Gabby Diaz resigned from her position as president of Bucknell Student Government class of 2025, citing various experiences with discrimination and racism within the organization, on Friday, Feb. 10. 

Her resignation comes in the wake of Bucknell’s Black Student Union’s list of demands, the second of such in the organization’s history, after the group has not received a formal address by BSG, as of Feb.16.

Diaz claims her resignation comes as a result of the response of BSG members to her Instagram story post containing both the list of BSU demands and an additional caption by Diaz that said “Bucknell as an institution, as an administration, and as a student led organization (BSG) only further perpetuates anti-blackness on a campus deeply rooted in racism and colonialism. Empty promises and strides to a ‘multicultural’ campus will never address the TRAUMA and violence it inflicts.”

She holds that her post was in no way offensive to the campus community, nor demeaning towards BSG as an organization, but simply highlighting her own experiences during her year and a half stint as vice president and then president of the Class of 2025. 

“Thank you to the staff and faculty of color, my allies, to the friends I’ve made in BSG, and most importantly: thank you to my fellow Black, Brown, students of color and marginalized friends who’ve put their all into an institution like Bucknell and organizations like BSG that drain us. I’m here for you, I value you,” Diaz said.                                                                                                                 

As of now, BSG is yet to announce who will assume the position of president of the Class of 2025.

Members of Bucknell’s Black Student Union attended BSG’s congressional meeting Sunday night, silently demonstrating with posters in hand before voicing their opinions on a variety of issues during the session for open comments.  Individual members of BSG were questioned regarding their involvement in Diaz’s resignation, and BSG was questioned on the whole in regards to their lack of responsibility to the Black Student Union’s postings.

According to various sources in both organizations, the open comments portion of the meeting lasted the greater part of an hour, with a back and forth dialogue between the Black Student Union and BSG that had not happened previously, and certainly not in a public setting.  

To learn more about the meeting and future prospects for the relationship between the two student organizations, BSG President Sam Douds was interviewed by The Bucknellian on Feb 15, during which he said, “BSG is actively working to address the demands brought by Bucknell’s Black Student Union.”  

This is the first statement BSG has produced publicly regarding the list of demands from the Black Student Union, as members of the student body await a formal statement from BSG on the issue.

While many students await to hear a formal follow up from BSG regarding the demands, the Black Student Union is continuing to run its February programming, highlighting Blackness on Bucknell’s campus. 

Kelsey Werkheiser contributed to this report.