxA criticized a Hunter College job listing, which stated that the institution was seeking “a historically grounded scholar who takes a critical lens to issues pertaining to Palestine … Ideal candidates will also have a record of public engagement and community action.” Although HxA defended the right of Hunter College to search for a professor of Palestinian studies, it claimed that the job listing had to be reworded because “it clearly seeks applicants to put activism before scholarship,” according to a press release on the HxA website. These examples highlight how HxA’s purported mission about viewpoint diversity and academic freedom has resulted in ideological tension.

To further understand students’ thoughts on academic freedom on the College’s campus, Mount Holyoke News interviewed Red Scare Book Club founder Vic Klapa ’26. Klapa founded the unofficial student organization in Fall 2023 to make leftist political theory more accessible to a greater audience.

Klapa agrees that there are merits to hearing the perspectives of those we disagree with, but said that “there is a difference between listening to those perspectives and having those perspectives platformed to people who don’t know any better.”

“You also have to remember the way American conservatives debate, and they don’t debate kindly. Debates aren’t supposed to be kind, but they frequently use a lot more logical fallacies,” Klapa said.

Schemmel Shapiro said that, in conversations that have taken place during her chapter’s HxA meetings, “the consensus was that … a lot of people think Mount Holyoke is an echo chamber and that they don’t hear different points of views a lot. And sometimes, they’ve been shamed” for having a “different point of view.”

Klapa, however, called attention to the ramifications of unlimited academic speech on campus. “If you have an opinion and say it out loud, you need to be ready to back up your opinion. And if people are actively being like, hey, I think your opinion is dangerous for X, Y and Z … try some introspection.”

Nevertheless, Schemmel Shapiro claimed there is strong student interest in an organization like HxA. “HxA exists [and] people [have] an appetite because they noticed that Mount Holyoke is abusing their mission statement. They’re saying ‘we stand for social justice and we stand for inclusion’ but inclusion is defined in elite terms … and it behaves in ways that say views that don’t align with this are bigoted,” Schemmel-Shapiro said.

Inclusion was a core principle of Mount Holyoke’s founding. The Seven Sister colleges, including Mount Holyoke as the first, were initially founded to expand access to higher education for women at a time when men dominated academics. The College was not only the first of the Seven Sisters to be established to create inclusion in academia, but also the first within the group to expand its college admissions to be inclusive of all transgender and gender-nonconforming applicants in 2015.

Schemmel Shapiro expressed disappointment with the College’s response to current social issues. For instance, she referenced the United States v. Skrmetti decision in late 2024, which would decide whether minors can receive gender-affirming care. Schemmel Shapiro said, “Within the next week, Mount Holyoke has a panel that says that trans healthcare is a human right … when they don’t have another event that gives a different viewpoint, that’s when it becomes a problem.” Schemmel Shapiro’s comments appear to be in reference to the “Trans Health Care Is a Human Right: On Safeguarding Gender-Affirming Care After United States v. Skrmetti” panel hosted by the College on Dec. 9, 2024.

Mount Holyoke News reached out to Lily Rood ’27, an activist for transgender rights, for her thoughts on the representation of trans issues on campus when it comes to ideological discussions. “We absolutely need viewpoint diversity in our communities; I believe deeply in creating opportunities for all people, especially those of us experiencing marginalization, to share our voices and be

heard. The activist foremother Sylvia Rivera once said ‘We have to be visible. We should not be ashamed of who we are,’ and I work every day to create that freedom for all,” Rood wrote in an emailed statement to Mount Holyoke News. “At the same time, I think often about the paradox of tolerance, which is this philosophical concept explaining the need to actually refuse to tolerate one thing — intolerance — in order to create a tolerant society.”

“We need to create a community in which different viewpoints about how folks understand and access their fundamental rights are not only tolerated but uplifted,” Rood continued. “We do not need to — and in fact must not — tolerate intolerance in the form of platforming viewpoints that deny people their rights altogether. I am a proud trans woman and, of course, I have a right to access my healthcare like anyone else.”

