As the United States approaches its 250th anniversary this Fourth of July, colleges and universities across the country will likely join in the celebration. There will be patriotic social media posts, historical reflections, and conversations about progress, democracy, and the opportunity education affords us.
And to be clear, there has been progress.
More students from historically marginalized communities are enrolling in higher education than ever before. Residence life staff members are more diverse. Campuses are having conversations about belonging, inclusion, and equity that would have been nearly impossible generations ago. But anniversaries are also invitations to tell the truth.
For many Residence Directors and mid-level student affairs professionals – especially professionals of color – there is a quiet dissonance in the work we do every day. We are asked to create spaces of belonging inside institutions that were not originally built for most of the people who now live and work within them. Sometimes that dissonance is literal.
We supervise buildings named after governors who upheld segregation. We host programs in halls dedicated to donors who promoted eugenics. We work on campuses where statues, portraits, or institutional traditions honor individuals whose beliefs would openly reject many of the students and staff currently walking those same hallways. I attended my education classes in a building (that has since been renamed after Autherine Lucy Foster) once named after a governor supported by the KKK.
And yet, we continue to serve.
The Weight of Institutional Memory
Residence life professionals know better than most that buildings carry stories. Students may see a residence hall as simply where they sleep, study, and build friendships. But professionals often learn the histories behind the names on the buildings. We know which campuses were built with exclusion in mind. We know that some institutions admitted women reluctantly, admitted Black students under legal pressure, or excluded LGBTQ+ people entirely. That history matters because people do not enter spaces as blank slates.
A first-generation Black student may walk into a hall named after someone who actively supported policies designed to limit their ancestors’ opportunities. A staff member may be expected to proudly represent an institution while knowing parts of its legacy are painful or harmful to communities they belong to. This creates an emotional complexity that student affairs professionals often navigate silently. We are told to foster pride in institutional identity while simultaneously carrying awareness of institutional harm.
“Progress” Does Not Erase History
One of the challenges in higher education is that institutions often prefer narratives of triumph over narratives of tension. It is easier to celebrate diversity statistics than to discuss why diversity was resisted for so long in the first place. It is easier to rename one building than to examine the broader culture that allowed harmful legacies to remain unquestioned for decades. And it is certainly easier to frame America’s 250th anniversary as a celebration than as an opportunity for reflection. But honest reflection does not diminish progress. If anything, it gives progress meaning.
The fact that campuses today are more diverse than they were 50, 100, or 250 years ago matters deeply. Many professionals working in residence life are themselves evidence of that progress. There are Residence Directors, Assistant Directors, and Deans serving students today who, in another era, would not have been allowed to enroll at the institutions where they now lead. That is powerful. But progress becomes shallow when institutions ask people to celebrate inclusion without acknowledging exclusion.
Residence Life Sits at the Center of This Tension
Residence life occupies a unique place in higher education because we are responsible for helping students feel at home within systems that may not have historically welcomed them.
We see the tension firsthand:
- Students questioning why problematic names remain on buildings
- Staff navigating emotional fatigue after campus controversies
- Professionals balancing institutional loyalty with personal values
- Teams trying to build inclusive communities within structures rooted in inequity
Mid-level managers often feel this pressure acutely. They are expected to support frontline staff, uphold institutional priorities, and manage crises while also processing their own reactions to campus history and current events.
This is not simply political disagreement. For many professionals, these issues are deeply personal. A campus landmark is never “just a name” when the history attached to it reflects beliefs about whose humanity mattered.
What Do We Do With This Reality?
The answer is not to pretend every institution is irredeemable. Nor is the answer to erase history entirely. Instead, perhaps the work is to become more honest. Honest institutions acknowledge complexity. Honest leaders recognize that pride and critique can coexist. Honest residence life professionals understand that belonging cannot simply be programmed into existence through events and bulletin boards if people feel the institution itself refuses to confront its history.
As we approach America’s 250th anniversary, perhaps higher education should resist the urge to tell only celebratory stories. Maybe this moment calls for campuses to ask:
- Whose histories have we centered?
- Whose contributions have we ignored?
- What does it mean to create belonging in spaces built during eras of exclusion?
- How do we support staff and students who experience institutional history differently?
These are not easy questions. But student affairs has never been about avoiding difficult conversations.
Holding Both Truths
The truth is that higher education has changed dramatically for the better in many ways. The truth is also that many institutions still carry legacies that can feel alienating, painful, or contradictory to the values they now claim to uphold. Both things can be true at once.
Perhaps that is the real lesson of the 250th anniversary: not blind celebration, but a willingness to look honestly at where we have been, where we are, and who has carried the burden of helping institutions evolve along the way.
Residence life professionals understand this better than most. After all, our work has always been about helping people live together in spaces that are imperfect, complicated, and still becoming what they aspire to be.
