SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California State University, Sacramento is planning some major changes following the protests in Sacramento over the death of George Floyd, a Black Minnesota man who was killed by a police officer who knelt on his neck until he was unconscious.
University President Robert Nelsen, who knows his words are not enough in a time of unrest, says there's no space for inaction. In an interview with ABC10's Mike Duffy, Neslon detailed what the community can expect from Sac State moving forward.
The following interview has been edited for clarity.
ABC10: What are you doing to make changes at Sac State?
Robert Nelson: We had had a town hall to talk about racism on our campus. At that town hall, we were reminded that words are important but actions are more important. Looking at everything that’s happening in Sacramento right now. Whether it’s the riots, whether it’s things happening on my campus, we knew we had to come up with some actions and make a difference. Because it’s not enough to apologize for what’s going on. We have to make sure we have some way to make a difference and change things. So we came up with a series of ideas, everything from an anti-racist plan to having and ombudsperson on campus who could actually handle questions about racism to having an anti-bias reporting tool. We knew we needed to have something to serve our students and our faculty and our staff.
How will this time be different?
Instead of just trying to make ourselves feel good about who we are and just talking about inclusion, we want to talk about what do we do different in our curriculum. What do we do different in our hiring procedures. Let’s make a difference.
Is something different this time around?
I feel like something is hugely different. I grew up in the 60s. We always talked about making a difference and trying to have peace, love, harmony, and everything. We certainly never accomplished it. Today if you look at what’s happening, if you look at the death of Mr. Floyd, if you look at what happened with the woman in the park and what she tried to pull off, these are not the same. It’s time to stop and time to admit that we have a responsibility and we have a complicity. In my email I tried to be very explicit. It’s on my shoulders. I’m responsible. And why am I responsible? Partly because I’m the president of Sac State, but largely because I’m a white person as well. And this is a white problem. And a problem we have to be actively solving.
Sacramento’s often considered one of the most diverse cities in the country. How can Sacramento lead the way when it comes to an issue like this?
When I came to Sacramento five years ago, I took great pride in saying all the time in saying Sacramento State is the 4th most diverse university west of the Mississippi. It took me a while, but I learned eventually that maybe we weren’t the 4th most caring university west of the Mississippi. And then what I’ve learned now, beyond that, it’s not just about being inclusive and caring, it is are we the most proactive university west of the Mississippi. Or east of the Mississippi. And I think Sacramento is at a point right now in our history where we have to be proactive, where we have to step up and own what has happened instead of blaming people for what has happened.
Follow the conversation on Facebook with Mike Duffy.
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