“It has been exciting to engage in dialogue with leading activists and scholars about how to protect that right, and I would welcome the opportunity to again engage with folks who may share a wide array of viewpoints on the matter and debate those openly,” she said. “I refuse, however, to put my rights and the rights of people who are dear to me up for debate. Trans healthcare is a human right.”

Mount Holyoke College is within its right to espouse a dedication to social justice and DEI through mediums such as panels. Although institutional neutrality is more strict in terms of public institutions associated with the state, private institutions are allowed to prioritize a specific set of moral, philosophical or religious teachings.

Students on campus do still have a right to express their opinions, even at a private institution like Mount Holyoke. The College has historically had conservative groups, such as the Mount Holyoke College Republicans, who in 2018 hosted a Conservative Women’s Summit with the College’s Weissman Center for Leadership and the Zionist Organization of America, though the MHC Republicans student group is no longer active on campus as of the last academic year. Although students may have the right to express their opinions, whether they be conservative or liberal, the College is not expected to reflect any viewpoint but the one that is written in their mission statement, whether it be through official press statements, lectures, and events sponsored by the College.

The recent state-sanctioned detainment of pro-Palestinian activists on college campuses has renewed discussions about the issue of free speech in academic settings. Based on several public statements made by HxA, the organization seems to draw a boundary between protected academic speech and “activism.” Agendas of open inquiry or institutional neutrality in this context seem difficult to ascertain. HxA defends rights to free speech, but not some forms of activism. The right to expression is also a civil liberty that individuals are entitled to by the Constitution.

“Everyone has a right to voice their opinion,” Klapa said, “but you shouldn’t be offended or shocked when you’re offering a juvenile point and the other person is actually giving you factual information.”

Leah Dutcher ’28 contributed fact-checking.

Editor’s note: Mount Holyoke’s chapter of Heterodox Academy is co-chaired by Professor Cassandra Sever, who also serves as the faculty advisor for Mount Holyoke News. MHN operates independently from the Heterodox Academy chapter; MHN does not endorse any of the opinions or views expressed in this article.

CORRECTION 4/29/25: After being contacted by both the Office of Student Involvement and HxA Chapter Co-Chair Cassandra Sever, MHN has updated this article to more accurately reflect the HxA chapter’s status. The original headline, “New student group seeks to alter campus discourse,” has been amended to “New campus community seeks to alter discourse.” Elise Schemmel Shapiro ’25 is now denoted as a co-chair of the HxA chapter alongside Sever, rather than as the group’s founder; according to Sever, “HxA chapters are not allowed to be founded by students” and the organization is primarily faculty-run. The article also mistakenly stated that the organization is unrecognized by the Student Government Association: the Office of Student Involvement has not officially recognized the group, not SGA. In an email to MHN, the Office of Student Involvement stated that “This group did not go through the Office of Student Involvement's new org process, was not approved, is not Recognized, and as such cannot use the Mount Holyoke College name.” The email also stated that “HxA is not an official organization on campus, cannot use the MHC name, and is behaving in violation of College policies.”

Mount Holyoke Research Services addresses federal records purge

Photo by Tara Monastesse ’25

Mount Holyoke’s research services team, based in Library, Information and Technology Services, has created a LibGuide to track lost federal data.

By Sydney Wiser ʼ27

Staff Writer

In the months since Donald Trump took office, an unprecedented amount of federal records have been altered or erased from government websites. According to the New York Times, over 8,000 web pages across at least a dozen U.S. government websites have been taken down. These web pages range in subject matter from public health information on preventing chronic diseases from the Center for Disease Control to data tracking hate crimes from the Department of Justice. 

To address this wide-scale information purge, Mount Holyoke College’s research services team has created a LibGuide called “Disappearing Federal Data.” The LibGuide is a compilation of “data rescue efforts” made by research and free press organizations, according to its web page. 

When federal records began to be scrubbed in January, the College’s Head of Research Services, Irene McGarrity, and the LITS team saw peer institutions create web pages addressing the disappearing information. Despite some initial hesitation, McGarrity decided to make one for the Mount Holyoke community as well. 

