By Sofia El-Hakim and Alena Masterson

Granite State News Collaborative and NH Press Association

This series was co-produced by a cohort of five college students from across New Hampshire as part of a mentorship project created by The Granite State News Collaborative and its partner the NH Press Association. Additional reporting and editing was provided by John M. Bassett, Rick Green, Phil Kincade and Melanie Plenda.

When Kya Roumimper first took on her job as Coordinator of Multicultural Student Support and Success and Equity Education at Keene State College, the job hadn’t been consistently staffed for a few years. 

Her first order of business, she knew, would be to start building relationships with the students of color on campus. It was in that process she heard stories that reflected not only her own experience, but echoed her master’s thesis work studying the impact of peer-led support groups for students of color.

“I would talk to the women of color on campus and many of them felt like they didn’t have a space to be themselves or anyone to talk to about their experience balancing school, code switching, cultural differences,” she said. “And it was a small group of women in a predominantly white college, in a predominantly white city, in a predominantly white state without a ton of connections. It left them feeling very isolated.”

Out of those conversations The Women of Color Circle was born. The peer-led group was a place where women of color could come together to discuss everything from their cultural identity to current events. 

“It was beautiful. It was wonderful,” Roumimper said. “It was really student-focussed, it was really the women running the group.”

“When you put the investment into the students,” she said. “That investment and support ensures that people stay and that they persist.”

Whether known as peer-led support groups or affinity groups, a crucial strategy in attracting and retaining students of diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds is fostering ethnic-oriented student organizations to provide encouragement and counter feelings of isolation. 

Data and research show these groups can have an impact on retention rates among college students of color by creating a sense of belonging.

“Students who are actively involved in extracurricular activities or the student community tend to experience better retention rates. Clubs, sports, study groups, school spirit — all of these can factor into a student’s feeling of community belonging, which can help them stay engaged in school and reach graduation,” writes Kristina Ericksen for Collegis Education, a firm that advises colleges on retention strategies.

“In order to participate in a huge thing like a campus you’ve got to be able to participate in small groups and some of those will be affinities according to the kinds of identities you have as an individual. That’s why they are so important. It gives you a home,”  said Dr. Carlos E. Cortés Professor Emeritus of History, University of California, Riverside, who specializes in diversity, intergroup relations, and intercultural communication.

“Affinity groups are not a new thing. What has changed is that there is now a recognition of the importance of affinity groups to help students feel at home and a place to lay their hat when they are on campuses,” he said.

That is a particular challenge in New Hampshire’s predominantly white college culture. 

In 2019, the white undergraduate student populations at the University of New Hampshire, Keene State College and Plymouth State University hovered near 82 percent, while SNHU and Dartmouth are outliers at 58 percent and 50 percent, respectively. SNHU doesn’t publish its in-person demographics, but school officials say that the on-campus diversity numbers would fall in with the other New Hampshire schools — below national averages. 

“We have students of color that come here, that walk downtown, for instance,” said Marlin Collingwood, Vice President of Communications, Enrollment, and Student Life, at Plymouth State University, “they love Plymouth, they love our campus, but they’ll walk downtown and never see another person who looks like them. That feels disconcerting for anyone,”

Jade Smith, president of Southern New Hampshire University’s Multicultural Student Union and head of the affinity group Sisters of the Yam, named from the famous Bell Hooks book on experiences Black women face daily said, “ It can be hard to make connections if you don’t see someone like you.”

“Affinity groups improve the SNHU experience because individuals get to feel supported and not feel like they're the ‘only one’ in the room or an organization,” she said.

When both the on and off campus culture feels non-inclusive many students have the overwhelming sense to leave.

According to Alane Shanks, President of Renga Consulting which specializes in developing diversity, equity, and inclusion strategies, affinity groups are one of the most helpful ways to retain students. 

The level of administrative support for student affinity groups varies depending on a college’s overall diversity strategy. Some of the colleges will support the affinity by assigning them staff or faculty advisors, while others will actively promote the organizations all around campus for current and prospective students. 

For example, Plymouth State University (PSU) has four student groups committed to multicultural issues including the Afro Caribbean Culture Club and the Black Student Union, but no apparent university structure for encouraging or supporting such groups.

Plymouth State junior Merlyn Desire said she noticed there was no mention of affinity groups when she was applying to school, however she joined the Black Student Union and Afro Caribbean Club on campus. 

“I understand there’s not as much contact with Black students on campus, so these clubs make it able to see students of color come together and have fun,” she said. 

Desire said the Plymouth State Administration is not doing enough to support the affinity groups on campus.

“They don’t help us spread the word; they want to remain neutral,” she said.

Collingwood said that the university is developing a campus-wide Center for Diversity, Equity, and Social Justice that will be led by a new cabinet-level position. A nationwide search is currently underway.

Staying neutral is opting out according to  Cortés. In doing so, Cortés said, they are taking the side of not taking a side, which can sometimes look worse.

“Neutrality is a position. It is a decision to not be involved. To be neutral is to not be neutral. They are opting out.” 

Although student affinity groups seek to unify students regardless of racial or cultural backgrounds, there is sometimes a stigma attached to joining,

A lot of students think that if they are not Black, they cannot join organizations like the Black Student Union, Desire said. “We try to get white people or Asians and other people to join the club so they can be educated on our experiences, and how our culture is.”

Dr Cortés stresses it’s important for students to join many different groups even if they feel uncomfortable and for colleges to support students in “cross-grouping.”

“America is wracked now because people, too much, cluster in their affinity groups and don’t get out. So affinity groups are good but to spend your whole life bounded by an affinity group is divisive,” he said. “I think administrations should do both, support affinity groups and also support people moving out of their groups to build bridges among people of different backgrounds.”

These articles are being shared by partners in The Granite State News Collaborative as part of our race and equity project. For more information visit collaborativenh.org.