Transcripts from major presentations at the 2008 forum

Keynote Speaker Eduardo Bonilla-Silva

I always wonder why people clap before they listen to the speaker.  Good morning.

I want to begin by thanking the various representatives from the native peoples of Wisconsin for their blessings.  And since I’m going to get busy, I’m going to take my jacket off because I get emotional.

I am pleased to be back at UW where I received my Ph.D. 15 years ago and where my son, Omar Francisco Bonilla, that kid there, was born 22 years ago and is today a rising senior.  You better graduate.  No more money for you.

Today, I will address an issue I feel very strongly about, the diversity puzzle at HWCUs, Historically White Colleges and Universities.  For me, the diversity puzzle is personal, but at UW, it is more personal and once upon a time, I was one of the students who pressured this university to institute a comprehensive multicultural plan.  As a member of the minority coalition, which was a coalition of various minority organizations here, we raised hell for two to three years to force UW to do something about its serious lack of diversity.  And I said we raised hell as the diversity initiatives in place today at UW and elsewhere in the nation are in large measure the direct result of students’ movements for racial justice.

So what is the state of UW’s diversity efforts 20 years after the minority coalition mobilized thousands of students?  Twenty years after the holy report in Donna Shalala’s Madison Plan.  It is sad for me to report or to say that in terms of diversity, the UW of today is not much different than the UW I left 15 years ago.  Although the proportion of minority faculty and students has increased; for students, from 10 to 14%; and from faculty, from 10 to 15; the bulk of the increase is deceptive, a fact you acknowledge in every report.

The growth is deceptive because it is mostly concentrated in one group, Asian-Americans, a group that as a group is not at the bottom of the racial totem pole in the nation.  This fact is further complicated because of the Asian-American students and faculty at UW, very few belong to under represented Southeast Asian groups.  I would be remiss if I did not point out this is not a UW problem but a national problem.  The diversity data in most HWCUs, and I want us talk to that concept, HWCUs, so the diversity data in all HWCUs is quite similar.  That is the bulk of the increase in minority representation in the last 20 years.  It has been mostly on one group.

The 2007 faculty diversity and excellence report issued by the College of Letters and Science at UW also addressed other inconvenient truths.  For example, the tenure rate for all women at Wisconsin is much lower than for men; 55% for men, 42% for women.  So gender matters.  But for women of color, the rate is an abysmal 33%, so the interaction between gender and racism is powerful.

Furthermore, a finding indicative of the climate of alienation, minority faculty experienced at Wisconsin is that 55% of minority faculty report their peers do not regard their research as mainstream which has tremendous repercussions for their tenure and standing in their departments.

Regarding minority students, they still complain about things we complain about 20 years ago such as the limited number of students, faculty and staff of color, a hostile climate, limited support from staff and faculty, and a curriculum that is not thoroughly multicultural and relevant.

Accordingly, the puzzle I explore today is the following: Omar, I want you to deal with this.  You’re going to repay me all the money I had given you.  So why have UW diversity efforts produced so little change?  And I hope no one gets defensive as diversity programs in universities across the nation have had a very limited success.

To examine this puzzle, I must make a detour and first explain, what is racism?  “Money well spent.”  What is the character of discrimination in the Post-Civil Rights Era?  And what is the nature of racial discourse in contemporary America?  This background is necessary to explain why I believe diversity programs as currently structured are unlikely to be successful.

To advance my punch line, so long as diversity programs operate within the logic and practice of an HWCU, the best they can accomplish is cosmetic diversity.  This is a lot so please fasten your intellectual seatbelts as I will go like in the movie, “Fast and Furious.”

The first thing I want to address today is conceptual because in my view, it has monumental repercussions.  For most, racism is the KKK or in the case of universities, fraternities and sororities doing slave auctions or ghetto parties or students and faculty and staff saying or doing racially insensitive things.  Accordingly, when Don Imus, or Dog the Bounty Hunter, said the things they said, or we hear about the ordeal of the Jena Six in Louisiana, or we read about the professor at the UW Law School making disparaging remarks about people, we reflexively think that is racism.

