This year at Guilford we saw a surge in both positive, productive student engagement and detrimental, destructive student behavior. Both sets of acts reflect on our community so it is worth taking the time to revisit them. On the bright side, the fruits of student-led initiatives were seen across campus. As the school year ends, so will Sodexo’s presence at Guilford. Meriwether Godsey, an employee-owned dinning service, will take their place. Meriwether Godsey’s stated philosophy to, “support the goals of responsible and conscious consumerism,” should mesh well with Guilford’s values.

Thanks in part to the efforts of environmentally conscious groups like Forever Green and the Sustainability Council and the cooperation of President Chabotar, we’re seeing the beginnings of Guilford’s push towards carbon neutrality. Nearly all the flushing urinals on campus have been replaced with waterless counterparts. Facilities is in the process of converting all the public toilets on campus to duel-flush valves and low-flow faucets that waste significantly less water. This is in addition to the solar panels that were installed on top of Shore hall last year.

Though it’s tough to consider the replacement of Coke with Pepsi a victory, the change is due, once again, to student initiative and administrator receptiveness. It’s unfortunate that the smaller soda and juice vendors did not respond in time for consideration, but it still shows that students can make an impact when they make the effort.

Unfortunately students can and did have wide-reaching negative impacts on our campus as well. Disgraceful vandalism has been a theme throughout the school year. In the fall semester, a swastika was drawn onto a professor’s office door. It was accompanied by homophobic hate speech. Some boys in Milner left urine, feces, and an antagonistic, hateful letter for the cleaning staff in the third-floor men’s bathroom.

Spring semester was not much better. Feces, condom wrappers, and empty alcohol bottles left in the basement of the library prompted restricted hours that have limited study space and computer access for the entire campus. Though no suspects were ever named, it would not come as a surprise if the string of car-window smashings came at the hands of a Guilford student.

Serendipity was no high mark for behavior either. Fireworks were thrown at people, a public safety officer was intentionally hit with a car, Jen Agor, associate dean for Campus Life, suffered verbal abuse and had bottles thrown at her. Serendipity is not a free weekend pass to act like a spoiled, violent, abusive jerk. Drunkenness is no excuse.

This list should strike you as depressing and embarrassing. These actions are mind-boggling far from the values that we hold dear at Guilford. There are few places in this country that encourage thinking, expression and intellectual, spiritual, and personal growth. There are probably fewer places that allow you to screw up royally without any real penalty in the process. The core values that the Guilford community professes – community, diversity, equality, excellence, integrity, justice, stewardship – are not universal values.

It takes a conscious, deliberate effort on the part of every member of the community to make those values more than empty material for Web sites and speeches. It takes student-led initiatives on food contracts and the environment. It takes student work trips to disaster sites. It takes volunteers at Pathways, Glenhaven, and Glenwood. It takes excellence in the arts, the sciences, and the humanities. It takes friendship, support, and respect instead of selfish violence and vandalism.

As you wrap up this semester and look ahead to the next, hold your hard-working peers in esteem. Take a cue from the positive examples being set all around campus. At the same time, learn from the many mistakes that were made along the way this year. They represent us just as much as our positive efforts do