Good afternoon, everyone. I'm just looking down at the participants count and we're
looking like we've got well close to 120 people already in climbing. So I'm going to
just wait maybe a few more seconds to have folks come in and be able to be
part of this campus conversation. So really really delighted to see several
individuals being able to carve out some time during what is clearly a very, very
challenging time for us. So yeah, we're up
to 260 odd people there. So I'm gonna get
going if that's okay just because I know
we have a wonderful group of panelists.
Darryl Peal is going to be moderating
this discussion, and we'll have plenty of
opportunity, I think over the next 90
minutes, to have conversations,
discussions and questions. So first and
foremost, let me just begin by thanking
all of you for taking part in this
campus conversation. This is our first
Summer Campus Conversation. Summer is of course, almost halfway over.
But again, appreciate all of you taking
the time to be with us this afternoon. I
want to take this opportunity to thank
our distinguished panelists, you'll hear
from them in just a few minutes. And I
want to thank our moderator as well
Darryl Peal who's of course our newest
member of the NKU team and he's gonna be
moderating the panel. I would be remiss if I didn't thank Bonita Brown, our Chief Strategy
Officer, for all the work that happens
behind the scenes and of course the IT
folks that have now become experts in
this venture and being able to handle
these types of webinars and town halls. So really happy that
were all together and able to have this
conversation.
You know we've used this term many times
we are in the midst of um I would say an
unprecedented set of crises. We began
with a global pandemic, something we
haven't seen in 100 years. Quickly that
followed up as a result of the the
approaches that we had taken very
prudent I might add with an economic
crisis that were of course dealing with. This economic
crisis is probably the biggest crisis we
have seen since the Great Depression.
And then you err on top of that that
social crisis given the systemic racism
that continues in real and horrific ways.
And we have more than what we would call
a perfect storm of crises. But during
these challenging times I think
institutions of higher education have a
very specific and important role. And
that is to convene and facilitate
discussions and dialogues around these
complex issues so that we all have a
better understanding of the challenges
and possible solutions to these to
these issues. And so it is very
consistent with our core mission of both
discovery transmission application of
knowledge so that our understanding of
these issues and we promote learning can
be enhanced. So once again I am so
grateful for this panel that has taken
some time out to be with us. I'm gonna
without further ado hand it over to
Darryl Peal to do the moderation and I for
one I'm looking forward to learning as
well from all these individuals. So thank
you again for joining us and Darryl
after you. Thank you very much Mr.
President.
Ladies and gentlemen I'm honored pleased
and very proud to serve as moderator for
today. Today we are gathered here for the
campus conversation town hall meeting.
The topic today is race, pandemic and the
power of education. And as we begin this
conversation I have to add just a few
words the president summed it up very
well but we in Northern Kentucky
University is a very welcoming community.
A community that is fueled by its desire
that love learners navigate the path
toward their educational goals. 
Student Success is at the very core of
everything we do at Northern Kentucky
University. Each year thousands of
students come from across the
Commonwealth, the region and around the world
to grow and to thrive at Northern
Kentucky University.
However, as do you all know in recent
months the pandemic and race relations
have really been the focus of all of
America and it has really impacted our
ability to to serve our institution,
serve our mission and serve our students.
So, today we gathered with a group of
subject matter experts
to talk about those very things
and how it has changed our lives and
what has become our new normal. In recent weeks we've had a couple victories. The
Supreme Court decisions to give
rights and protection to LGBTQ community
and for the legal status of dreamers to
not be nullified. And so while there's
still a long road for for the DREAM Act
we still have much better place than we
were a couple weeks ago when we thought
the legislation was going to be
dismantled. So with that, I'd like to
introduce the panel. The panelists
today is mr. Ande Durojaiye a Vice
President for Undergraduate Academic
Affairs, Karen Miller the Chair of Political
Science, David Singleton a Professor of Law
and Director of Constitutional
Litigation Clinic, Amal Said an Associate
Professor of Accounting and a member of the Inclusive Excellence Council and Valerie
Hardcastle Executive Director for the
Institute of Health Innovation and Vice
President for Health innovation. So
before we begin, I would like to let
everybody who's watching know that we
are recording today's program and will
be made available to you to review and
see again. And also too right now we're
going to take a pause just to do a quick
poll the poll will be so we can find out
who is in fact watching and enjoying and
engaging with us today and will be in
our way of being able to get a survey to
you afterwards to help us figure out how
we can continue to do these programs and
make them better. And so at this time we
turn it over to Bonita Brown, Vice
President Brown, who will help you
navigate through the poll. All right the
poll should be visible to you now if you
all could complete that we'll wait a few
seconds for you all to complete the poll.
And again we just want to know what your
affiliation is so we can again determine
and plan future programs.
Alright that looks like about everybody.
Alright so I'm going to end the polling
at this point. Thank you very much
for that and I will share the results. So
it looks like the staff is our large
majority so thank you all so much for
joining us today
Darryl thanks Bonita so ladies and
gentlemen we're gonna with no further
ado we're gonna go ahead and start our
conversation with the panel. Our opening
portion of this will be focused
mainly on the pandemic so at this time
I'd like to open up to questioning and the
first question is to the panel:
How has the pandemic impacted the
economy of Northern Kentucky?
Hello there.
Hi my name is Amal Said, thank you for
the introduction there I'd like to start
maybe with giving you a little bit of
background about the how the economy is
affected by the pandemic. So there is
more than 9.3 million people around the
world been infected with COVID-19. 2.4
million in the US and more than
481,000 people have
died sadly from the disease globally.
124,000 in the U.S.  In Kentucky that is
more than 14,000 infection cases have
been reported and more than 500 death so
the pandemic has had far-reaching
consequences beyond the spread of the
disease itself. So while it is very hard
to exactly quantify the economic damage
from the global pandemic there is a
widespread agreement among economists
that it will have severe and negative
impacts on the global economy. The
monetary impact has yet to be estimated
but more likely in the billions which is
really this was unprecedented
conditions. To give you a glimpse of
these effects
on February 24 the global stock markets
fell due to a significant rise in the
number of COVID-19 cases outside mainland China. By February
28 the stock markets worldwide saw their
largest single week declines since the
financial crisis in 2008. The global
stock markets crashed in March with
falls several percent in the world's new
logic major indices. This is as the
president mentioned this pandemic caused
the largest global recession and has to
make more than a third of the global
population at the time being placed on
lockdown and as the pandemic spread the
conference's events across technology
fashion sports were canceled or
postponed. So, for example, looking at the
U.S. economy with the pandemic limiting
movement disrupting supply chain and
economic activity retail sales dropped
eight point seven percent in March. That
is the largest month-to-month decrease
in retail sales I would say here since
1992. Unfortunately, our Northern Kentucky
region is not different as our local
economy is not developing back either. I
want to share some data relevant to our
region here and I'd like to give a shout
out to Janet Harrah the Director of the
Center for Economic Analysis and
Development at the College of Business
here at for the Kentucky University for
providing some very relevant data
comparing before and after the pandemic,
layoffs, unemployment and some of the new
unemployment claims. So to give you an
idea according to the 2020 estimates
that is around 6 to 7 drop in real GDP
in 2020 for the Cincinnati metropolitan
statistical area. That huge loss
represents a loss of more than 8 billion
dollars. There was around almost there
315,000 initial unemployment claims in
Cincinnati Metro
in statistical area over the 13 weeks
period through June 13. The percentage
drops drop in jobs in April was around
14.3%
13 percent drop in job rate for the U.S.
the unemployment rate for April was
around 14 percent in Cincinnati
metropolitan statistical area. Which is
also which is close to the national rate
for the U.S. There has been economic
disparities in minority groups for
example women in business have been most
vulnerable to the economic devastation
caused by the pandemic. This is why some people
call with the COVID-19 economy as being
the "She-Session." Research looked at the
pandemic effects on u.s. minority-owned
small business I know for example that
the Small Business Development Center at
the College of Business at NKU has
been assisting small business in the
region.
