November 2, 2015
Dear Campus Community:
On September 29, 2015 several students outside of Durfee Hall had a Confederate flag and were
confronted by a faculty member. The students were asked to remove the flag; Hope College Campus
Safety was on-scene to ensure the flag was removed as per request. The flag was displayed on the
same day as the GROW Annual Kick-off, but campus officials don’t believe the flag’s presence was
correlated to the GROW kick-off event.
Student Congress would like to assure our student body that we have addressed the situation during
our General Congress meetings with each of your elected campus representatives and are committed
to ensuring that every student’s voice and opinion is valued and respected. In hopes of respecting
every member of our campus community, Student Congress fully supports the decision of our
school’s administration to have the flag removed. We realize that every student on campus holds their
own personal opinions as to why he/she embraces or disavows the Confederate flag and ask that our
campus community respect the beliefs and opinions of others.
While the flag is a symbol of Southern pride, heritage, and state rights to many, the unfortunate
reality is that for many the Confederate flag carries with it a history of anger, hatred, ignorance, pride,
and fear. To this day, the flag still brings pain to many who see it displayed and we can’t ignore that
many have used the flag as a hate symbol throughout our country’s history. Our goal is to encourage
an atmosphere of love and inclusion on campus and to be sensitive to students who view the flag as a
symbol of racial injustice and oppression. We ask that we be mindful to the ways other students may
interpret our actions, even if they were not with ill-intent. Flying the flag without any clear message
may lead to assumptions of hatred towards members of our Hope College student body and
community. We thank our school administration for fairly addressing the incident and for respecting
the self-worth and dignity of the students in possession of the flag and the affected parties.
Sincerely,
Andrew Harrison
Student Congress President