Am I the Only One?

Am I the only one? Apparently not!

I attended an event sponsored by the Office of Diversity Programs and Services and the Center for Student Access last week. I was very happy to see a packed PACKED room filled with students of various ethnicities, religions, backgrounds and so forth. The warm-up exercise was a fabulous way to say hello and to meet fellow students. After spotting my fellow Diveristy classmates, I looked around and saw a student standing by himself. I went over and said, "Hello!" His name is Ali and he is a sophomore from Qatar! We had a great conversation about Islam, Qatar, diversity at Mason, the US educational system, politics, clothes and family! It was hard to step away, but the following panel discussion had me enthralled as I could totally relate to some of the stories and experiences being shared.

The follow-up group exercise was interesting and very very challenging - as there was one very strong personality in the group whose sole purpose for being at the event was to find answers to combat the perceived prejudice they had to endure on a fairly regular basis. The personality type was very strong and very single-minded. Their mission was for answers, black and white, if you will. They were not interested in thinking through issues, relating, sharing. They had such negative experiences that they just wanted to find a way to cope. As things got heated, the fire alarm went off and we had to vacate.

I knew that the likelihood of the seminar resuming was fairly low, but I hung out a bit and met up with the two facilitators - sharing with them how impressed and pleased I was with the event, content and format; however, I did share my experience, which led to a great conversation on how to move forward with the next session, the motivation for some to attend such an event, and reflecting on the how the individual I interacted with had such a difficult experience that their one and only goal was to find a way to cope - to find answers - "correct" responses - to the challenges they face.

We are all so different yet we still share so many of the same human needs such as love and acceptance. Sometimes acknowledging our differences is a wonderful thing, but we all ALL need to be reminded of what we, as human beings on this Earth, share in common.