And what is wrong with interpreting these events as racist?  Adding all these things after all truly racist.  The problem as I have argued in my work is two-fold.  First, by classifying overt racial events as what racism is all about, we fail to understand that racism forms a social system.  We fail to appreciate that we all participate in racism as a system; some as its beneficiaries and some as its victims.  If racism were limited to the actions of a few silly folks, racism would have been eliminated on the face of the earth a long time ago.

But the systems of racial domination we humans created around the invented category race are still with us because as systems, they are anchored in real practice and behaviors that produce positions of relative privilege for some and subordination for others.  Therefore, the crop of racism as a system is material rather than psychological.  Systemic racism remains in place because it benefits Whites as a social group.

The second problem with conceiving racism as a psychological quirk or the overt racially motivated behavior of some individuals, the so-called racists, is that we miss most of the normative racial affairs happening before our own eyes.  As I will argue soon, nowadays, most racial events and behaviors in the public space are surreal, institutionalized and apparently nonracial.  Hence, by focusing our attention on overt racial events for moral judgment and political action, we legitimate an erroneous conceptualization of racism, clout efforts to highlight how race matters in the everyday life and help sustain the notion of America the beautiful as a country that is no longer racist because racial incidents are as we say in colleges, isolated incidents.

I now move on and describe the general character of discrimination in contemporary America as well as the nature of the racial discourse it has produced.  I have labeled the dominant racial practices that maintain racial inequality today as the new racism.  By this, I mean the apparently beyond race character of most public racial practices.  This new system of racial practices emerged in the late ‘60s, early ‘70s, and has all but replaced the Jim Crow style discrimination of yesteryears.

So for more on that beautiful book that still sells for $19.95, let me give you a few specific examples of new racism practices.

We all know residential segregation was maintained in the past through the racial terrorism of individual Whites, housing covenants, neighborhood associations in the north, and citizen councils in the south, and by the active participation of the federal government, which among other things certified racist lending practices and transferred billions of dollars to Whites for the construction of roads to access White suburbia.

But as these practices became illegal and the normative climate of the post-civil rights era disallowed the open exercise and expression of racist behavior, one would expect residential segregation to have dwindled.  Yet, this is not the case.  Today, residential segregation remains a huge problem in the country.  How can this be?

Social scientists have documented that the high level of residential segregation is not because people of color want to self-segregate as so many Whites believe, or due to poverty and class inequality as some people argue.  Residential segregation remains a problem because discrimination in the housing and lending markets are still facts of our racial life.  Report of the report shows how little we have improved in this area and how new racism style discrimination is behind our current levels of residential apartheid.

For example, the Civil Rights Project at Harvard report titled “More than money” points out that, “Affordability alone cannot explain the existing pattern of segregation,” and adds, “the main reasons for continuous segregation include stealing by realtors,” that is where realtors take some people some places for the people or places.  “Subprime loans given disproportionally to Blacks and Latinos,” and we have learned a lot about subprime loans lately.

Lastly, a lack of action by the area cities and towns.  The fair housing center of greater Boston report of 2006 states their testers experience discrimination 45% of the time and their Black testers 50%.  Interestingly, the exclusionary tactic most often used was providing differential information to minority applicants about the availability of housing units.  All in all, they found Whites were five to six times more likely to be told about available units than minority applicants.  The report told of one Black tester who was advised the apartment she has seen was not available until January 1st while the White tester was told December 1st; advantage White by a month.

In another case, a Latino tester and a White tester both emailed an agent and left voice messages.  The White tester received a return email including photos of an available apartment and made an appointment to see it.  The Latino tester received no response from the agent; no soup for you.

Regarding the banking industry, the Center for Responsible Lending released a study in 2006 based on all the loans processed in the State of North Carolina in 2004.  I’m going to get emotional because I got my loan for my house in 2004.  After careful statistical analysis, they found, “Blacks were still 29% more likely to pay a high interest rate on a fixed rate home purchase loan.”  The report doesn’t say much about Latinos and says nothing about Black Latinos like me.  So maybe I got the double whammy.

A 2007 report by the Woodstock Institute found Blacks were six times more likely to get a subprime loan than Whites, and Latinos five times more likely.

All these housing and banking practices exemplify new style discrimination because they are hard to detect and even harder to label racial unless one has the smoking gun.  How can one prove new style discrimination by banks, realtors or renters?  In the case of banks, one would need access to all loans approved to demonstrate that race matters, which by the way has been done and we have documented that race matters.  Or have a whistle blower telling us how banks fake the racial funk.

