In recognition of the recent political violence that has occurred nationwide, Point Loma Nazarene University’s Student Life and Formation Office hosted a confidential space for students to share their feelings about the tragedies.
The event, “Listening Circles,” was held in the Fermanian Conference Center on Thursday, Sept. 18, from 7-8:30 p.m. Around 30 students attended the event, according to participant and Associated Student Body President Kenzie Lopez, a fourth-year dietetics major.
PLNU Dean of Students Jason Cha and Dean of Student Care Melanie Wolf led the main space at the beginning and end of the event. According to Connor Mathisen, director of community life, who was one of the small group facilitators, Cha has experience leading spaces like this in higher education. He is also trained in the practice of “Listening Circles.” Wolf is a licensed clinician and oversees PLNU’s Counseling Center.
Mathisen said the practice of Listening Circles is rooted in affective psychology, a practice focused on the emotional aspect of a person’s experience.
The small group facilitators included Mathisen, Dana Hojsack, director of Community Ministries, Richard Eberheart, director of Multicultural and International Student Services, Kirstyn Teegarden, director of Discipleship Ministries and Creative Arts, Esteban Trujillo, university chaplain, Kathy Lee, director of student experience and Beth Denney, director of Residential Life.
The goal of the event was to create a space where students could share about what they have been experiencing after the recent violence, Mathisen said.
The facilitators had a few meetings to prepare for the event, Mathisen said, but most of the members had prior experience in leading similar spaces at PLNU.
The planning of the event began last week, according to Mathisen, immediately following the death of Charlie Kirk, a right-wing political activist. A campus-wide email informing students of the event was sent the day before it was scheduled, on Wednesday, Sept. 17.
“[Cha], along with some other staff and Student Life and Formation, had been talking about hosting a space like this all week, and I was brought into it a couple days ago,” Mathisen said. “We began, as a Student Life and Formation team, talking about what are the spaces that our students are going to request and need for support.”
According to Jerome Brown, a fourth-year business administration major who participated, the event began with meditation and breathing exercises. Students were asked to share a word to describe how they felt.
“It felt very downplayed … At first, it felt like they were scared of like offending anyone by speaking [Kirk’s] name,” Brown said. “They were not saying his name at first, and that kind of upset me.”
He said he was disappointed that the event did not begin in prayer, but he was glad that it ended with The Lord’s Prayer.
“I was disappointed that we didn’t start off in prayer because we are a Nazarene school,” Brown said. “As Christians, we come together in the name of Jesus to pray; we come together to seek healing, and I think that might’ve been a better route to go than meditation.”
Students were broken up into groups of seven or eight, where they went around, answering four questions. Students were able to pass on answering but would be circled back to for another opportunity to answer, Mathisen said.
“As part of the Listening Circles’ practices, is that you ask everyone in the circle to participate equally,” Mathisen said. “Ultimately, if a student did not want to share about a specific question, they were totally allowed to pass again; but the kind of expectation and the grounding in that practice is that it is most beneficial for everyone in the circle — of everyone sharing equally.”
Brown said he thought the format of the event was effective. He said it was helpful to break up into smaller groups so students felt less pressure when sharing their feelings.
Lopez also said she thought the event was helpful. She said she saw that students were able to decompress when sharing their emotions.
“I was very inspired by these students because I was hurt, by the grievance and everything,” Lopez said. “We were all holding a lot of pain and anger, and all these emotions and just for it to be a space where we can share that with one another … I was just so inspired.”
A similar event was hosted last year by Olive Branch Solutions, a dialogue-based peacebuilding program, in response to the presidential election. Mathisen said PLNU did not reach out to them to facilitate this event because they are a large organization and require much more planning and time, and PLNU wanted to have the event as soon as possible.
Following the event, Mathisen said some students told him they would appreciate another event similar to this.
“I hope it was a good opportunity for students to share with each other what they are experiencing and how they are feeling,” Mathisen said. “We do hope to have similar opportunities for students to meet together and share those things again.”
After the session, Brown initiated a group hug with his circle to end their time together.
“I think [the event] was a good step [in the right direction],” Brown said. “People have expressed they want more interactions like this. … People want to be heard; they want to have their opinions expressed and find some sort of support.”
Angelica Moser