Black Americans have higher rates of
infection and death from Coronavirus.
They've been vulnerable even before the
pandemic and certainly it has shocked
minorities in Black disproportionately
hard. So many Black Americans are in
industry's most predisposed to health
and economic problems such as
accommodation, food service, retail, health
care. The unfair access to loans among
other factors contribute to the health
and economic disparities in the Black
community during the pandemic and the
reason has more to do with 400 years of
history than biology. Absolutely so we
move to the next question. So
panelist I would like to know from you as
well, what role has politics played and
how we have managed the pandemic? Well
I'm happy to jump in and swim in
treacherous waters. I'm David singleton
and it's really a pleasure to be part of
this discussion I am NOT a political
scientist I am a lawyer by training
but I'm civically engaged and I pay
attention to politics. And the thing that
is really distressing in in my opinion
about the time we live in is the hyper
partisanship the tribal nature of
discussions around politics in our
country. And it's just and and and so
many things are in there salt there's a
result of that. We can't agree on what is
fact and what is not fact. Science is
very much now something that is
politicized. If you are you know in favor
of science, you're in dis-favored to
some people. And that's really
problematic when it comes to how we
should go about managing responses to
the pandemic. I just saw last night what
happened down in Palm Beach Florida
where the local council there voted
unanimously to require masks to be worn
to prevent transmission of the virus. That is something that science says is
affected and the discussion devolved
into accusations from people who were
opposed to that and it was it was it was
sort of a nice summary of how broken we
are politically where you have folks
yelling at the council members and
basically threatening to have been
arrested by citizens because
mask-wearing has become politicized. When you think about reopening economies
around the country, that has been
politicized with some folks saying it's
better to open and and be robust
economically when it's going to result
in deaths. So I guess what I'm saying is
I think that
absolutely yes it's politicized it's the
nature of of where we are right now. But
if we don't find a way to come together
across this political divide what
Professor Said was talking about in
terms of the recession that we're in is
going to get worse. If we cannot work
together across political lines to
manage this outbreak, this pandemic, we're
gonna have to shut it all down again, and
that's going to hurt us all so we've got
a bridge to the political divide. And if
I could follow up on that because I
think in summary with everything that
was said and I think David Singleton
said it in a much politer way than I
would articulate my opinions about
what's going on with political
interference with our management of the
pandemic. But the other thing I think we
need to keep in mind are unintended, what
I am going to charitably call unintended
consequences. And this is where to me it really intersects
with the conversations around race that
we are having as a nation right now. So
41% of African-American owned businesses were closed during the pandemic and part
of that has to do with the fact that
most African-American businesses are
consumer-facing and obviously, those are
much more dangerous than if you are
running say an IT company. Another issue
is that African-Americans, for a variety
of historical reasons that we can talk
about later, do not have access to
capital in the same way that White
Americans do. So they simply don't have
the cash to be able to front a pandemic
in the way White Americans do. So 41% of
African-American businesses were shut
down. 16% of White owned businesses were
shut down. Now the government decided, and I'm glad they did, that we needed to
provide loans to businesses to help them
bridge the pandemic. Only 10 percent of
African American businesses were able to
access those loans. Why is that?
Because part of the criteria for getting
the loan is that you needed to have a
pre-established relationship a business
relationship with a bank. But the
African-American business owners
by and large particularly the very small
business owners don't operate that way.
And so I think an unattended consequence
of being hasty in how we're managing,
providing, help to people ends up not
assisting the very people who need the
most assistance. And to me a lot of this
has again to do with the politicization, that David Singleton was talking about, because we can't talk
about these issues and as a consequence
very employment voices are being shut
out of the conversation. Because of
somebody there had just a little bit of
awareness regarding who it is that
actually has business accounts at banks
they would quickly realize that this
policy while intended to help small
businesses ended up not being able to
help them and in particular
differentially impacted the communities
that already are differentially impacted
by the pandemic. Thanks, Valerie. I'm gonna
move to our next question. You know as
educators and here at Northern Kentucky
University all of you have had I'm sure
multiple conversations with your
students and we would like to know how
is the pandemic impacted our students?
There's issues around digital divide,
multi-generational housing, unemployment,
health concerns. What do you hear from
your students? What are the things and
how's that in a pandemic impacted our students?
So I would like to start with
they have full glass and saying that
there is a little bit of positive things
that I saw from my students. For example,
think the enhance enhancing the students
flexibility and global awareness. So
they're you know being exposed to this
pandemic the students are aware now that
we are one community, one virus, that
started thousands of miles away and has
affected each and every one
and everyone around us in some shape or
form. This is in Friedman's, you know
Friedman's words in The World is Flat, so
definitely this pandemic showed the
manifestation of the core idea of his
book. It also I saw a lot of flexibility
that increased for students and we as we
as they change the learning to adapt to
their new learning environment, the
delivery modes and in turn to help them
to be more, I think more, resilient. But
definitely there was also a lot of
negative or effects from the pandemic
and I saw that unfortunately, you know
during the spring semesters especially.
You know there was delay
graduation for some students there has
been severe financial impact because of
losing their jobs, losing job offers, the
growth potentials and readiness to to
the job market has also been affected
due to some of the cancellation and
internships. You cannot ignore the
psychological effects due to illness
losing loved ones or social isolation.
Academic performance for some students
affected too so that means we as
educators and as a campus we need to
know and be aware of the resources
including financial resources,
counseling resources, to help our
students and to think creatively to
provide experiential learning. Just to
share with you and a recent study that
has been has been done by Arizona State
University. It's just been recently
published in Inside Higher Ed just a
couple of days ago. The main conclusion
was the the pandemic hurt college
students. What is interesting is that the
same study found that we that these
results varied, depending on the students
socioeconomic status and race,
lower-income students were 55 percent
more likely to delay graduation than
their higher income peers. COVID-19 also
nearly double the gap between higher and
lower income students expected GPAs. 
Racial minority
students were 70% more likely to change
their majors due to the pandemic and
first-generation students were 50% more
likely to delay graduation. Looking at
NKU when the pandemic start and we
had to move online and change the mood
of instructions, some students could not
cope, and guess who, minority particularly
Black students were affected the most.