This implies that in order for people of color to prove discrimination, we must bring a White friend along to go shopping, buy a car, get a loan, rent an apartment or buy a house, drive a car, walk in the streets or well to do almost anything in America.

Is Tim Moy in the audience?  Tim?  That’s it.  You’re my White friend and I need you.

Time does not allow me to go further but similar new racism practices have been documented in other venues and areas of life.  Before I move, I have to give you one example.

So yes, I’m a professor at Duke University, presumably successful, but I don’t walk with a sign stipulating I’m a different kind of minority, not the ones you think are going to do this or that or that to you, so please do not discriminate against me.  So I navigate America the way I look and sound; beautifully dark Latino with a beautiful charming Latino accent.  Which by the way is the accent of the future of the nation; your kids will look and sound like me.

So I go to a store, 30 seconds into the store, I get, “May I help you?”  “Just looking.”  Thirty seconds later, “May I help you?”  As I told you 30 seconds ago, “I’m just looking,” and again and again, “May I help you?”  African-Americans and Latino members in this audience recognize this is a new way of telling you we’re checking you.  But it is a difficult way because if I were to go to a court of law and claim discrimination based on the fact that someone asked me five times, “May I help you,” I would look like a fool.  So what do I do?  Now, I go by the rule of two.  The first time, cleanly and clearly, I let them know I’m just looking.  And if they come 30 seconds later, I tell them, “Yes, I’m trying to steal this fancy coat and I was wondering if you could give me a few pointers about how I can accomplish that task.”  Of course, alert members of this audience know that sometimes we miss.  So far, I’m betting for a thousand because whenever I have done this, their reaction is, “I didn’t mean it that way.”  And I tell them, “If you didn’t, your response should be, ‘huh?’”

Now, I lecture across the nation and when I mention this example, young members of the audience come after and tell me, “In the store I work, we do this or that.”  So they sort of confess to me other ways of sort of accomplishing the same goal in a clever way.

Now, I discuss the dominant racial discourse in the U.S.A.  In my “Racism without Racists” book, I argue the nasty in your face you people are inferior to us racial discourse of the past has been for the most part replaced by a more elusive racism I call color-blind racism.  Color-blind racism is the racial ideology that rules how most of us talk about race matters.  This ideology allows Whites to manufacture apparently non-racial color-blind explanations for all sorts of race-related issues.

I suggest two fundamental things about this ideology.  First, as the dominant racial ideology in the nation, most Whites subscribe to it wholeheartedly.  This includes most of you in the audience, but we’re friends and family, so we’re not going to get mad.

Second, color-blind racism comprise of friends style and racial stories seems suave, almost gentile but it is not.  In fact, it is the most significant political tool available to Whites to explain and ultimately justify the racial order.

The central frames of this ideology are minimization of racism, cultural racism, naturalization and abstract liberalism.  And I will illustrate one of them for you.

Abstract liberalism allows Whites to frame race-related issues in the language of liberalism and thus makes Whites seem reasonable while opposing all practical approaches to deal with de facto racial inequality.  For instance, Jim, a 30-year-old computer software salesperson from a privilege background explained his opposition to affirmative action as follows:

I think it is unfair top to bottom on everybody and the whole process.  Often, discrimination itself is a bad word, right?  But you discriminate everyday.  You want to buy a beer at the store and there are six kinds of beers.  You can get from Natural Light to some others, right?  And you look at the price and you look at the can of beer and it’s a choice.  And a lot of that, you have laid out in front of you.  Which one do you get?  Now, should the government sponsor Samuel Adams and make it cheaper than Natural Light because it is brewed by someone in Boston?  That doesn’t make more sense, right?  Why would we want that or make Samuel Adams eight times as expensive because we want people to buy natural Light?

I always begin my formal comments on color-blind racism with this quote precisely because it doesn’t seem racist.  For those of you who are still hooked with Jim Crow racism, this is like, what is wrong with that?  I sort of agree with that.  So let me help you out.

Since Jim assumes hiding decisions are like market choices, choosing between competing brands of beer, he embraces a laser fair position on hiring.  The problem with Jim’s view, a view shared by most Whites, is that labor market discrimination is alive and well and affects Black and Latino job applicants anywhere between 30 to 50% of the time.