“If a really good thing already exists, I don't feel the need to remake it,” McGarrity said. “But ultimately, we decided that Mount Holyoke faculty and staff would appreciate just having something specifically for them with Mount Holyoke's name and branding on it.”

As of time of writing, the page provides access to 13 data-preservation sites. These resources include “End of Term Web Archive,” which preserves archived government websites; “Data Rescue Project,” which “rescues” data and data access points for at-risk government data; and the Harvard Law Library Innovation Lab, which houses datasets from data.gov, PubMed, and federal GitHub repositories. McGarrity compiled these sources from other established guides that are tackling the information purge. 

The erasure of federal records began after the Trump administration started issuing executive orders on Jan. 20. Of these executive orders, the two that resulted in the most purging of federal information were entitled “Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government” and “Ending Radical And Wasteful Government DEI Programs And Preferencing.” These two orders directed government agencies to erase all programs, initiatives, and contracts pertaining to “gender ideology” and “diversity, equity, and inclusion.” 

Since the initial purge, some pages have returned as a result of public backlash and lawsuits. NPR reported that a week after being taken down, parts of the CDC’s Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System – which is responsible for tracking the health of young Americans – have returned to the website. 

However, a statement on some pages of the CDC’s website now reads: “Any information on this page promoting gender ideology is extremely inaccurate and disconnected from the immutable biological reality that there are two sexes, male and female. The Trump Administration rejects gender ideology and condemns the harms it causes to children, by promoting their chemical and surgical mutilation, and to women, by depriving them of their dignity, safety, well-being, and opportunities. This page does not reflect biological reality and therefore the Administration and this Department rejects it.”

It is common for incoming presidential administrations to “rebrand” government websites, according to McGarrity. She said that even before the establishment of government websites, administrations have withheld public access to information in other mediums. 

However, McGarrity has concerns about what she describes as the “perfect storm” of conditions occurring alongside the purge. “I think the combination of social media, filter bubbles, information silos, political polarization, and information erasure and revision is very, very dangerous. It makes it easier to convince people of things that aren’t true,” McGarrity said.

McGarrity also worries about the targeting of trans and nonbinary individuals. She finds the executive order claiming that there are only two genders “quite disruptive, because we live in a world where that's not true, and people express gender in lots of different ways.” 

In addition to these concerns, McGarrity also has fears about the public losing access to a wide variety of unbiased, accessible and federally-funded information which McGarrity described as a “public good.” She noted that research conducted by private entities like corporations can sometimes be inaccessible or misleading. 

“The idea is that we as citizens will pay a little bit of money in our taxes to fund this data and have it be available for everybody,” McGarrity said. “Having it available for everybody means that there’s not barriers based around socio-economic status, everybody can access it.” 

There are numerous benefits to the public having access to federal records such as datasets. According to McGarrity, this research can broaden people’s worldviews and challenge their perceptions. “It helps us see what our reality is,” she said.

McGarrity also noted that public data can amplify societal problems, pointing to how research about the opioid crisis brought the issue onto the national stage and increased the resources directed toward the crisis. 

At the College, McGarrity explained that faculty members use federal records for their research. Students also use this information for projects and to help them understand the world around them. 

McGarrity hopes that students and faculty members will build on the work that she has started with the Disappearing Data LibGuide. McGarrity stresses that the page, which is updated weekly, is “constantly evolving,” and encourages individuals who know of other resources to reach out to the research services team at researchservices-g@mtholyoke.edu. 

Madeleine Diesl ’28 contributed fact-checking.

Transgender community members reflect on NCAA policy

Photo by Emily Tarinelli ’25

The NCAA’s eligibility policy for transgender athletes has sparked discussion among the community.

By Madelyn Dalley ’27

News Editor

Content warning: This article discusses transphobia.

On Feb. 6, 2025, the National Collegiate Athletic Association announced an update to their eligibility policy for transgender athletes competing in NCAA-sponsored sports. In this announcement, the NCAA stated that athletes who are “assigned male at birth” are no longer able to compete on women’s varsity sports teams, but are otherwise allowed to practice with said teams. The policy also stipulates that “a student-athlete assigned female at birth who has begun hormone therapy (e.g., testosterone) may not compete on a women’s team,” but may also continue to practice with a women’s team. Mount Holyoke College, being an NCAA-sponsored Division III institution, has since changed its athletic participation policy to align with that of the NCAA.

