At a large school like Iowa State University, scholarships are handed out for many reasons. Athletics, education and even multiculturalism are promoted by the school through the offering of various scholarships. These scholarships are of varying value and carry some limitations, performance standards and benefits.

As a recipient of ISU’s MVP (Multicultural Vision Program) award, I find programs of this nature to be vital to the promotion of education within the affected population. The scholarship I receive provides tuition to Iowa minority residents. The scholarship comes with several benefits; unfortunately it is not a “full ride” as described in complaints to the Daily.

One of these benefits was being able to register on the first day of freshman registration, Nov. 14. Other scholarship recipients were able to schedule even earlier. This practice has caused outrage from a few individuals, most likely white.

I am shocked and appalled at the indifference shown by whites toward such practices. “Isn’t it enough that I … pay for all my education?” whines one unappeased student in the Daily.

America is a culture that can’t avoid its dark and racist path. Slavery, the occupation of Native American lands (and relocations such as the Trail of Tears), and the internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII are just examples indicating America’s tradition of inequality. Intolerance toward Arabs is the newest fad among bigots in America. Minorities have never really been given an equal opportunity to thrive and prosper.

One writer to the Daily feels that she has been discriminated against as a middle-class white. I’m sorry you feel this way, but I find it very difficult to sympathize with the very class of people responsible for such past oppressions.

Minorities are discriminated against on a daily basis, whether it be due to difference in appearance, language, customs, eating habits or religious beliefs. Don’t even get me started on racial profiling by police and job hiring practices. The fact is, this is still a very racist and divided country.

Only since the 1960s have civil rights been seriously pursued. Programs have since been put into place to help repair the inexplicable damage caused to minorities/ethnic groups by “white society.”

The movement toward equilibrium of civil rights needs a catalyst such as educational benefits. Scholarship programs such as the aforementioned are vital to our nation’s growth and prosperity. These programs provide avenues of education, rather than the dead ends that our predecessors experienced.

Ryan Hulleman

Freshman

Industrial Engineering