On Thursday, Jan. 23, members of Macalester College Student Government (MCSG) welcomed Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Alina Wong at their first weekly Legislative Body (LB) meeting of the semester. After hearing updates on work and initiatives within the division of institutional equity at the college, the LB asked Wong questions relating to Macalester’s future under President Donald Trump’s administration. The rest of MCSG’s meeting was dedicated to reintroductions of all members of the governing body, committee updates and plans for the upcoming retreat.
Wong began her speech to MCSG by framing her work in the role of vice president for diversity, equity, and inclusion and with the division of institutional equity.
“All of our work is in partnership across campus faculty, with other student affairs and administrative units and with student organizations. None of our work is isolated or alone. I also say that we don’t ‘own social justice.’ It is all of our work and all of our responsibilities,” Wong said.
Wong followed this by briefly explaining the numerous divisions, offices and people who work under the lens of diversity, equity and inclusion on Macalester’s campus and make up Macalester’s division of institutional equity. These various institutions and administrators include Dean of Institutional Equity Minerva Muñoz, Equity Specialist Mayzong Lee, the Center for Religious and Spiritual Life (CRSL), the Lealtad-Suzuki Center for Social Justice (LSC) and the Title IX and Non-Discrimination Office.
Wong then began to speak to MCSG about specific projects and updates from their role.
On Aug. 1, 2024, the Biden Administration and the Department of Education’s new regulations for Title IX took effect. The new regulations, which include eliminating required live hearings with cross-examination as part of school processes for resolving reports of sexual assault, could not be accepted by the college in 2024 due to various legal reasons according to Wong. Instead, Macalester legally maintained its Title IX policy according to 2020 regulations, which will now remain due to the Trump administration’s recent elimination of the 2024 regulations, as stated by Wong.
Wong then commented on the safety of the transgender and non-binary community on Macalester’s campus.
“Gender identity and gender expression are part of and protected in our non-discrimination policy, and that will not change. But we also are revising our non-discrimination policy to make sure that it affords the rights and protections to all of our community members that we believe they should be afforded,” Wong said.
Wong asserted that the above is a college policy effort and Macalester will remain in compliance with state and federal law. Recently, President Trump ended continuing efforts by the former Biden Administration to extend Title IX discrimination protections to transgender students.
The decision was part of an executive order that defines sex as male and female and allows only such options for official government documents like passports and visas.
Wong then moved to discuss a new resource on the institutional equity page of Macalester’s website. On the left navigation toolbar of the site, viewers can find a new page entitled “Equity Education Resources.”
“We created these learning guides so that people could do their own self-work. It also includes not only resources in terms of articles, books, podcasts, videos, applying universal design principles and having multiple mediums, but also reflective questions and action planning guides so that you are not just thinking about and talking about equity, social justice by our way, but applying those things,” Wong said.
According to Wong, these learning guides were designed to complement the in-person equity workshops put together by Muñoz. Each semester, about three to five of these workshops are announced in the Mac Daily.
Wong ended her updates to MCSG by highlighting improvements and news in various institutions as part of Macalester’s Division of Institutional Equity.
Wong pointed to plans for the movement of the Cultural House (C-House) from 37 Macalester St. to Summit House, discussing LSC Director Hana Dinku’s plans to build a new curriculum for C-House residents that will include a study away program.
Wong also discussed the importance of renovations to Kagin Commons where an updated LSC will eventually call home.
“The Lealtad-Suzuki Center for Social Justice does so many amazing things and also provides advocacy support and programming for BIPOC students, LGBTQIA+ students, first-gen students and undocumented and established immigrant students,” Wong said. “We know that [the services to these students] will become heightened in the next four years and beyond that.”
Vice President Ryan Connor ’25 then opened the floor for questions. International Student Liaison Laurice Jimu ’27 asked whether Wong was aware of the demands of the First-Generation Low-Income Student Union (FSU), particularly one calling for a fund that would allow undocumented students to have work-study positions and get paid the equivalent of federal work-study.
Wong responded that this is something they and their colleagues continuously focus on. They emphasized the importance of bringing structures and roles for Macalester staff that would take the responsibility of highlighting these issues off students’ shoulders.
“What I have the responsibility of doing—and I think what FSU raised that’s important—is who’s making sure this happens so that it doesn’t fall on the students to keep having to bring it up,” Wong said.
After the Q&A, President Joel Sadofsky ’25 invited all of MCSG to introduce themselves, as the beginning of the spring semester marked the return of LB members from study away. They then split into committees and spent ten minutes discussing the plans for the upcoming semester. Connor then followed by explaining the logistics of MCSG’s spring retreat that will take place on Saturday, Feb. 1. The agenda includes icebreaker and team-building activities, discussion of finances and plans for the upcoming semester.
Moving to announcements, Connor asked the class representatives to introduce the class nights they planned for their classmates. First-year Class Representative Aisha Ibrahim ’28 described the first-year class night as “elaborate,” explaining that they have yet to decide between two potential themes: starry soirée and garden party. There was a pizza and ping pong event for the sophomore class, snacks and board games in the Loch for the junior class and a Fond Farewell for the seniors.
Sadofsky then concluded the meeting with a reminder of the upcoming MCSG elections; ballots open on Friday, Jan. 31 at 1 p.m. and close on Monday, Feb. 3 at 1 p.m.
