College Mosaic Research Paper

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The College Mosaic

Imagine , “ a mosaic of pieces that differed in shape and color but are held together by a solid frame, which itself may recast” is what should describe a liberal arts college community which uses its diversity to achieve its full potential. (Etzioni 2015,11) The mosaic is a liberal arts college community and the different glasses that it is made up of describes the individuals and smaller communities that reside within and form interactions and connections with other glass pieces and therefore may change based on the interactions to fit together. Just like a mosaic takes pride in all its pieces and only looks perfect when everything is together, so does a college community that takes pride in its diverse …show more content…

This means that the beliefs of individuals itself also shapes a community because the individuals create a layout by fitting uniquely into their part of the mosaic. Members with similar beliefs will come together and form their own individual groups and are diverse themselves and contribute to the diversity in the bigger …show more content…

Even if interactions occur among diverse group of people, “ learning does not always occur.”(Aries 2012, 100) Most people cannot be forced to learn something and neither can just interactions create this either. Most people believe that if you will automatically create more diversity then people will benefit from it but just diversity alone does not help. Numerous communities form within a college community from sports teams to academic clubs to acapella groups. These communities sometimes have common values but not necessarily mean that they are exclusive. However some smaller communities with too strict beliefs about others can lead to tension among the student body. In the movie Dear White People by Justin Simien, the the people who inhabited in the house at Winchester College were keen on keeping to for colored students only and were against the randomization of student housing because they felt that it was taking away their rights. Whenever they were questioned they tried to make the house more exclusive by not even letting other college students eat in the dining hall. Therefore, this smaller community did not contribute to the overall college community and diversity here was not beneficial at all because the members of the house ended interactions based on the diversity at the house. This created more differences to build up