Campus Equity Week? Let's Have Campus Equity Year . . .

Or century - how about that?

This week - October 28-November 2 is designated Campus Equity Week. The organizations behind this event ask us to wear red or scarlet on Wednesday, October 30. The Clarion University Faces of Retrenchment and other groups within the PASSHE system are asking us to wear black all week to mourn the loss of faculty and programs.

I can do those things. I can also wear pink and buy yogurt with a pink ribbon, but it doesn't stop breast cancer. In fact, I'm so tired of being urged to greater awareness of breast cancer I want to scream.

But the cancer eating academia is not as famous. There are no Races for the Cure of adjunctivitis. So wearing black all week - black with scarlet accents or vice versa on Wednesday - isn't nearly as annoying. But while the awareness of breast cancer is so pervasive that everyone immediately knows why even NFL players are wearing pink in October, I doubt very much that anyone will understand the symbolism of my wardrobe this week - even on my campus.

I will say that the life and death of Margaret Mary Vojtko has increased awareness phenomenally. But phenomenally is not nearly enough.

And awareness is not nearly enough. Let us Race for the Cure for Adjunctivitis and Other Academic Cancers.