I am white.

I am Christian.

Yes, I am privileged.

Yes, I need to be educated on my privilege.

On April 3, Fox News published an article called “Christians and white people get 'unmerited perks' live 'easier' lives, George Washington University Seminar says." Essentially, the article believes that this seminar is targeting Christian — but specifically white — students in an unfair manner.

There is nothing unfair about this seminar and it is an opportunity to foster a discussion around a specific type of privilege. These Excellence in Leadership Seminars are put on for student leaders to fulfill requirements as a part of continuing professional development for student organizations on campus and are also opened to the all GW community members who may be interested in learning more on a whole host of topics.

The center on campus, the Multicultural Student Services Center (MSSC) is a place where people of all cultural, racial, ethnic, and religious backgrounds are welcomed and there are services that accommodate specific groups and their needs.

I believe this seminar is well-intended and very appropriate for our college campus at this time.

The biggest, most glaring example of Christian privilege I can think of that relates to a college student's experience is the timing of our break between fall and spring semesters always aligns with Christmas. Every year, I am lucky enough to be able to go home and celebrate Christmas with my family.

In this stretch of time, Christmas is not the only religious or spiritual holiday that this celebrated. Hanukah and Kwanzaa also fall within the same window of time as Christmas.

This year, most students I know who are Jewish celebrated Hanukah on campus, away from their families in the midst of final exams. As I have made friends with more people who are Jewish since coming to study at GW and as someone that values her religious traditions and practices, it was on my mind a lot this year how unfair it was that I got to go home in time for Christmas but my Jewish friends did not.

I brought up these reflections to my friends one night in conversation and in that conversation Christian privilege came up once again. One of my friends who is Christian had the tenacity to say something along the lines of, “Hanukah isn't an important Jewish holiday, it has just become commercialized and mainstream because Jewish families wanted their kids to have something like what Christian kids get for Christmas."

I was shocked that she would go so far as to say that. After that comment, my other friend and I just exchanged glances and moved the conversation along. Nothing about that comment was right or justified because my friend is not Jewish and has very minimal knowledge of Jewish traditions and holidays.

This is privilege.

However, this article is also exhibiting privilege because I am focusing on two major religions, Christianity and Judaism. These are not the only two religions on GW's campus. There are a whole host, including Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, as well as smaller religions. On GW's MSSC's website it says, “Currently, Roman Catholic and Jewish student enrollment represent the largest combined percentage of the undergraduate population with religiously unaffiliated students representing the next largest self-identification."

The majority is always privileged and the majority needs to be educated on how to respond to that privilege.

Coincidentally, I have recently been doing research for a project on different diversity issues on college campuses, but I feel like the following quote is applicable here, “On many college campuses, however, this post-racial society is not wholly apparent. Historical legacy, normative custom, racialized schemas and unequal resources all yield separate worlds of racialized organizations and student groups which often result in profoundly different interpretations of, and perspective on, campus and community life."

College campuses still grapple with diversity issues in all areas, racial, sexual, gender, religious, socio-economic status. This isn't even the first time this semester where GW's lack of diversity has been called to attention. It is clear that the time is now to start doing something to address the lack of diversity and the privilege that comes with being in the majority.

The way to do this is by starting conversation and dialogue and this is what our campuses MSSC is doing by hosting this leadership seminar and also providing trainings on “heterosexual privilege, cisgender privilege, able-bodied privilege, socio-economic privilege, LGBTQ+ Diversity and Inclusion, unconscious bias, and transgender diversity and inclusion."

Furthermore, these sessions need to be more than voluntary, they need to be mandatory and strongly encouraged. One way to do this is incorporating more diversity training into new student orientation programming, which is a goal of GW and something the administration claims it is trying to do for our incoming class of first-year students.

So Fox News, the more newsworthy story here is yes, GW has a problem with privilege, and these seminars are the first step in doing something long-term that ensures we address these issues and become a more inclusive and progressive campus where everyone feels welcome and as though they belong.