Although there were a lot of efforts
from different colleges across campus,
NKU to provide resources such as
loaner laptops hotspots and other
assistive programs financial ones such
as feeling you there were still
inequalities and disparities related to
digital divide. As I mentioned
multi-generational housing unemployment
lack of health care lack of counseling,
health concerns in general, which means
that more needs to be done
systematically to bridge these gaps. And
more alarming concerning is a poor
surfacing that the recession is forcing
more students especially minorities to
leave all for more college which means
of existing disparities.
Thank you. Thank you.
I'm sticking with the idea around of
pandemic and education panel. I'd like to
know how is the pandemic impacted higher
education? You know the way we teach, the way we deliver classes, the
expectations of students, student support
services, tuition educational costs.
There's a lot of issues on around high
reading you high-ed. I think it's safe to
say that the pandemic has impacted
higher-ed in every way imaginable. And we
can break down every element that you
mentioned but if you imagine it's
imagine if someone who told us a year
ago that universities these factions
of learning, where people gather for
every activity where we experience this
energy from youth, and the idealism that
comes from that would be closed and
everyone will be working from home. I would not have believed that. And I don't know how
many of us in higher-ed would have
thought we could have pulled it off. But
we did. Going remote due to the pandemic
caused us to re-examine everything that
we do. We've learned that we can deliver
content remotely even content that we
thought seemed impossible before
pandemic has taught us that we can no
longer function within the Ottoman New
England Model the leaves falling from
the trees while the students are walking
around and the professors have their
Blazers with the patches on the elbows.
It just doesn't work anymore. It's not
not as much of the reality. It's caused
us to recognize that we have to change
our approach. We have to evolve. And one
thing that that as professor Said was
talking I think about this generation of
incoming students it's almost a gift.
If you consider this alternate view. We
have as a society faulted this
generation of students for being too
focused on technology, too distant from
one another, we've discouraged their reliance on text
rather than voice, their social media
rather than face-to-face and now they're
forced into a model of higher education
that they better than any generation
before them are equipped to handle. So I
think we can find a bright side as we
move forward in this this new realm if
you will. Thank you. Thank you. As we think
about higher education and where we go
from here. What is the role of our
education and in NKU in
this new world
situation that we're in? And how do we go
how we're going to help our students in
community and region through the
pandemic? I'd love to hear from Ande. Ande
we haven't heard for you. Thanks Darryl, you know
as we think about what the role of
higher education is and what we need to
be taking out going forward, I go back to
the idea of being a student-ready
institution. So we've been talking about
how we are ready to take on our students
no matter what their circumstances or
what they're going through or where
they're coming from. And I think the
pandemic just adds an additional layer
to it you know you think of our role and
what we need to do, we need to be
educating our students we need to be
educating our reach, we be educating the
nation. And we're gonna have to find more
effective ways to do that. To access, to
connect and also to open opportunities.
And so, as Karen mentioned before, you
know our faculty we're amazing and how
nimble they
to be able to transition to online and
and we're really excited about how we
did that and this summer were training
so we can be even better if it happens
again which is highly likely. But I think
we've got to make sure we think about at
this time when we're being impacted on
so many different fronts, from an
economic standpoint, from a social
standpoint, from a health standpoint.
We've also got to bring another level of
empathy that I think oftentimes gets
lost in our conversations with our
students. Right now you know God has a
narrative that these students haven't
dealt with anything. That they have it
you know had a hard life that many past
generations ahead. You know these
students are coming to us in a space
relating an experience the end of their
senior year. You know they're coming from
where people are dying at an alarming
rate. And so they're bringing a lot of
emotional baggage that's going to impact
a lot of the outcomes. You know we start
thinking about student success that it's
you know go to class versus take care of
a sick parent or you know worry about my
health health. You know these are things,
that our students have to take into
account so as we think about the role of
higher education. Our goal is still to
educate learners but I think we have to
think about how we do it, we have to be
nimble in how we do it, and innovative. But
also I think we have to have another
layer of empathy recognizing that the
individuals that we are dealing with are
impacted by things that you know didn't
exist when many of us were going through
our higher education journey. Absolutely.
May I respond to Andy? Mostly if you
consider the impact the pandemic make is
having on minority students their path
to an occupation that pays a living wage
has been severely compromised. The early
data indicates that they're being
adversely impacted so if universities
are forward-thinking and we towards
different models of skill based
education we can help these students who
are adversely impacted, we can provide
them with a path toward gainful
employment toward great company you know careers that are rewarding and so we
have to as Ande says think about meeting students where they are but we
can't just focus on the liberal arts
model. We have to expand that.
Absolutely. Valerie? Yes and to build further on what was just said I think NKU given
that is it is a regionally engaged
institution and prides itself on being
that we need to recognize
we have an additional responsibility to
help lift our economy back up. So Amal
gave great examples of the challenges
that are we're facing on all fronts in
our economy. And the truth is that a
significant portion of businesses in the
Northern Kentucky Cincinnati region have
closed. And we as an educational
institution that will be here on the
other side of the pandemic need to
figure out ways, new methods, new training
programs, new collaborations that really
can help reboot our economy because the
faster we can get it running again the
more jobs will be available for students
the more families will be able to afford
to feed their children and so forth. And
I think NKU can play an extremely
important role in helping our region
reboot. Thank You, Valerie. So ladies and
gentlemen, as we talked, said earlier, when
we opened our topics today is the
pandemic and race relations as well. And
so we're gonna shift our questions to
talk about some of the race relations
and issues and challenges that we're
facing in America. Our first question is
how did we get here? The history of
racial inequity and policing as a long
and sordid story. And so we can't do not
we have to also look at how has this
been part of our historical experience.
I'm here in the United States and has
things changed very much so our question
for the group and again is how do we get
here; how is history just repeating
itself?
Or or is this new? I would tend to say
that it's not. I think what's new is that we
have cameras on phones and things of
being recorded but I'll start that
question although that ought to Karen
first. The primary focus of American law
enforcement has always been on the
protection of private property. In the
North, law enforcement finds its roots
and things like night-watches railroad
police, coal police. Basically they
were protecting Commerce. In the South
law enforcement finds its roots and
slave patrols. Southern cities with
large slave populations
formed police arrangements to deter Black
uprisings. To apease property owners or slave masters. At one time all southern states
had slave patrol legislation. They varied
in content, but there are some
similarities. Like rounding up 
of suspected runaway slaves, preventing
uprisings, common thing ironically was
that they had full power to enter into
any dwelling where they thought there
was evidence of a slave uprising. In
other words, a no-knock search, that we
know is present today in law enforcement.
But that's not the only way that police
history has led us to where we are.
Racism has been codified into law in
many ways and therefore police practices.
Black Codes, drug war, capital punishment,
Jim Crow, etc. All throughout our history
as a nation, police have been used to
oppress Black people. And American White
Americans have accepted that reality. So
if you follow the patterns of police
practices through history our current
situation is almost an obvious
destination. There was almost no avoiding
it, if you followed that path. Thanks
Karen. Anyone else would like to speak to
this? I would like to jump in if I could.
