The Student Government Association’s judicial board hosted Creed Week to promote their creed and its values. Creed Week began in 2014 when the Honor Code written by Dean of Students Eddie Holloway was adopted into the student code of conduct as the creed. When it was written, the creed’s goal was to encourage general civility among students. Creed Week now also promotes issues such as diversity, inclusion and sexual assault.
SGA Attorney General and junior political science major Lauren-Hunter Gaudet is responsible for overseeing the judicial board, therefore making her the point person for Creed Week.
“Creed week is a time to think about the creed and understand what it means and try to apply it to your life and what you do at school,” Gaudet said.
Throughout the week, the judicial board hosted events such as a tabling event in the Thad Cochran Center, a cultural fair with various campus organizations and a reader’s theatre featuring Southern Style.
Southern Style leader and junior sociology major Michael Matrick said each event’s purpose was to bring awareness to the creed and how students can use it.
“The whole purpose [of Creed Week] is to bring attention to the Creed because I don’t think it’s something that people look at every day but it should be,” Matrick said. “It helps to have a whole week dedicated to it and people discussing it.”
The reader’s theater performed by Southern Style on Oct. 25 consisted of lines saying that discrimination and sexual assault should not happen on Southern Miss’ campus.
“Not on our campus, not on our organizations, not at Southern Miss,” the Southern Styles leaders said. The performance also discussed how students should find their voice in order to speak up if their peers are being mistreated.
Freshman psychology major Elizabeth Gentry attended the reader’s theater because she said it stuck with her after orientation. “I have never been somewhere where they address issues that people like to ignore because it is uncomfortable or hard to talk about so I appreciate this,” Gentry said.
Southern Style leader and senior political science major Aaliyah Elbert said that the creed is special to her because she belongs to two minority groups as an African American woman.
“While I might be stigmatized against it, it is still not right for me to stigmatize others because they are different from me,” Elbert said. “Others have different opinions so knowing that and that being diverse makes you a better person is important.”
Gaudet also emphasized the importance of being accepted in a variety of ways.
“It doesn’t even have to be about only including others’ cultures or ethnicities or races. It can also be recognizing and appreciating other political perspectives or ideologies,” Gaudet said. “To recognize that people have different ideas and backgrounds and being able to appreciate that on a college campus is so important.”
Although it is not an official document that students are required to abide by, the Southern Miss administration along with SGA strongly encourages students to live by the creed.
