No Shame? College Uses Misleading Advertising

This photo, taken in the Des Moines Airport, is one of the College’s current marketing tools. Pictured are two wind turbines in a corn field, wind turbines that in reality do not exist. After students, faculty, staff, and alumni have put in a great deal of energy organizing, letter-writing, educating, and fund-raising to get the President and Board of Trustees to agree in 2007 to power campus with wind energy, we are still waiting for results. For the Communications Department to sell the College in this way, given our efforts, is frustrating. Importantly, this advertisement symbolizes a larger trend of the College saying one thing (we’ll build turbines, or we’ll write a Hate Crimes Response Policy) and doing another (withholding money for the turbine project, or taking one and a half years to write a Hate Crimes Response Policy). Why do we spend more money marketing the institution as socially just than actually implementing our commitments to social justice???

Take action!
1. Call/ email/ meet with the Office of Communication Director Kate Worster and President Osgood. Contact info HERE. Tell them to
a) take down the advertisement and any others like it.
b) BUILD THE WIND TURBINES the College has promised to, and
c) take action on the rest of the No Limits Project demands!
2. Come to a No Limits Meeting: Wednesdays at 9pm in the Voicebox.
3. Talk to a Trustee about this issue during Trustee Weekend, the weekend of Sept 25th. Come to the Open Forum that Thurs night (time and location TBA) and talk to them in person!

STUDY BREAK!!! Next Wed (Oct 7th) from 12-5 and 7-9pm in the grille. Frustrated with the College’s misleading Wind Turbine Ad Campaign? Make your own “Ideal Grinnell” advertisements! We will provide crayons, markers, paper, and homemade cookies! We will also have a list of suggestions of things people could make their ads about. All advertisements will be sent in campus mail to the Office of Communications/ Admins with a NLP cover letter telling them to take down the ad and put up the turbines!.

Join the movement!

We meet Wednesdays at 9pm in the Voicebox (3rd floor of the JRC) every week. Everyone is welcome!

Our goals for this semester are:
– Get Need Blind Admissions for International Students reimplemented
– Get a Hate Crimes Response Policy with substantial student input implemented
– Get new Emissions Reduction Commitment implemented
– Ensure student input on creation of inhouse Mental Health Services for next year
– Track Lily Intern situation this year

(-As well as tracking new developments with all 14 of our original demands)

Welcome back to campus!

Hello First Years and Returning Students,

The first No Limits Project meeting of the year will be:

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2nd at 9pm in the VOICEBOX (3rd floor JRC).

Everyone is welcome. Come learn about our project and plan for the fall!

–

NSO Planning

Join us at the next meeting- Sunday, August 23rd at 2pm outside the JRC Grille to plan our activities for NSO and the first week of school!

Remember, the administration and student government have said that they hope our movement dies over the summer, so we’ve got to show them that we’re still here and we still care!

Summer News:

ERC progress: The EcoCampus comittee is working on updating the ERC and has met several times this summer and plans to present the new ERC to the trustees when they visit campus in the fall.

AJust: A budget was approved for AJust for the coming school year through the Office of Student Affairs. Programming will include SA training, NSO workshops, and other workshops as the year progresses.

We’re having another meeting August 5th, 9pm, location TBA.

Love,
NLP