This policy change has sparked much discussion among the Mount Holyoke community, with some community members questioning the College’s stance on trans inclusion as well as the general future of transgender collegiate life. In the athletics sphere particularly, some students have raised concerns regarding whether or not there is still a place for transgender students to participate in athletics at the College. 

Mount Holyoke News reached out to members of the transgender community to ask them to share their experiences and feelings regarding this policy change. On Friday, April 4, Mount Holyoke News sat down with Annie Bethell ’26, a nonbinary member of the Mount Holyoke soccer team, to discuss their opinions on the NCAA policy change as a direct participant in the Association.

Bethell, who is currently a junior, has been competing on the College’s soccer team since their first year. Their choice to compete in the NCAA on behalf of Mount Holyoke was largely influenced by the College’s inclusive reputation. However, even prior to any policy changes, Bethell has struggled with this notion of inclusivity.

“I came to Mount Holyoke soccer because I knew that Mount Holyoke was going to be a more inclusive environment for trans athletes, and upon arrival, I did feel that way,” Bethell said. “But externally, we are a women's soccer team who play other women's soccer teams, and people like referees or spectators, other teams' players, aren't as inclusive as Mount Holyoke is … NCAA teams are registered as women's teams, so everyone involved in athletics outside of Mount Holyoke treats us as women and uses terms like ‘ladies’ when referring to a group of us. So that's been challenging.” Bethell also stated that prior to the policy change, they were permitted to take small doses of testosterone for hormone replacement therapy, as well as receive gender affirming surgery. 

Bethell is not alone in feeling awkward as a transgender person in the athletics sphere. Even those at the College who are not directly participating in athletics have expressed discomfort with being involved in the athletics world as transgender people, even before the recent NCAA changes, including an anonymous Kendall Sports & Dance Complex employee and senior student at Mount Holyoke. “I'm the first person people see when they enter the gym, and I sometimes feel out of place as one of the few workers who presents myself quite differently,” the anonymous student employee wrote to Mount Holyoke News through a submission form. “When I enter the gym for a shift, I enter a place where I am a non-athlete woman. It feels off.”

The re-inauguration of President Donald Trump has intensified this discomfort among those interviewed, and raised concerns among Americans in general regarding the intensification of already existing country-wide human rights issues. While initially being more concerned by other Trump administration policies, such as an attempt to reinstate the death penalty and the push for mass deportations, Bethell, being a transgender player on a collegiate women’s soccer team, grew increasingly worried about the administration’s impact on themself. 

“[In] my situation specifically, I recognized my positionality and privilege, but there was a voice in the back of my head saying, ‘they're coming for you, too,’” Bethell said.

Regardless of the College’s reputation as an inclusive environment for members of the LGBTQ+ community, the College’s compliance with the NCAA’s newest policy has already started to affect transgender athletes on campus, including Bethell.

Bethell stated that the order has deterred them from pursuing further steps in their transition, such as further hormone therapy. While the NCAA policy does not explicitly stipulate that athletes who receive gender-affirming surgeries are ineligible to compete on either men’s or women’s teams, the recent NCAA changes, Bethell said, have greatly challenged them since being enacted. “For a variety of personal and collegiate NCAA reasons, I'm now unable to [receive gender-affirming surgery] unless I find a way to argue that it is not for a gender-affirming purpose,” Bethell said. 

Bethell also argued that the policy will create complications for all NCAA participants, in and outside of the College, who need hormone therapy and have already undergone the process while it was still permitted. “It's a lot harder for people who genuinely need … hormones,” Bethell said. “Coming off of hormones, even at a small dosage, is really challenging, and I'm aware of that happening here.”

Collegiate teams are not the only athletics groups at risk. Federal and executive orders to bar transgender athletes from other leagues of play — such as Executive Order 14201 “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports” — aim to ban transgender women from participating in all women’s and girl’s athletics teams receiving federal funding, including  K-12 teams. 

