On Sept. 19, Scripps College’s Kimberly Hall dorm residents received an email informing them about an unspecified “derogatory word” found on a student’s dorm whiteboard. In response to the message, some students criticized the college’s approach to the situation, citing a lack of transparency and action and also questioning what the incident revealed about free speech on campus.
“It has been brought to our attention that there has been some insensitive behavior taking place within the residential hall,” the email read. “A student wrote a derogatory word on another student’s whiteboard on their door. This behavior is not condoned and is a violation of the Scripps Code of Conduct.”
The Office of Residential Life (ResLife) at Scripps declined to comment on what was written on the whiteboard.
Carmen Brown, Director of Campus Life and Assistant Dean of Student Affairs, said that the situation was brought to ResLife’s attention by a student who found the term discriminatory. The term was then flagged for both discrimination and harassment, along with abusive conduct policy violations.
“At Scripps, we are unwavering in our commitment to fostering an inclusive and supportive environment for all students,” Brown said in an email to TSL. “Acts of discrimination or harm have no place in our community, and we take all incidents like this very seriously.”
Still, some students expressed concern over the way that the administration handled the situation.
Stella Robinson SC ’25, a resident at Kimberly Hall, said that the Sept. 19 email’s ambiguity made her question what residents are allowed to write on their whiteboards.
“We all feel a little concerned because it’s like, what are we allowed to write on our whiteboards and what are we not?” Robinson said. “And why should the school be monitoring that?”
Kimberly Hall residents said that the whiteboards allow students to express their interests, ask community questions, draw and get to know each other.
“I love that we have whiteboards on the outside of our doors because it is a way for me to communicate with my friends, especially my neighbors who live on my floor with me,” Robinson said. “We can leave each other messages and things like that.”
Rashmi Ramchandra SC ’25, another Kimberly Hall resident, said that the boundaries surrounding what could be written on the whiteboards are unclear.
“If I make a joke to a friend on her whiteboard for her birthday, is that going to be construed in the wrong way by the administration?” Ramchandra said. “What are the limitations? I don’t really know.”
Ramchandra said that in the three years she has lived at Scripps, she has never experienced a situation like this.
“The whiteboards foster a sense of community in the dorm,” she said. “By putting out an email like this with not a lot of information, I think some students might be a little anxious to have that community.”
Marina Thacher SC ’28, another Kimberly Hall resident, said that she was unaware of any hate speech on the whiteboards and had not seen any writing that would provoke a significant amount of controversy.
“We are avid users of our whiteboard and would never consider writing something derogatory on one of our neighbors’ boards,” she said.
While students said they were still unsure about what was written on the whiteboard, both Robinson and Ramchandra suggested that hateful speech should be dealt with differently.
“If the language on the whiteboard was derogatory and hurting our community, I think a conversation would have been way more effective than the vague email that was sent to all of us,” Ramchandra said.
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