{"id":5602,"date":"2024-03-25T20:41:47","date_gmt":"2024-03-25T20:41:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/?p=5602"},"modified":"2024-03-25T20:41:53","modified_gmt":"2024-03-25T20:41:53","slug":"sga-holds-unity-walk-amid-dei-controversy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/2024\/03\/25\/sga-holds-unity-walk-amid-dei-controversy\/","title":{"rendered":"SGA holds Unity Walk amid DEI controversy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">TROY, Ala. (<a href=\"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">TROJANVISION<\/a>) \u2014 Despite recent controversy surrounding Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) programs and events, the Student Government Association (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.troy.edu\/student-life-resources\/groups-organizations\/student-government-association\/troy-sga\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">SGA<\/a>) held its DEI Week Unity Walk on TROY&#8217;s campus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Historically, unity walks have been a way for people to come together to promote diversity, equity and inclusion, and togetherness. That is why the Troy University SGA holds DEI Week and a Unity Walk every year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;It&#8217;s just a very diverse campus that&#8217;s coming together to unify what is really important and to emphasize the importance of unity and what we&#8217;re here to do,&#8221; said student Jakevia Williams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/2024\/03\/20\/troy-university-unveils-trojan-book-bag-says-program-will-save-students-money\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">OTHER NEWS: Troy University unveils Trojan Book Bag, says program will save students money<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">SGA members said the walk brings people together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;Our main goal is to promote conversation between students of all different backgrounds and walks of life,&#8221; said SGA member Brayden Varnado.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This year&#8217;s walk comes at a time where DEI programs are facing scrutiny. Wednesday, Gov. Kay Ivey signed <a href=\"https:\/\/alison.legislature.state.al.us\/files\/pdfdocs\/SearchableInstruments\/2024RS\/SB129-int.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">SB129<\/a>, also known as the &#8220;divisive concepts&#8221; bill. Once it goes into effect on Oct. 1, the bill will ban state funding of DEI programs in schools, public colleges and state agencies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;I think it&#8217;s very important to still show that we care about others,&#8221; Varnado told TrojanVision. &#8220;We want to make sure that diversity, equity and inclusion is something that never gets left out of the conversation.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Students like Williams say there are benefits to participating in DEI activities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;You get to learn different things from different people. You get a different perspective on things. You get enlightened on different things that you never heard of, you never thought about.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Unity Walk wasn&#8217;t the only DEI Week event. The SGA also held a diversity handprints painting event and on-campus interview.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>TROY, Ala. (TROJANVISION) \u2014 Despite recent controversy surrounding Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) programs and events, the Student Government Association (SGA) held its DEI Week Unity Walk on TROY&#8217;s campus.<\/p>\n<p>Historically, unity walks have been a way for people to come together to promote diversity, equity and inclusion, and togetherness. That is why the Troy&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"a-button\" href=\"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/2024\/03\/25\/sga-holds-unity-walk-amid-dei-controversy\/\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":5604,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1127],"tags":[1492,50,405],"topics":[],"class_list":["post-5602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campus-news","tag-dei-week","tag-sga","tag-unity-walk"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5602","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5602"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5602\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5602"},{"taxonomy":"topics","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.troy.edu\/trojanvision\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topics?post=5602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}