“Welcome to the fifth and final episode of the Allyship series. As we step into spring quarter, our team will embark on a new series, which means this one is coming to an end. However, this does not mean that our allyship is also coming to an end. In this concluding episode, we want to reflect on where we began with the series and discuss how our vision changed over time.”
“Setting out to produce an Allyship series, we had the particular goals of shining a light on racial injustices and amplifying the voices of marginalized communities on campus. We wanted to bring more attention to diversity and inclusion on campus as well as provide a safe place for people to have important conversations.”
“In our own experience with this series, our team learned more about what it means to be an ally. At the beginning, we knew that to be an ally, one had to attach actions to their words to truly embody allyship. People saying they are allies without acting in that way is detrimental to the vision of diversity and inclusion.”
“In our first Black Lives Matter episode, Dr. Travis Heath provided even more information on what this could look like at DU. While Diversity, Equity & Inclusion are great starting points, they mean nothing without creating a transformation in the systems that were built for privileged groups.”
“As our team continued on in this series, we found some flaws in the way we were approaching allyship. While our initial goal of bringing in student groups or guest speakers was meant with well intentions, it was wrong of us to assume that people in marginalized groups would want to speak on the disparities they face.”
“Allyship comes with an individual determination to learn, and it should not be up to marginalized people to relive their own trauma for other people’s sake of learning. A true ally does the research and the work to learn on their own. When we came to this conclusion, we thought it would be a good idea to provide an example of this.”
“In our second episode about the Black Lives Matter movement, we had a more educational purpose. While talking with Heath was extremely eye-opening for many of our team members, we also knew it was our duty as allies to learn about the history surrounding black lives. Doing research on many trustworthy websites and cross-referencing them, we came up with our episode about the history of Black Lives Matter.”
“Though the episode was brief, we thought that including an episode in which we did the work ourselves to become better allies served as a good example for listeners and expanded our own roles as allies.
While we did not get the opportunity to have guest speakers and informational episodes for other marginalized communities, we will continue to act as allies in our daily lives through our actions instead of relying solely on our words. As we grew in our definition as allies over the course of this series, we hope some of our listeners also grew and found new ways to be allies.”
“Ending this series after one quarter was not our original intention, but extenuating circumstances caused us to move in this direction. The conclusion of this series does not mean that our experience with allyship is ending but is instead moving to a more personal matter. Thank you for learning with us.”
“If you have any comments, questions or concerns, you can email us at thedupodcast@gmail.com.”