“I’m really worried about the suicide rates of trans youth, especially in rural areas, where this legislation is literally taking civil rights away,” Bethell said. They also raised concerns about general spreading of misinformation and ignorance regarding trans issues.

“These restrictions are a total disregard for the voices of scientists, transgender people, and athletes. The fear-mongering and misinformation have been extremely powerful conservative tools to keep transgender people out of the mainstream,” the anonymous student worker at Kendall said.

The student added that they are also “concerned by how our gym is actually handling this,” further showing the impact that the NCAA’s policy change, and national restrictions on trans people in general, have had on Mount Holyoke’s trans community already.

Employees at other institutions have shown concern for transgender people in their athletic communities. Cameron Wein, the Assistant Athletic Director for Compliance at Kutztown University, is a transgender man who has also shown concerns for his own position. 

“My whole transition has taken place in college athletics,” Wein wrote in a submitted response. “Prior to the change of presidential administration, being trans in any sphere can be difficult. The hate has been amplified. Individuals that seemed to have no problem with me prior to the election, now are very vocal about their feelings [towards] trans people.” 

However, regardless of national bans and restrictions regarding transgender participation in athletics, hope is still held for the future of transgender Americans in and outside of athletics. “I think that being hopeless is easy, but having discipline is hard, and where I get hope from is the work of the people who came before me,” Bethell said. “Trans people are going to exist no matter what happens, and trans people are going to be really good at sports no matter what happens.” 

Wein also expressed hope for the future, despite current action taken by fellow athletics administrators. “I want my voice to be out there. I hope that more administrators start speaking up, but I haven't seen much happening across athletics,” Wein wrote. “I will continue to fight for what is right.” 

Additionally, Bethell mentioned that the increased focus on transgender exclusion is likely due to government concerns about threats to its power. “In a really twisted way, this kind of legislation actually means that we're doing something right, and so we should continue doing what we're doing,” they said.

Madeleine Diesl ’28 contributed fact-checking.

Students celebrate 32nd annual African and Caribbean Day

Photo courtesy of Akua Omono Osei ’27

By Thandiwe-Wanjiru Delgado-Kinyatti ’27

Staff Writer 

On Saturday, Mar. 1, Five College students, faculty and community members gathered in Chapin Auditorium to celebrate the 32nd annual African and Caribbean Day. AC Day, as it is called by the students of Mount Holyoke College, is a time honored tradition at the College that is celebrated annually on Mar. 1 and organized by the board members of the Mount Holyoke African and Caribbean Student Association. 

Over 30 flags representing countries from Africa and the Caribbean were displayed around Chapin. This year marked the 32nd celebration of AC Day since its commencement in 1993, and the highlighted region chosen was East Africa. Students participating honored the phrase “Kuadhimisha Mizizi Yetu” which, directly translated from Swahili, means “to celebrate our roots.” 

Students celebrated their roots that Saturday by recognizing where they came from, celebrating their home countries and showing their culture through poetry, dances and music. Many wore clothes from their respective countries, including jewelry containing cowrie shells, which were once used as a form of currency in parts of Africa. These pieces were later showcased in the fashion show.

The two hosts from MHACASA, Nathania Amadi ’26 and Amanda Amoabeng ’25, not only made a point to honor and recognize the roots of those in the room, but also those not present whose homes are devastated by current ongoing conflicts. After the land acknowledgment Amoabeng stated, “Lastly, we would like to recognize Palestine, Congo [and] Haiti. … To stay in community, please speak up, please vocalize, do everything you can because what is happening today is not okay, so Free Congo, Free Palestine and Free Haiti.” 

