Written by Phuong Bui

Every semester, Eta Charter participates in MGC Traditions, a night where chapters under the Multicultural Greek Council showcase their brotherhood or sisterhood to the community through strolling or saluting. However, in light of the Black Lives Matter movement and the COVID-19 pandemic, MGC decided to take a different approach to MGC Traditions this semester. MGC Traditions decided to host an all virtual educational event centered around systemic racism. More specifically, how systemic racism relates to us as college students. Each chapter selected and presented a subtopic under systemic racism through sharing information, experiences, and resources. Because of this new approach to MGC Traditions this semester, it was only appropriate that we choose this for our focus event because the issues surrounding systemic racism are very important to us, as it not only affects us as women and people of color, but it heavily affects our Black sisters and brothers.

We have seen the events of racial injustice unfold during the summer with the deaths of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, and countless others who have suffered because of the racist and oppressive systems in place in America. It is crucial, as those less affected, to be Allies by using our voices to call out these injustices and to educate others within our community. With MGC Tradition, participating gave our charter the opportunity to educate others and facilitate those difficult but necessary conversations to the large Mizzou community. Our charter ended up choosing the subtopic of “Systemic Racism in the Justice System”. Other organizations included: Delta Xi Nu Multicultural Sorority, Inc. presenting “Systemic Racism in Higher Education”, Kappa Pi Beta Fraternity, Inc. presenting “Systemic Racism in the Workforce”, Lambda Theta Phi Latin Fraternity, Inc. presenting “Systemic Racism in Healthcare”, and Sigma Lambda Gamma National Sorority, Inc. presenting “Colorism and Anti-Blackness within the Latinx Community”. Listening to other organization’s subtopics and participating in their discussion allowed sisters to also educate themselves and bring the discussion back to our charter, to our friends, and to our families as well.