Campus heritage events, voter registration celebrate American values

Two hundred and thirty-one years ago, three words — “We the People” — along with the 4,491 words that followed launched both United States Constitution and our nation and, in so doing, forever and profoundly impacted not only the lives of every American, but also the lives of diverse peoples around the world – people who look to America as a destination of hope, promise, and opportunity.

One hundred and seventy four years later, on a day when he correctly envisioned the approximate time in history in which an African American would be elected president of our United States, one of my heroes, Bobby Kennedy, observed that “The United States Government has taken steps to make sure that the Constitution of the United States applies to all individuals.”

It is important to note that RFK did not point to our Constitution as applying only to “all Americans, “all residents,” or “all documented citizens.” Instead, he very deliberately declared its applicability to “all individuals.” And last week, when I contemplated the power of his word choice on Constitution Day, I was reminded of a similar phrase that we at Cal State Fullerton use when we refer to our diverse students and the support we commit to them. We do not promise access and equity for all our students who have the financial means to attend Cal State Fullerton, or all our students who can graduate in four years or all our students born and raised in the United States. Instead, we very simply and intentionally make that promise to “all our students,” and we are proud we have taken steps to ensure that our mission and work so reflect in everything we do.

Indeed, we are a leading influencer to ensure that our notion at CSUF of  “We the people,” is welcoming, inclusive, and equitable — a notion that was tragically not true when those words were first written 231 years ago, and despite much progress, still rings false for some in our communities. And while our role as an influencer is year-round, last week, two events that coincided with our campus-wide Constitution Week celebration shined a light on the importance of our work in this arena and provided an opportunity to enhance its impact.

First, we dove in head-first and took the lead in a statewide Ballot Bowl competition that aims to increase voter participation at colleges and universities leading up to the November election. Second, we began our month-long celebration of Hispanic Latinx Heritage Month.

At first glance, these three seemingly disparate events — Constitution Week, Hispanic Latinx Heritage Month, and our voter registration push — may appear unrelated.  Instead, however, like much of what we do at Cal State Fullerton, they are deeply interlinked, and we were intentional in recognizing and leveraging that linkage.

For example, the campus’s many Constitution Week gatherings, including open forums on topics like gun control and the death penalty, engaged our community in the robust and free exchange of ideas that is not only guaranteed by the Constitution, but also vital to a verdant higher education environment and fundamental to our democracy. And since we cannot have democracy without first choosing our laws and leaders through the electoral process, these discussions (and the passions born from them) often circled back to the importance of registering and voting, no matter what your viewpoint — a salient notion on a college campus when you consider that not even 15% of all college-going students voted in the 2016 election.

The importance of this endeavor is even more poignant for Cal State Fullerton, a Hispanic Serving Institution in a state that is now what all of America will soon be: “minority majority.” With Hispanics leading that demographic shift (and our university leading the state and nation in graduating Hispanic students), we must also lead the effort to change another troubling statistic from our 2016 election: Hispanics make up 34 percent of California’s population, but account for just 21% of all likely voters.

So, last week, as we began Hispanic Latinx Heritage Month while concurrently celebrating the Constitution and bringing awareness to voter registration through the Ballot Bowl competition and our #TitansTurnOut social media campaign, I also asked our campus community to take our actions to the national stage; to stand up and speak out for equity, social justice, and access; to spread the recognition of a social compact that assures all members of our communities can thrive, strive, and arrive in a future full of promise, opportunity and love; and to wield the power of our voice at the polls so “we the people” truly applies to “all our students” on our campus and “all individuals” in our communities, state and nation.

Fram Virjee is the president of Cal State Fullerton.