The president of Oberlin college says that the Ohio college is making "significant progress" investigating a series of hate speech crimes on campus during Black History Month. The college, known widely as a place that’s liberal and forward-thinking, canceled classes on Monday in order to hold a series of rallies to help unify students. The incidents in question included a "whites only" being written above a water fountain and a swastika scrawled across a science center window, according to the college newspaper the Oberlin Review. The paper also reported a series of physical assaults on campus in which the assailant made derogatory remarks about a student’s ethnicity. [More from USA Today](http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/03/05/oberlin-college-hate-speech-incidents-kkk/1964381/): "All these reports are being investigated thoroughly," President Marvin Krislov said at an afternoon rally at Finney Chapel, the The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer reported. "We have made significant progress in the investigation of these instances." "We believe these actions represent the work of a very small number of very cowardly people," he told a packed audience of 1,200 students. "I am shocked that this happened at our college, which I love. It hurts all of us."