Breaking the silence, speaking out, raising awareness and making a change on campus are the goals of students in a Quest 212 class through a movement known as Baker University Project CHIRP.
Project CHIRP started in QS 212: Black Social Thought, taught by Coordinator of Student Achievement Carrie Coward Bucher. Class members have been studying the five different topics of oppression for the name behind the project (capitalism, heterosexism, imperialism, racism, and patriarchy = CHIRP), and they created a class video.
Bucher gave her class a choice to write a 10-page research paper or do something to fight oppression that has an impact, showing a measurable change. That is when the CHIRP movement began.
The students decided to make a video that replicated a movie trailer because they felt like it would gain more attention for what they wanted to accomplish.
Sophomore EJ Carter was the director and editor of the video and is also on the public relations team to help spread awareness for Project CHIRP and what it stands for.
“The whole class got involved with the project and wanted some active role within it,” Carter said. “What we wanted to do with this video was to start a foundation for something really great. We wanted to showcase the diversity on this campus, hoping to spread awareness of oppression, and then let it grow from here to make a change in other places also.”
Carter has been spreading the word about it since it was launched April 17, primarily by posting the YouTube link on Twitter. He feels that Project CHIRP can make a change and promote the movement behind this video.
Sophomore Kendra Clark is another student working on the project. She is part of the assessment team, which keeps track to see if there is a change. Clark and another student keep track of the Twitter, YouTube and Tumblr accounts to see how many people are watching the video and being exposed to the movement.
“Assessing this project, I have learned that there are individuals who don’t know what these terms mean, but are curious to learn, figuring out the importance behind these terms and the role they play into our society,” Clark said.
This project is important to Clark because they are topics that she has learned about in sociology classes and she believes that others should be informed about them.
Senior Jeremy Gathright also took a role in the project by monitoring heterosexism section. He looked at blogs and videos and will also be interviewing individuals on the topic of heterosexism to share on Project CHIRP’s different social media sites.
“I really think the video has had a positive (effect) on Baker’s campus and a bigger impact than we all thought it would have,” Gathright said. “We are super happy for the support and are finding out that people are glad we are talking … breaking the silence.”
The YouTube video had more than 32,000 views as of Tuesday, and the class will show the video May 8 in Harter Union.
