The Rise of 'Black Frosh' on Canadian Campuses

When students from Ottawa universities held their first-ever “BLK Frosh” event three years ago, it was to help Black students feel included and meet each other. Now other universities are catching on.

Frosh, or orientation week, depending on what your school calls it, is generally a hyped-up experience that ends up feeling a bit disappointing. The drinking events—if they even exist—usually get too rowdy and the non-drinking events can fall flat. Frosh events can often feel awkward, but as a woman, queer person or person of colour they can be offensive and even harmful.

For example: there was that year where Brock University had to tell students to stop culturally appropriating during frosh. Or that time in Montreal when students were sporting blackface in a frosh event. The high risk of experiencing sexual assault at these events is an open secret. The list goes on.

While frosh weeks have been maturing as schools attempt to make them less about partying and more about learning something valuable, some students still feel the need for an alternative.

Selali A-W and Sakinna Gairey are the two founders of Black Like Me, the group responsible for putting together the Ottawa intercollegiate BLK Frosh event. This year the events were themed “for the culture” and included workshops such as “Surviving School While Black” and a beach day with free food and yoga.

“The way that Black Like Me does things is just pretty much by creating the condition that we feel would make people feel most comfortable, most safe, most at home, and then see what happens from there,” said A-W. “So people who are Black like me, Black like anybody else can find what they want.”

While some some people have criticized separate frosh events for “segregating” students, the founder of Black Like Me say that this is about empowering students who don’t get the same support as others.

“I think in Canada specifically, we have a very particular narrative when it comes to discussing Blackness in Canada, or Blackness in the context of Canada,” said Gairey, the other founder of the group. “Because of the nature of racism in Canada being more covert, and very implicit, a lot of conversations don’t get had. I think it is good for an initiative that is as loud and as Black as we are.”

For the 2018 semester, at least 10 schools had some version of an alt frosh. This year, Halifax’s Dalhousie University had their first alternative orientation week named “Dreaming in Colour” hosted by the Black, Indigenous & People of Colour Caucus in partnership with the NSCAD University student union and Kings College student union.

“We’re coming to terms that no one is going to do this work for us, no one else is going to give us centre stage or highlight us in this way, so we need to take the step up and do that, and if we don’t we’re just going to allow the false narrative to exist,” said Aisha Abawajy, BIPOCUS Executive Chair, who said they felt a lack of support from their own student union and barriers in creating the event.

At Ryerson, the Black Liberation Collective (BLC) connected with Black Like Me in Ottawa to help plan Toronto’s first Black Frosh, which took place this year and hosted over 200 students. After hearing from Black students across the city what they wanted to see out of frosh, they set out to create their own events.

“There really wasn’t spaces to talk to people or talk to Black students. And I come from a small town north of Barrie so that was one of the things I was looking for,” said Josh Lamers, one of the founder of Ryerson’s BLC. “When I was at U of T, the particular campus I was on was very white and so there was no one who looked like me, no one who wanted to have conversation that I wanted to have, and it’s very isolating.”

Lamers pointed to one example of an event at Toronto’s Black Frosh that provided one-on-one consultations at their community fair to teach students about new ways they can reimagine Black hair, since many students change their relationship with their hair when they start post-secondary.

Meanwhile, Carleton has also introduced new alternative frosh events like Fem(me) Frosh and Queer Frosh. One event called “Jilling Off” taught students about masturbation techniques as students might be starting to discover their bodies.

Harar Hall, programming coordinator at the Womxn's Learning Advocacy & Support Centre, said the feminist frosh is important to introduce students to the concept of these spaces when they first enter post secondary, and creating a space that is open for everyone to even just come and learn.

“I myself grew up in Toronto, I’m really used to the idea of having women’s spaces available in a very urban centre, a lot of people have never been in a space like this before,” she said.

“Disorientation” week is a title that has cropped up at multiple post-secondary schools—the idea is to “disrupt” orientation week so that activism is a part of being introduced to your school. McGill University introduced “Rad Frosh” in August, which included a Queer Prom and Radical Walking Tours all with the opportunity to opportunities to connect with activist groups and clubs on campus.

Ontario Public Interest Research Group in Kingston for Queen’s University will be hosting an alt-Frosh which has events such as “anarchism for students” and “progressive happy hour.”

But frosh week hasn’t shaken the reputation for drinking and acting stupid, still major parts of student identity. Groups like Black Like Me aren’t necessarily trying to change that, they’re just building on that experience. For the founders of Black Like Me, expansion was planned from the beginning—and they have support.

“I think it is important that as we do create these spaces we learn from each other around what works and what didn’t work,” said Lamers, who will be catching up with the Ottawa team to discuss the events.

“I’m really excited to see what the future holds,” said A-W, who hopes to eventually expand globally. “I think we’ve done a lot of great things here and a lot of folks have been able to tell us that and show up that and that it’s about time that we get that goodness everywhere else.”

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