This project was heavily inspired by The Seattle Times’ 2016 project Under Our Skin. After attending the Under Our Skin team’s presentation at the national student journalism convention last year, we decided to bring this project back to M-A to encourage honest conversations about race on campus.

Over the years, the M-A Chronicle has covered issues of race on campus -- whether that be the math pipeline, underrepresentation of students of color in AP's, or taking a knee on the football field -- but it’s still a dialogue that we feel deserves more attention, from our own newsroom included. By defining the words and phrases we use to have these conversations, we hope to begin that process.

Although the format of the interviews and presentation is largely the same as Under Our Skin, the words we selected reflect issues we believe are specific to M-A. We also chose to include words that go beyond racial injustice to acknowledge the complexity of those issues.

As one of our interviewees, Juliana Zolopa, noted, “we have a unique opportunity" at M-A because of our diversity. We hope this project will bring M-A’s diverse community together to discuss more openly and reflect more deeply on the issues that affect us all. Please watch, share, and join the conversation!