I want to give the viewers a very
sobering statistic that plays off of
what we just heard from Karen. In
the United States we lockup 2.4 million
people in prisons and jails. We lead the
world in incarceration where 5% of the
world's population in United States and
yet 25% of the incarcerated population
in the world. And who is
disproportionately impacted by that? It's
Black and Brown people. If you are Black
if you are a Black man in this country
one out of three, one out of three of us
will spend some time in prison at some
point in our lives compared to one out
of 17 White men.
That should not be, but it is. And you
know there will be some people
who will say, well hidden that because
Black people commit more crime? Well if
you look at drug crimes Black and White
people commit drug crimes at the same
rate. And yet historically and it's true
today if you are Black you are far more
likely to be arrested, put into prison or
jail, and have your life wrecked. Because
the wrecking doesn't just stop with the
conviction, it's all those other things
that come with a conviction. Like not
being able to have a job because you're
disqualified based on a criminal record.
So historically this has been something
that has grown out of the
disproportionate use of police power
against Black people in this country.
Darryl, if I could just jump in I know
everybody wants to get in on this one.
But you know another thing I would add
as we move just away from policing but
the overall American society I mean when
you look at everything we have at our
institutions. They're built off racial
inequities. You know we work in higher
education and we built institutions,
historically Black colleges, for the
slight exact purpose to keep
African-Americans Black people away from
White people in higher education. Until
you think about higher education as the
number one driver access and you know
educational attainment and social
mobility and we didn't even want groups
to be together to go through that. And so
when you think about that as a baseline
that we're always thinking about how we
divide how we keep individuals apart, you
look at where we are currently now and
it's not surprising at all. You know as
we think about the protests and riots
and you know having conversations with a
lot of individuals, one of the big
takeaways you know people say well we
can't believe people are so mad or
people are so upset and we're seeing
these riots. And the thing that kind
of shocks a lot of Black folks and I'm
gonna be quite frank because I think we
want to be honest on the fact this this
is not new to anyone this is not new to
anybody.
George Floyd was a tragedy but we can
name all 50 people right now that
and killed by police that we know. And so
again when you think about it from that
standpoint you know I look at it having
my other lawyer in the panel we look at
the but-for cause of what's going on. You
know we weren't rioting a week before
George Floyd was killed and so let's not
let the riots and the response you know
drown out what the root issue is. And the
root issue is that these inequities are
leading to these outcomes whether it be
policing, whether it be in education,
whether it be from health and social
standpoint. But Black people are just not
treated fairly in this country. And I
think that is the impetus for a lot of
the things that you're seeing going on.
Thanks, Ande. Karen gave us some a great
historical backdrop on the history of
policing and its relationship with more
specifically African-American
communities. So my next question is how
do we see that previous history, present,
and modern contemporary police?
It's not just in policing though it is.
It permeates every aspect of policing
but all of criminal-justice, all of the
political process. And if you just look
at the societal or political level it it
is what behaviors are considered
criminal. What do we criminalize? And if
you want to arrest a lot of people make
behaviors that people want to engage in
criminal. So drug activity, prostitution,
things of that nature,
loitering. If you want to
arrest a lot of people in a community
make loitering illegal and then it's
selective enforcement beyond that. Where
do you arrest people for loitering? Is it
the middle-class, White kids, hang out the
mall? No ,it's the in the inner-city
neighborhoods. The ones where White
America accepts us bad neighborhoods.
Where we just all hook line and sinker
believe that they're just permeated with
crime. And when you could convince
the majority that that that's the case
these things like select enforcement, the
use of force,
deadly force, no knock searches, all of
that becomes a necessary policing tool
in the eyes of a majority of Americans.
And until we can break that down and get
people to see, that you know, we're
in about individuals who are dead. Dead
forever because of a broken taillight. Or
I got drunken and made the ridiculous
decision to drive home. That's horrible
none of us want to condone drunk driving but
that's not a death-penalty offense. And it also just defies the whole notion
of justice that police are the the
police, the courts, the sentences, and
the corrections that carry out the the
execution. I mean the whole justice
system is demeaned when we have these
cases. Thanks, Karen.
Could I actually add a point here?
And it's how policing has
looked in the pandemic and I'm going to
talk just about across the river in in
Cincinnati. Because that's where I also
practice law and you know I've been an
observer what's going on here. And when
you want to talk about disproportionate
policing let's look at who got arrested
in Hamilton County. Hamilton County for
those of you who don't know is where
Cincinnati is. Let's talk about who got
arrested for violating the state's stay
at home order. First of all there were a
hundred eleven rest arrests in Hamilton
County for violating the order. And oddly
in New York City just 125 arrests for
their similar law. Which is just weird. We
are a lot smaller than New York City but
put that aside. Black people make up 27%
of the population of Hamilton County
Ohio and yet 68% of the arrest for
violating the stay at home order. Now you
don't tell me that that's because only
Black folks were out walking around when
they shouldn't have been walking around.
No, that's not true. We can all, you know those of us on this
side of river, can all talk about how we
saw White folks who were wondering what
do they do and they don't look like
there is you know essentially out for
whatever reason and yet they're not
getting arrested. Why is that? Why is that?
There were Black people
who were the victims of violent crime
during times when the stay in order home
order was in effect and they got
arrested and cited for violating to stay
at home order and they've been shot and
they're out in the street that is
craziness. And so if anybody is sitting
here thinking that policing is unbiased,
that shows you that it is not and it is
very biased and a troubling deeply
troubling way. Thanks, David.
So ladies and gentlemen, as we move down the road and start to deal with systemic
racism as an institution, as a nation and
as a state. How do we move from protest
to action, equity and fairness? How do we
move from protests to action equity and
fairness? So I'll jump in, Darryl. Do you know I think for us to move from protest to
action, we've got to take a couple steps.