The show started with the “African Intro,” showcasing dances from around the continent. Afterwards, other groups presented dances concentrated in the East African region, further  highlighting countries like Somalia, Uganda, Ethiopia, Tanzania and Kenya. Other dances focused on West African styles, and later in the night dancers brought the audience to the Caribbean to showcase countries like Guyana and the Dominican Republic. Many other countries were represented throughout the dances and songs performed by individual students and groups, including Mount Holyoke groups like Sangre del Sol and Five College organizations like the Students of Caribbean Ancestry from the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

An emotional performance that stood out was the song “Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika,” sung by Dani Darku ’27. “Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika” is the national anthem of South Africa and has a rich history and meaning behind it. In a text message to  Mount Holyoke News, Darku said, “I chose this song because of its embodiment of African liberation. Originally a hymn that was embraced as South Africa’s national anthem post-apartheid, this song has been used by other African countries as their anthems, although translated from the original isiZulu, isiXhosa and Sesotho into other languages like Swahili.”

Darku added, “Personally, I was first introduced to this song in my high school, which embraces a heavy Pan-African ethos. It has stuck with me ever since as a clarion call to lift up and decolonize the continent, and I wanted to share that with everyone else on this special day.”

For many Mount Holyoke community members, AC Day is a time to connect with their cultures and embrace who they are at a predominantly white institution. Omono Osei ’27, a member of the MHACASA board and the AC Day social chair, said, “I feel so wonderful … AC Day is my favorite event throughout the whole school year. It just reminds me that I am still with my people.”

One sophomore, who wished to remain anonymous, knew she had to return after attending AC Day in 2024. “AC Day was then an opportunity for me to connect with my cultural heritage and celebrate my Caribbean ancestry with the Mount Holyoke community, while savoring many traditional delicacies,” she said.

Others attested to the event’s inclusivity. Shenelle Sandoval Gonzalez ’27 said, “I feel very included and very appreciative to be able to learn and acknowledge culture all around me. It’s very beautiful to see and acknowledge all the dances, the performances, the singing. It’s just very powerful to see, even down to the food, and I appreciate it. This is my second year being at Mount Holyoke and I’ve always attended AC Day.It’s a great way to get involved and to learn more about your peers around you.” 

Jacksiel Colón Rodriguez came to celebrate with Mount Holyoke and echoed similar sentiments. “I feel very included, I feel like [AC Day] is very insightful, very poetic, very beautiful,” he said. 

One tradition of AC Day is to give back to the communities being celebrated. AC Day Coordinator Precious Biney ’27 concluded the showcase by presenting the organization that would be receiving a donation of over $1,000 from ticket sales. The organization that was chosen was Mathare Social Justice Centre. Mathare is a community located north of the Nairobi city centre in Kenya, and is primarily run by the youth of the community who work to make Mathare a more just place. The organization is dedicated to combating issues ranging from police abuse and forced evictions to climate injustice. 

The Centre has a book club, which they have named Matigari as an ode to Kenyan novelist Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o who is famous for his works centering the topic of decolonization. In its mission statement for the Matigari book club, the Centre writes, “Matigari Ma Njirungi means the remnants of the freedom fighters, and we see ourselves as the generations to take up the mantle from where our freedom fighters in Africa left, because for us it is not yet uhuru; even though the physical chains are gone we are still mentally enslaved, especially through the education system in our African countries.” 

In her address to the crowd, Biney said, “After learning about the transformative work that is done by MSJC, advocating for social justice, human rights and community empowerment in Mathare … we were deeply inspired by their mission and for recognition for their impactful effort we were honored to make a donation to support the stuff theyìre doing.”

“Mathare Social Justice Centre … is making a real difference in the fight for social justice in Mathare, and I am so proud to have your support and to see how much we have come together to help,” Biney said.

After her speech, Biney said in an interview with Mount Holyoke News, “The number of people who showed to the event … have significantly decreased over time, but this year it was a surprise that we were able to raise over $1,000 in donations, and also over two hundred [people] showed up for AC Day and seemed really excited to celebrate with us … I am really grateful for everyone that came and supported this event.” 

The final moment of the night was the flag walk. Students flooded the stage, each dancing with their country’s flag. Each time a new flag was presented, the audience erupted with cheers. Even students who were not a part of the showcase went on stage with their peers to represent their countries, and with this joyous tradition, the night came to an end.

Abigail McKeon ’26 contributed fact-checking.