By Roger Smith

You've come to Wesleyan University and decided to get involved in
activism. You want to help people, believe strongly in a cause, and want
to see results from your hard work. I want to help prevent you from
wasting your time by repeating the mistakes of previous years, and want to
give suggestions on how to make a difference to your cause.
Trouble starts with the activities fair. At Wesleyan's annual meat market
of student groups, first-year students are confronted with over 100
different uses for their extra-curricular time. Temptation leads to
over-committing (two activities is reasonable), and that leaves group
leaders with an unrealistic idea of their organizational strength for the
coming year. Before joining an on-campus student group, make sure it is
the best fit for your interests. The student government (Wesleyan Student
Assembly), and off-campus organizations (get info from the Office of
Community Services), are other viable ways to improve the Wesleyan and
Middletown communities.

Now you've joined an activist group or two and expect to follow along
passively in their major campaigns. Be warned: the level of organization
may be less than you expect, and new members may even outnumber returners.
You may be needed to fill a major role in the group from your first day.
This is one of the symptoms of a common affliction of student activism at
Wesleyan, factionalism. In short, there are more worthy causes than
Wesleyan students, and being ambitious, Wesleyan students try to tackle as
many issues as possible. The result is dozens of groups with only five or
ten members, all competing for members, money, meeting rooms, press, and
the attention of the rest of the Wesleyan community. But if you have only
committed to a cause or two, you're willing to do what it takes to make
your chosen group(s) effective. Your group probably has a lot going for
it, but here are some typical places where activist groups go wrong.

1. Myopia-The first thing group leaders need to do is to look at the big
picture and decide how a small number of students can effect change and
work towards a common goal. The first step, forming a student
organization, has already been taken, but the rest of the strategy needs
to be decided. Answer questions like : does it make sense to form an
alliance with other groups on campus? Does it make sense to become an
affiliate of a regional or national organization? Are there people in
Middletown, or on the Wesleyan faculty, who are interested in your issue?
Could the WSA help you with your campaign? Would it be beneficial to run
members for WSA office? Consider all of the options available, and turn to
resources like WESUNITY (a project that seeks to bring together various
student activist groups), the WSA office, and the Office of Community
Services for help finding campus, local, and national contacts.

2. Faulty Group Process-At liberal Wesleyan, hierarchy is out and
amorphous blobs of government are in. While the ostensible purpose is to
democratize the group, the real result is to create de-facto leaders who
earn their rank through dedication, seniority, having a monopoly on
information, or a combination of the above. This trend is reinforced by
the propensity of the activist elite to assume that other members,
especially new members, are unwilling to take initiative or competently
execute tasks, and thus take it upon themselves to do everything, further
tightening their grip on the group. The result is that little gets done,
and large numbers of underutilized, disillusioned members quit the group.
The answer to this is not to replace the informal hierarchy with a formal
one, but to encourage involvement through specialization, dividing up
vital roles among group members. Expecting responsibility and work from
all members gives them a real stake in the group's work, and gives them
the ability to make informed, meaningful decisions through a democratic
process. To get a group working along this model, try volunteering for a
role that interests you (artist, publicity, treasurer, whatever) and
encourage other members to do the same. Take the burden off the "leaders,"
and ask (often this is better in private) for more input in group
decisions. If you are still having problems, turn to other experienced
activists for advice. The Community Learning Network consists of activists
who are very interested in improving process (both in student groups and
in the community as a whole), and there is a leadership retreat called
WESLEAD which is planned by student leaders, Student Services, and members
of groups like the CLN and WESUNITY.

3. Omitting Essentials-Your group has avoided the above pitfalls, and is
working hard on a major campaign. You're spending so much time raising
money, finding speakers, and making buttons that you skimp on publicity.
The probable result: a poor turnout for your otherwise well-planned event.
Remember, that with athletics, homework, and over 150 student
organizations, there are huge demands on every Wesleyan student's time.
Getting a decent crowd for anything, especially an event that is not pure
entertainment, can be a chore. The first step is to specialize, with an
interested and competent person in charge of coordinating publicity. Step
two: know what options are available. The obvious, free, and relatively
inefficient answers are to chalk your message on the sidewalks, send out a
bulletin broadcast over the phone system, and to put up posters around
campus. For the slightly more dedicated, you can use the Argus to explain
your event and your cause in a WeSpeak or letter to the editor, you can
purchase a partial-page or full-page ad, or you can write a classified ad
for free. For a big event, consider writing (or getting someone to write)
a Hermes article. While they will get a good amount of attention, remember
that Hermes does not publish often enough for last-minute promotions.
There are other news sources on campus. If your target audience is other
student groups, get an announcement put on the popular WESUNITY web site,
or send a message on the WESUNITY group e-mail list. For a Middletown-wide
event, consider asking WESU to broadcast a promo. If your event is
academic and has faculty involved in it, Wesweekly will cover it. Finally,
there is Time-Out Wesleyan, a new internet events listing and email digest
which is for "social" events only, that should launch this fall. Finally,
if you really want to pull out all the stops, be visible for a solid week
before the event, try to get the local press interested (see the WESUNITY
site for advice), and consider working with campus artists to make your
publicity memorable.

4. Avoid this at all costs: if things aren't going well in your group,
don't form a splinter group in protest. This only exacerbates the problem
of too many groups with too few members and too few resources working on
too many causes. Patience, persistence, and positive suggestions will
overcome all problems if given enough time. After all, many groups are led
by sophomores. If you're wondering why there aren't more obviously
redundant groups, it's because either the splinter, the original, or both
collapsed. Don't sabotage your cause!

Hopefully all this will give you a realistic idea of what to expect from
student groups. Little is more rewarding and exciting than activism done
well. A major part of success is knowing (and avoiding) what can go wrong,
and where to turn for advice. WESUNITY, the CLN, WESLEAD, the WSA, Student
Services, and your activist peers are all here to help. Together we can
make activism exciting and strong!