I think first we've got to you know
having awareness that there is an issue
and I think that's part of the protest
we recognize their challenges. But I
think what an individual level the next
thing we need to do is really assess
ourselves what are our bias because we
all play a part in this you know David
just mentioned it but generally our bias
is what lead to the outcomes we're
seeing and so going in and saying what
are my biases in certain populations and
how is it negatively impacting those
populations and then once we've been
able to actually identify there's a
problem assessed with our bias is then
we need to go and look at what are the
barriers we put in you know
intentionally unintentionally that are
negatively impacting these populations
you know you think in the context of
higher education so you know you look at
us as NKU and we are originally engaged
institution as we mentioned before but
Cincinnati is part of our region and so
you know that's one of the things we
have to think about you know you look at
our demographics on campus of our
students and we don't see that in our
staff and our family and that's
something we need to say to ourselves
why is that the case why is it the fact
that our student of color can go through
matriculated NKU and
with the staff member of color what does
that be an academic advisor or someone
in the faculty as well and so you know
we've got to look at one of the things
that we put in place that negatively
impact you know these groups and then
the next step is we got to come up with
tangible ideas that will solve these
problems you know we hear a lot about
conversations of statements around
diversity inclusion and those things are
great but statements without action are
going to be hollow you know across the
higher education landscape every single
president put out a statement about why
diversity inclusion matters and you know
they're standing us out there a Black
lives matter but if you go back to your
campus and you don't do anything
different you go back to your community
if you don't do any difference you go
back to your social circle and you don't
do anything different then really you're
just paying lip service and we can have
conversations too we're blue in the face
but if folks aren't ready to go back and
have tangible outcomes they're looking
for and actually hold each other
accountable we're not really gonna see
the change that we hope to see and I
think - um talking building off what
Andy said is that we really need to take
both a systemic view as he was
articulating but also a very particular
view and make sure we think everything
through and that is we need to pay
attention between the distinction
between policy procedure and process
because a lot of times you could have
our policies correct but our procedures
and process are messed up and so we
don't get the outcomes they want I'll
just give you a very quick example which
I am pulling out of a hat so I'm not
claiming it applies to and can you at
all but many institutions want to
increase the number of students of color
on their campus a lotta Bulgaria shion's
requirement require the SAT or a CT
score and they use that as a benchmark
for whether you are admissible to campus
but anyone who studies anything about
higher education quickly recognizes the
a CT and SAT scores tell you absolutely
nothing about the potential for student
success we know what gives you what is
most correlated with student success
it's high school GPA so let's say you
did recognize this and you realize well
we should not be requiring at all a CT
and SAT scores so we want to do
something else we're gonna move to
holistic admissions holistic admissions
means you look at the entire student
without particular regard for you know
some bar like you have to have this SAT
score a CT score
so we're regionally engaged institution
maybe we want to care about whether
students are regionally engaged are they
interacting with your community in
particular ways that seems like a good
criteria to have a good procedure to put
in place to replace our policy about a
CT scores but then those students who
come from low-income areas in many cases
students of color may not have that sort
of experience because they have to go to
work when they're fifteen or sixteen and
help support their family and so they
don't get to do the after-school stuff
or volunteer in the community or
anything else and so you have to think
through not only changing in your policy
but also the procedure behind it and
then finally you have to look at how
things are implemented and I'll give you
I'll give you a case for my own history
just so it's it's only my embarrassment
no one else's and of course this doesn't
deal with being African-American but
deals with being a woman and so when I
first went to when I was first hired of
course I was I was one of two women in
my department I went to got my PhD on a
minority scholarship I mean that that's
how bad it was back then but faculty
meetings were scheduled from 4:30 to
5:30 p.m. on Thursday afternoon my
daycare closed at five o'clock so I had
to leave every day by five o'clock
before five o'clock to pick up my kids
now the thought was that if you bring a
woman on to the faculty things would
start to change but the reality was I
was intimidated in just speaking up and
saying wait a minute I can't actually
participate in your community because I
have to go get my kids and I was worried
about the perception that they would
then see me like well now I don't belong
because they don't have that problem
they had their kids taken care of but I
don't and so I'm not as serious as they
are in wanting to participate in the
community now of course I could have
spoken up and of court now today I would
have spoken up and explained the issue
and probably a better way than I could
have when I was 27 but the point remains
that a lot of times we have all of these
cascading unintended consequences even
when we're trying to do the right thing
or we're just trying to live our lives
and we have to recognize that if we want
to change as an institution we're gonna
have to rethink things through top to
bottom and we're gonna have to listen
more carefully to voices that might be
afraid to speak up because they already
feel like they don't belong thanks
Valerie. Darryl, do you mind if I just jump
in on one point in terms of like reform
or changing transforming the criminal
legal system I want to say one thing
about what needs to be also done though
please vote I saying that particularly
to young people many of whom I'm hearing
are just tuning out of the electoral
process because they don't think it's
going to get anything accomplished
please vote if you care about
disproportionate prosecutions based on
race though voting vote not just for who
the president is vote in your state and
local elections where most of criminal
legal system policy is made vote in the
prosecutors race vote for who the judges
are because that stuff can make a
difference and particularly if we
organize enough and in vote in blocks we
can get some things positive to happen
so vote quickly David and I think going
back to your question Darryl how to
move from protests to action I think
process itself is a kind of action so I
think is more how to systematically
create change and part of the change
also is as part of is being active and
building and I think there is a bigger
role for education that we definitely
talk about and also just to oh my David
it's so important those local elections
are in some ways more important than
than the national and regional the
criminal justice official is the
prosecutor when their elected officials
they get really tough on crime during
those election cycles and they make
decisions and they prosecute people on
on things that are sometimes suspect
they become overzealous the police
mission and mandate can be changed at
the local level and and it starts with
voting for those local politicians and
so McCree aiding change education is key
but so too is voice and since we're
talking about voting and voice I will
also make the obvious connection that
our entire system of criminal justice
which has disproportionately taken a
voice away from a segment of the
population has really silenced African
Americans in our history especially
since the civil rights movement when
they really fought for the vote and we
had the war on drugs etc and one of the
outcomes was silencing that voice we're
quiet absolutely so I would like to
remind the audience that if they would
like to submit questions they can
because after we finished our last
question we will be entertaining
questions from our from our audience so
please if you have questions please
submit them my next question is about
what is the role of higher education as
we move and navigate through our
challenges with racial inequities and
and and and and other social heals what
is the role of Education and so I would
like to also not just limit it to higher
education as in universities but even K
to 12 what is what is the role of
education you're all educators love to
hear from so I would you know jump in
and say you know the role of education
is educating students and so as we think
about where we currently are as a
society I think our role has never been
more important because one of the things
that's leading to a lot of the outcomes
we see is a lack of education
individuals aren't aware you know the
higher education institution we talked
about creating these informed citizens
who go out and do things like voting and
lead the social change that we know need
happen and so as educators we need to
take advantage of that you know one of
the concerns that I have is oftentimes
we look at what we're teaching in the
classroom outside of the classroom and
we don't rig the tube but we definitely
need to bridge the two what we're doing
I was talking to accrue two students and
one of the students said to me you know
why don't we have mandatory courses on
Black history and so a student I said
did you take you know history 102 and
history 103 American history and they
said yes we took over this course and I
said history 102 American history that
