It’s 7:00am on an early April morning. The sun is barely peeking over the trees, as fifteen students pile their luggage into the back of two large vans. We are about to drive five hours to Yakima, WA for the annual Students of Color Conference, which most people call “SOCC” for short.
The first question that students who haven’t been to SOCC before always ask me is: “So… what is this conference about?” I could tell you that it’s about understanding your identity and finding your voice. I could say that it’s a place where you meet and learn about people of all different backgrounds and beliefs. I say that it’s a time for us to come together to share our stories, to heal, and to inspire social change. I tell students that SOCC is a new way of seeing the world. It’s hard to imagine what all these things mean though until you’re actually there.
Peninsula College students at the 2017 Students of Color Conference in Yakima, WA
The first thing that makes you realize SOCC is different are the All Gender Restrooms. Imagine a world where everyone felt safe to use the restroom, without harassment or discrimination. Throughout the three days we were at the conference, students would come up to me excitedly, “I tried the All Gender Restroom, Sophia! It was so cool!” And then came the epiphany: “I guess it really shouldn’t matter which one you use. Everyone should be allowed to pee in peace.”
At sessions like “Double, Not Half: The Multiracial Experience” and “Don’t Leave Your Culture at the Door,” students opened up to one another and shared their experiences. They hugged complete strangers and bonded with people with whom they never would have thought they had anything in common. We watched a Muslim playwright rap on stage. We heard the story of an undocumented student, and we learned why Black Lives Matter is about the fact that all lives should matter, but don’t always.
When we returned to Port Angeles, I asked the students to share their reflections on the experience. Here are some of the things they said:
- “SOCC gave me the opportunity to learn to accept ourselves for who we are and to accept others for who they are. I learned that even though we are all different, we are all family.”
- “SOCC taught me that my identity is unique and that I have the power to keep it unique and not let anyone push me to be something I don’t want to be.”
- “The Students of Color Conference is a jam-packed 60 hours. You learn and grow so much in such a little amount of time. Hopefully, if you can bring back only one thing and teach it to others, it’ll make a change.”
- “The most honest awakening I had at the conference was that advancing human rights is the responsibility of all people. There is too much at stake for us not to do our best to make more inclusive and supported spaces for all people.”
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. had similar sentiments in mind when he addressed the graduating class of 1965 at Oberlin College:
“We must work for peace, for racial justice, for economic justice, and for brotherhood the world over. We have inherited a big house, a great world house in which we have to live together – black and white, Easterners and Westerners, Gentiles and Jews, Protestants and Catholics, Muslim and Hindu. If we all learn to do this, we, in a real sense, will remain awake through a great revolution.”
Applications for SOCC 2018 are now available. For more information, please contact Sophia Gu at Diversity@pencol.edu.
About the Author
Sophia Gu is the Multicultural & Inclusion Services Coordinator at Peninsula College and is club advisor for Rainbow Alliance. She works with students of color and other diverse identities to foster diversity and inclusion on campus.
