University of Wisconsin students and Madison community members came together Tuesday night to scrutinize points brought up by the Center for Equal Opportunity during last week’s visit, contemplating future actions and aiming for a solidified movement.

The International Socialist Organization, Student Labor Action Coalition and Teaching Assistants’ Association’s Stewards Council coordinated the Tuesday event, titled “Power to the People: Fighting Racism on the UW Campus.”

The event was composed of a forum and open discussion, with speakers Nakila Robinson, Katrina Flores and Keeanga-Yahmatta Taylor.

It was formed as a reaction to CEO President Roger Clegg’s press conference revealing the organization’s report stating UW discriminates against white and Asian applicants.

Robinson is a UW student studying English education and a member of First Wave, a multicultural program promoting artistic expression that awards full tuition scholarships to each member.

A Milwaukee native, Robinson zeroed in on the report’s use of standardized test scores.

Through her experience in the Milwaukee Public School district, Robinson said she was made fully aware of the disadvantages of coming from a school in a poor area.

Citing that standardized tests do not take quality of education into account and that they are expensive both to take and prepare for, Robinson said affirmative action benefits all students from poor economic backgrounds.

“Poverty reaches everybody and has nothing to do with the color of your skin,” Robinson said. “Taking away affirmative action affects these people and takes away the beauty and brilliance [these students] can have.”

Studying for a masters in curriculum and instruction at UW, Flores is an Audre Lorde Cooperative member, a co-op open to all people interested in promoting a “sustainable and socially just society,” according to its website.

Flores asked the audience which groups were being targeted, left alone and left out of the CEO’s discourse. The consensus was blacks and Hispanics were being targeted, white women were being left alone and Native Americans were being left out of the discourse.

This, Flores said, was important because groups benefiting from affirmative action were also being split against each other.

Flores then advocated being proactive through a unified movement.

“Too often when we do act, we react,” she said. “There’s not a lot going on in terms of massive movements unless we are being attacked. What happened to people holding massive protests for injustices occurring every day”?

Visiting campus, SocialistWorker.org columnist Keeanga-Yahmatta Taylor is a Ford fellow in African-American studies at Northwestern University.

Taylor focused the majority of her discussion on institutional racism, stating the racial inequality the U.S. was built on through slavery is endemic to society.

She said this fact and a “divide and conquer” strategy was being used effectively to turn society members against each other instead of against the elite.

“We constantly are being put in a position of looking at other people in accusation instead of solidarity,” she said.

Flores said she was excited by the possibility of solidarity, so long as people recognize the learning experience offered through a multicultural collaboration.

“We need to really consider our education right now, what it means and who is deciding for us what we get credit for,” Flores said. “I am excited for the possibilities of transforming our movement.”