At St. Cloud State University late last year, vandals defaced campus property with swastikas and other racist images.

The incidents were unpleasant reminders of the Minnesota institution’s struggle to overcome its reputation as a hostile place for racial and ethnic minorities, the Associated Press reported.

In 2002 the university settled a discrimination lawsuit that led to the creation of a Jewish-studies center. Since then St. Cloud State has spent considerable time and money to improve its image. Recently it announced a series of plans, including a “unity rally,” to reassure minority students that they were safe on the campus.

The university is located in central Minnesota, in a predominantly white area that has had a recent influx of Somali immigrants. “When my classes start tomorrow, ‘Introduction to the Hebrew Bible,’” a rabbi at the university told the AP, “there will be people who walk in who’ve never met a Jew before.” —Eric Hoover