Secondly, although Jim believes, as most Whites, that jobs are awarded in a meritocratic fashion, researches have documented that most jobs, as many as 80% of them, are obtained through informal networks.  America is not a meritocratic nation, we know that.  One example: George Bush.  And this finding applies to good, he is a great teaching tool.  Those of you who teach Intro to Sociology, you believe it is a meritocratic nation, explain George Bush.  So this finding applies to good as well as to bad jobs.  Therefore, by upholding a strict laser fair view on hiring while ignoring the significant impact of discrimination in the labor market, Jim can safely voice his opposition to affirmative action in an apparently race-neutral way.

There is much more to this ideology but I refer interested parties to my 2006 book available in amazon.com for just $25.

So with this background in place, I can now discuss HWCUs.  We signal the racial character of HBCUs by calling them HBCUs, Historically Black Colleges and Universities.  We believe these colleges are all Black and some even believe these institutions have lost their reason to exist.  In truth, we do not know much about these colleges.  For instance, do you know non-Black faculty account for 45% of all faculty at HBCUs?  Or that despite that these colleges are severely under-funded, they still serve the Black community in very important ways?

As a report of Black pieces network indicates, even without only 60% of the Black students in college, HBCUs account for 28% of the bachelor’s degrees received by Black students nationwide.  In some southern states, HBCUs graduate even greater percentages of African-Americans.  According to the Department of Education, HBCUs graduate more than 50% of the Black students who receive bachelor’s degree in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina and Virginia.

Lastly, do you know the student body in HBCUs is at least as diverse, about 20% non-Black, as HWCUs?  Please, always remember that HBCUs are the product of racial exclusion in this country, so their degree of diversity and their very existence should be interpreted with different lenses than HWCUs.  So don’t go and tell me, well, HBCUs are sort of reverse discrimination unlike you got to be smoking the wacky tobaccy.  With some of you, I was last night in the terrace so some traditions remain.

So we recognize HBCUs in racial terms, albeit in distorted ways, but we never think about the whiteness of the places we labor.  We seldom think about the history and practices that created and maintained these institutions as White institutions.  And I will address why we don’t see this whiteness in the breakout session.

Instead, we can see these places in universalistic terms as just colleges.  However, these colleges have a history, demography, curriculum, climate and a set of symbols and traditions that embody, signify and reproduce whiteness and white supremacy.

Although we downplay the central fact, universities such as UW were established as all White and most remain so until the 1970s.  Wisconsin, for example, despite its radical traditions and the student activism in the ‘60s remain a lily-white place until Chancellor William Sewell, first a sociologist, pressured because of his inefficient handling of the tumultuous events of ‘67 and ‘68, enacted a series of policies to diversify the university.  Thus, a central constitutive component of HWCUs is their historical White demography.  However, I’m sure a few of you would doubt that what past history as the classics as philosophy and as sociology in HWCUs like Wisconsin until the 1960s was absolutely bias toward Whites, the west and Europe.

And probably most of you would agree with the great Black historian, Carter G. Woodson, who stated the following in the 1930s in his “The Miseducation of the Negro.”  Much of what universities have taught us, economics, history, literature, religion and philosophy is propaganda.  When a negro has finished his education in our schools, then he has been equipped to begin the life of an Americanized or Europeanized White man.  The present system under the control of Whites trains the negro to be White and at the same time convinces him of the impropriety or the impossibility of his becoming White.

This curricular concern is a hot issue because many minority students and faculty still believe a lot of the knowledge transmitted in HWCUs is one-sided, not relevant to their experiences and Eurocentric.  By the way, let the record reflect that the minority coalition asked for a thorough curricular revision and for educators at UW to consider Paulo Freire’s dictums on education.

We ask educators to always consider the possibility they may need to be educators and from time to time by their own students.  Our call then was not for dropping standards or canons which was the caricature conservatists put out there in the public square.  We were not forbearing the work of dead White guys but for the canons to be open to alternative interpretations, for the canons to be discussed as anything should in a true university, and for the possibility that we may need diversity of canons.

On this, I agree with Sandra Harding who states in her “Science and Social Inequality” that lack in ecological systems, “The cognitive diversity generated by cultural and local knowledge projects is a great resource for our species.”

