<ofessor Dev Gupta’s Social Movements class, covered in last week’s issue of The Carletonian (“New seminar offers students activism experience”), has begun to culminate this week with different groups bringing speakers from various movements to campus. On Tuesday night, Bruce Anderson, founder of Sustainable Community Solutions and member of the Northfield Energy Task Force, discussed alternative energy solutions for Carleton, Northfield, and the larger state of Minnesota.
On Wednesday night, another group organized the Northfield Immigrant-Student Alliance Forum. Guest speakers included Michele Garnett McKenzie, Advocacy Director with the Advocates for Human Rights. Reginaldo Haslett-Marroquin, Director of the Rural Enterprise Center in Northfield, was scheduled to attend, but had to pull out at late notice.
Four other groups are also currently working on several different social movements. One group is working to stop genocide in Darfur, another is campaigning for equal pay for women, another is focusing on homelessness, and a sixth is working with the issue of a negotiated settlement in Palestine.
“It was really exciting to learn that we are on the brink of making some major progress on alternative energy in Northfield,” said Michelle Deeter ‘09, who along with two other students organized the alternative energy discussion on Tuesday. “At the same time, it was sobering to learn about the challenge of getting all of Northfield together.”