In the fifth week of this semester, campus organizations representing ethnic minority students across Kent State are discussing their spring 2011 plans and goals.

?The leaders of student groups such as the NAACP, Focus on the Future, Advocates of Culture and Knowledge and Spanish and Latino Student Association were in agreement on their central goal to support students and bring them together. The Student Multicultural Center also has programs planned to help students.

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Kent State’s chapter of the NAACP will represent its constituents at university committees this semester, said Robin Wright, president and senior Pan-African Studies major.

?“We’re not going to do as (many events) because we are focusing more on the advocacy end rather than the programming end this semester,” Wright said.

?However, the NAACP will still have around six programs this semester, she said. An informational mass meeting and a poetry night are among this month’s events.

?“We’re working with (the Center of Pan-African Culture) organizations to focus two specific initiatives: increasing political awareness of students here at Kent State and specifically get minority students more involved in leadership positions outside of just minority organizations.”

?The Student Multicultural Center also has its own initiative to improve academic skills with programs lined up for this semester. A panel on GPA improvement and a session on dealing with parents and summer jobs are planned.

?“(The event will focus on the) impact of freshman year on GPA, how to protect it, how to bounce back from a bad first semester,” said Bryan Gadson, a graduate appointee in the Student Multicultural Center. “(We want to) intertwine with social aspects and how (students can) get involved on campus.”

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Focus on the Future also wants to help students academically and bring them together, group President Christopher Hicks wrote in an e-mail.

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“Our general goals for this semester are to become more diverse as an organization and begin to break these barriers down between races on this campus,” Hicks wrote.

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Jonathan Jones, Advocates of Culture and Knowledge president, said the cross-cultural and all-inclusive group wants to raise awareness on current events this semester and help students graduate. One of the group’s goals is also to establish relationships with all campus organizations.

“We have created unity ties with people who were not unified before,” Jones said.

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SALSA is hoping to continue its support system for students, see more Hispanic people apply to Kent State and get them involved, said Kaley Alvarado, president of SALSA.

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“It’s nice to have somewhere to go if you need some help,” she said.

?The student group leaders stressed the inclusiveness of their organizations for all minorities.

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“Our ultimate goal is just empowering minorities,” Wright said. “Not specifically African Americans, but all minorities politically, economically, educationally and socially.”

Contact Ryan Collins at [email protected].