On Sunday, Feb. 17, the California State University chancellor and university presidents, provosts and distinguished faculty spoke to congregations of 30 black churches throughout the Bay Area and Sacramento as part of the Third Annual Northern California Super Sunday. This event is intended to reach out for more black student applicants.

SF State President Robert A. Corrigan spoke at both the 8 a.m. and 10 a.m. services at Providence Baptist Church in the Bayview Hunters Point district of San Francisco.

It’s nice to see our university president out and about in order to bring more students to our school. After all, we do attend school in San Francisco—a place of great diversity and acceptance. San Francisco is a melting pot of every type of person and culture on this earth.

Our school is just a smaller version of that universe. People from all different places come to study all different majors. It’s not hard to throw a stone and hit someone who is completely different from you, both culturally and background-wise. A smorgasbord of diversity, if you will.

These kinds of events are great to see and we are happy to see them happen. It’s common to grumble that the executives in the CSUs just sit in their offices while collecting a big paycheck.

It’s a positive sign that our president is working to bring new faces and fresh voices to our school. Plus, it’s not just our school. This is happening across the state.

What we hope is that this outreach is nothing more than a photo-op for the CSU system.

We hope that this event is truly reaching out and telling people that SF State is the right place for them.

But also, this needs to be more than an annual event. Can one Sunday a year really make a difference in influencing potential students into coming to SF State? Probably not.

It also needs to move beyond the church. There are other ways to reach out to youth looking to attend college.

It would be a shame if this event were nothing more than just a public appearance to gain sympathy over the budget cuts being bestowed on them.

According to our university’s Web site, in Fall 2007, black student enrollment increased by 6.5 percent at CSU campuses.

It’s great that the school is worried about bringing diversity to campus, but the effort needs to extend beyond the churches and into the black community itself.

One day a year is not enough.

It’s time to reach out across other racial lines and attract even more diversity.