is Black history and if we're not
covering Black history within those
courses that we're doing our students a
disservice because the history of Black
people is part of the history of this
country you know the other thing I think
we've got to think about is we've got to
be the leaders of the change for our
region being a regionally engaged
institution the surrounding community is
looking for us to take the lead on
things they're looking for us to model
the behavior we'd like to see going
forward you know oftentimes myself and
many of our other colleagues across
campus get asked to go out and talk to
group so one of the questions they ask
is you know how do we show that Northern
Kentucky is a welcoming place how do we
include diversity inclusion how do we
show that we are committed to you know
eliminating racial inequities and so
again if we can think about how we
eliminate those things on our campus and
model that behavior I think that's an
example of being a regionally engaged
institution and that shows that our role
within the community within the region
within the nation and the country is
extremely important and whatever you
want things that lead to change that
we'd like to see thanks Andy
yeah completely definitely these are
challenging times there's a lot of
injustice anger came but it comes with
greeted opportunities to me change
specially as educators and as an
educational institution we have the
potential to provide transformational
experience to our students but also to
the Northern Kentucky community in
general so I joined thank you thank you
I'm just joined in in August but I've
been involved with inclusion and
diversity efforts and initiatives for 16
years at my prior university serving as
faculty advisor for minority students
and being president's council diversity
for so many years
I've been fortunate just in the last few
months to to join part of the efforts I
thank you the inclusive excellence
Council where we are looking at and
using the success by design strategic
framework identified the universities
focused on student success how to align
it with the region as our roadmap map to
empower the future of students and
enhance the economic social and civic
strength of our region and as a team
we've been working on tying these
different colors how can we recruit and
access give access to minority students
and diverse students how can we improve
their completion and career Community
Engagement I know there is a lot of
Institute you know offices and
organizations and on campus that provide
the array of initiatives and provide
resources for minorities Center for
student Lusignans
office of Latino programs and services
African American student ich tips LBGT q
programs all of these are good but the
question is it enough and probably not
probably we need to do more we I think
we have a great opportunity to make
changes educator is another higher ed
institution we need to be more engaged
and more engaging empowering not only
students but also faculty and staff
especially minority more cultural treat
and training I know there is things
happening but definitely we need to do
more so that students of color and
minority you would feel comfortable
having more communication channels and
that looks this is a good start today
I'm sure that it's gonna be much more
how can we help students you know our
colleagues and our self recognized our
own biases and sometimes toxic treats we
need conversation about recognizing that
Black Lives Matter for all lives matter
we need to make sure that every student
staff and faculty member feels welcome
to have a sense of belonging and
appreciate appreciation for what they
bring to the table
so we we've been working the last few
months in the college and the university
to be prepared for the fall in terms of
coating 19 in the pandemic and I think
we need to intentionally put more effort
in in preparing our faculty and staffs
for possible intimidation
microaggressions in the classroom in the
dining halls we need to sometimes wear
different hats and serve as buffers and
advocates and I think as educators me to
be proactive and start moving change for
I've been looking for example at course
material how to promote conversation
about diversity provided a very good
perspective here Andy for example
anything I know there's all the
resources maybe we need to start you
know sharing some of those resources
Harvard Business Review for example
provide a list of cases and articles
about the either ship and inclusion and
how focusing features characters from
historically on underrepresented groups
women and leadership around the world
cases on Black CEOs and business owners
those are all important so we can attack
all diversity through our and build it
into our common curriculum and in the
classroom I think it's very important to
be prepared as I mentioned and just
swallow so you will start discussing and
addressing these racial injustice is we
need some of the things I've been
hearing you know from how our younger
generation Z is we need to make sure
that there is accountability you know
how are we gonna react to racist you
know comments having consequences for
aggressions and they can you know and
making change changing its maybe some
requirements for faculty and students on
Black history and diversity as a
dimension so in general I think we have
a great opportunity we need to address
it and we need to involve it we prepared
culturally religiously and
generationally open and and then keep
that in mind so we can provide this even
in the classroom in the university thank
you mom
so ladies and gentlemen of the kind of
this is our last question that we have
we have planned before we open up to the
questions from our audience and so the
last question is how do we think racism
and the pandemic combined will impact
our campus this fall
the combination of race relations and
the pandemic how do you think will
impact our campus when return in the
fall so I'll start off by saying that is
a very very loaded question and so I
think it's gonna impact it a number of
ways you know again we're dealing with
the pandemic and so we're gonna have a
new group of first-time students but
also returning students whose lives have
been impacted from an economic
standpoint you know jobs have been
impacted health outcomes have been
impacted and so we've got to recognize
that and then when we think about our
racial inequities you know we've got
groups of students that are on campus
that are not going to accept the status
quo around race relations as we have in
the past and rightfully so and so I
think as an institution we've got to
make sure we're able to respond to that
like Valerie said through our policies
through our practices but also you know
through facilitating conversations
because again I think these things are
going to come up in a lot of different
places they're going to come up in the
classroom they're gonna come up in our
residence halls they're gonna come up
you know in our Student Affairs Center
in the rec center and I think we all
have a duty and a moral obligation to be
prepared to to engage these
conversations to facilitate those
conversations so I think that you know
we're gonna wear one more hat in the
fall but I think we all got to prepare
for it because again we've got to be
able to serve our students how they're
coming to us anyone else from the panel
I would add you know I was really just
reading recently a very nice article by
Stephanie clearly from she teaches
diversity at the immersive Pennsylvania
Wharton School of Business and advised
educators so we're preparing ourselves
to conversations about race in
universities so she calls it trees so
are recognize that conversation about
race can create anxiety but you know
what we can reduce anxiety by just
talking about trees and then the a II
accept that tree is including my race in
your race will either be hyper visible
or invisible and then the see call on
internal and external wise for help we
need we need we need to have you know
support to be able to address those
things and then the II expected you will
need to provide some answers practical
tools skill base framework to help
students move from focusing on the
problems to hopefully creating solutions
and changing behavior thank you thank
you so at this time we will turn it over
to Bonita who will bring us the
questions from the audience
absolutely we have several questions
that have come in so bear with me as I
try to read those and pull those
together the first one wants to go back
to the topic of the police I mean the
question of defunding the police is that
the solution to the problems that we're
seeing today what are the panel's
thoughts on that well I think it's gonna
depend on what's meant by defunding the
police and I know that you know back to
the original conversation this is
something that's now become hugely
politicized
and I'm not sure people can have a
rational conversation about it right now
so I'm gonna change the approach just a
little bit funding defunding I don't
know but what we do need to have is a
different type of policing and that is
we need to recognize that the vast
majority of calls that police go to are
not dealing with violence they're
dealing with problems of human
and substance abuse and mental illness
and so we need to have people responding
to those calls who are actually trained
to deal with human misery substance
abuse and mental illness and most police
are not trained they're trained to deal
with violence so whether that comes down
to all we need two different groups of
people we need to have a differently
trained force we need some hybrid model
I don't know but in my opinion that's
what needs to happen is we need to
recognize the sorts of calls our first
responders get and make sure the people
who are responding are able to respond
to the human need David yeah you're on
mute Valerie said much better what I was
going to say I agree with everything she
just said I I also would say this there
there are people who would say that that
we shouldn't bother with doing any kind
of you know what we call reform of the
system in terms of you know how police
officers use force and what their
training is and the like I would say
that while I a thousand percent agree
that we need to reimagine what policing
looks like and think about ways to do
exactly what Valerie indicated which is
to shift resources to folks who can
address issues that don't require police
officer I also think that in the short
term it's important to make sure that we
don't have police officers in the
streets right now killing people because
they're using force that they shouldn't
be using or that they are doing other
sorts of things that exacerbate the the
disproportionate bringing of Black and
brown people into the system so I think
we need both I think we need to be
thinking big and also it
same time engaging in some sorts of
efforts to make to make the system work
better for people who were trapped up in
it now and I think something that
underlies this conversation is every
time we talk about the police mandate
and we talk about the police mission and
what we can do to reform policing we
that policing is necessary it's
something that this militarized
institution to design to control and
enforce the law is necessary and it may
not be necessary in the form that it
takes I think that what Valerie was
mentioning was more of a service model
can are not as criminogenic as the media
and other sources would have us to
believe so it could be that we could
just reevaluate the entire institution
and come out of it much girls thank you
the next question there are a couple of
questions from faculty members on they
were intrigued about the diversifying
and making their curriculum more diverse
do you all have any suggestions or
recommendations tips strategies for how
they can just make their curriculum and
their syllabuses their classroom just a
more diverse environment so I thought
one of the questions I would start off
by saying you know there's a lot of
training out there and this is something
that Darryl has on agenda saw I'll put
that plug in now of inclusive classrooms
how do we promote inclusion within our
classrooms and so I would say that you
know this fall in the spring and going
forward we're gonna make a kind of keeps
effort to make sure that we can provide
training around these issues you know we
offered a cultural competency training
through North advising previously and
one of the things we've been in talked
about how we can expand that to more
groups because one of the issues that
started thinking about how it can be
more inclusive is being culturally
competent it's understanding the
different potential groups we're going
to be engaging with and you know how we
engage them you know one thing I want to
emphasize and I think it's really
important we think about you know simply
African Americans that Blacks are not a
monolithic group and so one of the
challenges I think we
and time see is that we start thinking
cultural competency and we think well
about dealt with one of this group that
I can deal with any and so what am i
I'll say pet peeves is when we try to
lump in person of color to include
everyone who is non-White and so I think
that could be a starter because you know
the lived experience of a African
American in the United States is going
to be very very different than someone
who may be coming from a different
ethnic background and so you know taking
that into account as we think that we're
interacting with our students is all
individuals you know we started talking
about specifically out the curriculum
you know this needs to happen at the
department level but I would say that we
really need to take a hard look about
what we're teaching you know I use the
example of American history but and we
are touching on Black history in
American history
are we really teaching American history
and if we are really are teaching
American history are we really kicking
true an accurate American history and I
think you know as we look at many of our
courses we can find ways to be more
inclusive and more inclusive in our
content you know we have a section
within our genetic curriculum around
cultural pluralism but I don't like the
feeling that we think that those three
credit hours should be enough to ensure
that all of our students are exposed to
diversity inclusion and issues that
relate to populations of color so I
think there's a lot of things that we
can do and we will be rolling out
training to help help faculty in those
situations become more inclusive within
their classrooms as an instructor I I
can say that just be intentional about
it really take a look at your materials
for each class and explore them examine
them critically and are you being biased
in your perspective example I teach her
I used to teach a class on sociological
theory classical theory so that means
what a bunch of old White males thought
about how the way society functioned and
when I really critically looked at my
syllabus for this course I realized
there was no feminist voice there was no
person of color voice no Black history
voice none of that was was in that
traditional teaching of that class and
so I stepped back I made the changes and
I think that that's one of the things
can do we have to educate ourselves
because as the Andy was talking about
with the students at Northern I too went
through my undergraduate education at a
major regional institution and had one
African-American history professor and
that was it so that that voice is very
important and when when the the sources
of that that voice are limited it falls
on us it's our obligation and our duty
to make sure that we bring that to our
students
if I may add also I've been looking at
as I'm preparing my syllabus for the
fall I'm looking for material that can
Hance the diversity through even the
cases I'm teaching or some of the
assignments even changing the names of
you know the assignee you know in their
in the assignment or in the case or in
exercises if we're doing to make sure
that we are as diverse as possible one
another aspect I've been thinking about
is how we form the groups in the group
activities and the teamwork that we're
doing in the classroom how can we
educate ourselves as Karen and Andy
mentioned so we are prepared to educate
our students a classroom and have
especially the group work you know much
not only much enjoyable but a learning
movement for everyone to be more
inclusive thank you
the next question is about protests and
free speech how is the campus or what is
the campus responsibility and role and
how will they manage free speech and the
right to protest on the campus this fall
I think I'm gonna direct that one at
Andy you know one of the things that we
have to balance as a campus is we are
you know we focus on diversity and we're
committed diversity inclusion but you
also are committed to the First
Amendment and the ability for
individuals to speak freely and provide
their opinion so one of the difficult
things that we deal with is that there's
a lot of speech and a lot of language
that we don't like and so because of
that we
got to be a place that can be open to
all different forms of speech we've got
to be a place that would individuals say
things that we don't like or counter to
our beliefs we have the opportunity to
respond because in a democratic society
in a society that supports free speech
all individuals have a voice you know as
we think about speech that we think
borders on discrimination harassment
arising at level
Darryl's working on protocols in place
so we can respond as an University when
we get to that point but I want to
emphasize for our campus community that
the vast majority of speech out there is
protected speech and the way we combat
speech we don't like is more speech and
so when you hear things that you don't
like that don't aren't consistent with
your values I think you need to call it
out and I think you need to have you
know exercise your voice as well to let
individuals know that whatever they're
saying is not consistent with the values
of the University and we don't support
and I think if we as a community can
come together and be vocal and vigilant
and how we use our speech I think we can
see some change in some of the ideas and
things that we see going on on our
campus but also around our campus in the
region in the community all right thank
you
the next question probably can relate to
the pandemic anti-racism what tips and
strategies do you have for having the
conversations with people who believe
for example that systemic racism doesn't
exist or that the pandemic is not real
and it's not having the impacts that we
are seeing seeing you all have any tips
or strategies for how you engage in some
of those conversations I realize that
this may be a statement that others will
disagree with and that's fine because
you know I think there's some people who
would say don't waste your time having
conversations with folks who who are
going to do nothing but upset you I
think that there is value to
communicating with people you disagree
with free if no other reason even though
you disagree you get to see a glimpse of
their humanity because I think that that
everybody's got humanity and I think
part of reason why we're so broken and
politicized is because we're losing
sight of the humanity
and others so I think you have to lean
in and have a conversation where you
know it's not an argument but a
conversation why do you feel that way
you know if you disagree with someone to
you know tell me tell me what's leading
you to feel like you know wearing masks
are some form of oppression and if you
could have a genuinely open conversation
you may not leave that confident that
discussion feeling like you've bridged
the divide you may not get that other
person to agree with you you may never
agree with them but I think that that
that it does some good in terms of of at
least getting a chance for for for two
people who disagree to see each other's
humanity and maybe from that some some
good things will happen I know I will
just say in this legal practice that I
do representing people in the criminal
legal system I have gotten people who I
completely disagree with politically
completely to embrace criminal legal
system reform that we are involved in
because we sat and had conversations and
I didn't write them off they didn't
write me off and I would like to
underline what David just said and I
think when you're you're confronted with
someone whose views are completely polar
opposite of what you think it's very
easy to dismiss them as an idiot but I
think if you have a conversation and
struggle to find some point of agreement
that that is a place where you can start
building change I mean you may not ever
get someone to agree that systemic
racism is a problem but maybe they would
agree that what happened to George Floyd
was a problem and maybe we need to
figure out policies that could prevent
that from happening and so it may not be
the big change you're looking for but
baby steps still count as change and and
I agree with him the more we can have
these conversations perhaps the less
polarized we will be and the more focus
will be on creating some positive change
as opposed to just shouting loudly or
trying to convince someone
like everything I believe is right and
everything you believe is wrong so if I
could add just one thing to both what
David and Valerie said I also think we
have to remember as an institution of
higher education you know we do have a
duty to educate and so our students are
leaning on us to prepare for them to go
out into the workforce to go out into
the community and so those opportunities
to engage when there's a conversation
about an issue we may not agree on that
may be the only time that student
interacts with someone with a different
perspective in life and I think we have
an obligation to make sure we need we
engage their students because when they
go out into the workforce we want to
make sure they're exposed to as many
different perspectives and as many
different ideas and thought processes as
possible and if we don't take advantage
of those opportunities we're going to be
doing them a huge disservice so I think
if we look at them as individuals coming
with unique perspectives and this is an
opportunity for us to at least expose
them to something as two tips we can use
that will help us with a lot of these
conversations great there is a question
a couple of questions are about voting
and civic duties and responsibilities
and there's a thought that higher ed may
not be preparing your students well
enough in those areas to know the
significance of it or what it means what
do you all think about again higher Ed's
role in preparing that and where would
students get that in their matriculation
through a university
well let me just say this it is not it
should not fall fall on higher education
when I was in elementary school that's
when I learned about the importance of
voting
I remember watching what was it that
show on ABC on Saturday mornings or just
schoolhouse rocks I think or something I
think that's what my memory is is foggy
because I'm old now but you know I
remember learning about how a bill gets
passed and and things of that nature we
talked about that in my elementary
school and in middle school and I
recognized I got the benefit of a good
public school education growing up where
I where I was where I was raised not
everybody gets that but I think that's
even less the case now you know III
talked to folks who are saying well the
reason I'm voting for this candidate for
president is because the day the day
they get in office they're gonna make
reparations for Black people happen I'm
like wow wait a minute
the president doesn't get to just do
everything that the president wants to
there's a Congress and this is how
things happen lots of people have no
idea so I don't know if I have the
answer to what higher ed should be doing
I I do think that we should recognize
that there is a deficit that many of our
students are coming to us with in terms
of never being educated on civics the
importance of being engaged and wherever
I can in the classes that I teach I find
ways to work in the importance of voting
I I almost always talk about that in
some way shape or form because it
matters it really matters Benita if I
can jump in ah you know I think that
David makes some excellent points you
know when you think about some k12
systems are talking about this but as he
mentioned many of our students are
coming with zero exposure to that and so
I think we have a duty as higher ticket
institutions to find out ways to connect
with our students on important issues or
issues that we think important I think
it's unanimous in this panel
unanimous across campus that voting is
important and so I think we've got to
start thinking about how can we pray on
you how can we plan co-curricular
programs around these issues you know
we're not pushing one agenda versus
another we just want individuals to be
engaged and be civically engaged and
part of that falls on us to make sure
that as we're going through the year as
our student affairs professionals are
thinking about one of the things that we
want to connect our students with it
should be around these issues because
again if someone goes to their k12
system and their higher education system
and they've never been connected to the
idea of voting it's important and why
it's important then the educational
system has done them some extent agent
service and so being a student ready
institution we've got to make sure that
we pick up the gaps and meet students
where they are and we think that's a gap
we've got to be intentional on how we
feel that going very good and this is
the last question there's a lot going on
a lot of them seem like daunting tasks
and challenges what are you all finding
that's inspiring or what gives you hope
coming out of this both of these are
pandemic and the and the racism I think
one thing that gives me hope maybe the
word hope is overblown
because I I've been through so many
cycles of this but at least what I see
with the current protests is that they
are definitely multiracial and so the
racism the challenge of racism in our
country is no longer something that
Black Americans have to carry on their
shoulders alone but I think for the very
first time since really the 1960s early
70s have I seen this many White people
engaged in trying at least to brought
draw attention to these challenges and
that gives me hope because in your gonna
it's gonna take the majority of citizens
of this country to create systemic
change and so we need to have the
majority strongly engaged I would add to
Valerie point which is also what's
giving you hope it's multi-generational
to seeing jazzy
a more active on the streets in protest
but also social media even
tik-tok and social media venues but
being active this is gives me a lot of
hope about the future in addition to all
of those things seeing police officers
taken in with protesters that's
something we've never seen before in any
movement the police have always drawn
the thin blue line they're there with
their SWAT gear and you have some
individuals taking it and identifying
with the protesters and to me that's
phenomenal I think that the fact that
majorities of people across racial
gender and generational lines support
Black Lives Matter is inspirational to
me I I take hope in that I really do and
and I hope more and more people will
come to understand that Black lives
matter is not about saying that only
Black lives matter but for too long in
this country black people's lives have
not mattered and that they matter also
and I think that the tragedy of what
happened in those eight minutes and 46
seconds when the life was squeezed and
out of George Floyd has woken up a lot
of people to the fact that Black lives
have not mattered for me you know what I
see hope or inspiration is the fact that
I think now in all of our institutions
in the country individuals are
recognizing that Black people have a
different experience and so one of the
things that's been really unique and
exciting is that we're seeing a lot of
our you know White brothers and sisters
reaching out asking how you're doing and
we've been dealing with these things for
as long as we can all remember but never
before in the past I think we've seen
uniformly how individuals are saying how
are you are you doing okay and how can I
help I think that's a huge step in a
step that we have not seen in the past
so when I think about Owens
firing it is the fact that we've got
other than the biggest were really
concerned with our well being it's
really exciting it really encouraged
Dallas back to you.
Thank You, Bonita. So ladies and gentlemen
we're coming to closure here. And I want
to first thank our panelists and but I
also want to thank a Vice President,
Bonita Brown, for pulling us all together
today for the Town Hall. What many of you
may not know this is the first of many
that will happen during this academic
school year and moving forward. And so
we're really excited to have
opportunities like this. Having these
conversations are an essential part of
healing and growth and today our
panelists touched on so many topics and
gave us incredible guidance and
information. And although these are
difficult times as we've seen lately
there's also been an outpouring of love
and support across the races. And it's
been very important I appreciate you
know what Ande shared just now because
it's very true. When people call and say
how are you and and show they're caring.
So today we, as we close, we realize the
NKU is a small representation of the
nation. And that we're going to have
different views and different opinions.
And it's our diversity of views that what
makes us strong and what makes us great.
I'm proud to be a part of what we're
building here at Northern Kentucky
University. Yes, we have much work
remaining at our University and across
the country as we work toward a more
equitable society but let's remember to
celebrate the victories along the way.
Our community will engage and more of
these conversations, like I shared. And in
the future they will also include
students. We will hear their voices as
well. So with that thank you for coming
with us and we appreciate you engaging with us
today and have a wonderful weekend.