HWCUs also have traditions that predate their so-called integration, many of which are exclusionary such as homecoming.  If we’re not part of the home or felt not welcome when we’re at home, we would not do the homecoming thing.  Yet, other traditions are almost innocently exclusionary such as Friday afternoon tea at Smith College or yearbooks.  That’s the Wisconsin yearbook circa 1931.  You know because of the funny haircuts.

Some of these traditions are sometimes highly racialized as is the case of offensive mascots throughout the U.S.A.  And at times, the defense or lamentation for losing this tradition has the flavor of the defense of the confederate flag in the south.  I’m not going to read that but this is a statement by the president of the alumni association at Illinois after they were forced to remove Chief Illiniwek from their mascots.  It reads like a lamentation of all he was great and whatever.

Lastly, HWCUs engender a white ecology and culture.  Fagan had also suggested the most damaging component of discrimination in higher education is “their taking for granted by most white administrators, faculty, staff and students that the campus is a White place in which Blacks and others are admitted as best as guests.”  This White ecology bolstered by attitudes, traditions and quite often by alcohol is the reason 25% of minority students in the nation report experiencing hate crimes in HWCUs ranging from the mild name-calling to physical violence and threats.  And I believe this number severely underestimated hate crimes in universities because as you know, we, professors, we, administrators, are in the business of lowering that number unless we want to have a negative public relation situation.

The combined effects of White symbols in HWCUs create an oppressive racial ecology were just walking in campus is unhealthy for many minority students.  Where my students feel, as one observer commented, “As guests who have no history” in the house they occupy.  There are no photographs on the wall that reflect their image.  Their paraphernalia painting sense and sounds do not appear in the house.

In the case of UW, you have statues for Lincoln, pictures of all White presidents and chancellors and building and after building named after White folks.  But where are the statues honoring the many Native American leaders in this state’s history?  Where are the buildings named after important minority educators and leaders?

Many HWCUs co-create college stands such as Madison, or college station where Texas A&M is located that mimic the nature and White flavor of these colleges.  Hence, local businesses and even townspeople cater to White only or White mostly interests.  Catering to Whites may lead to a defending turf type of mentality.  When dealing with people of color such as three years ago when an employee at Ed’s Express here in Madison approached a group of Black students eating dinner and told them, “I’m sick of you people leaving piles of shit all over our tables,” and added, “I want you to leave the premises.  I don’t want you here.”

Although HWCUs are horrid places for students of color, they are great places for most White students.  Thus, a Black student in Fagan’s book lamented, “Sometimes, I’m like god.  If I was White, I have the best time.  They get to have parties at frat houses.  They don’t have to pay for it.  They just have the best time.  Everything is geared toward them.  Their campus paper is geared toward them.  Everybody agrees.”

I now conclude by addressing the implications of my arguments.  First, UW like the nation at large must appreciate that the problem of racism we should look at the core of the diversity dilemma is systemic rather than a matter of a few prejudiced students, faculty and staff.  The new thinking on diversity must be rooted on this social fact.  And accordingly, UW must understand that until it becomes a multicultural university, diversity efforts will accomplish late.

But let me be clear, I am not suggesting that since racism is a national problem, universities cannot do anything until the nation changes.  On the contrary, because of the peculiar role of universities as institutions of knowledge production, as places willing to experiment and as potential repositories of what is good in society, they can and should struggle to forge spaces where racial democracy and racial justice flourish.

HWCUs like UW can enact non-reformists reforms with the goals of eliminating their White foundation and structure and fostering their transformation into truly inclusive and democratic institutions of higher learning.  The work will be hard but HWCUs can re-imagine and reinvent themselves into pockets of anti-racism and through universalism in the U.S.

Second, as I argued today, impose civil rights America, Whites have created a color-blind racist way of talking about racial matters.  This has produced a formidable racial arsenal of words, phrases and arguments thus giving Whites the discursive upper-hand as they can express and defend their racial interest in an apparently non-racial manner.  The new racial discourse and climate of contemporary America has led university administrators and human resource personnel in the business world to switch the language, justification and policy content of programs that were the product of racial struggles and were originally couched as initiatives for achieving racial justice.

On this matter, I cite Maulana Karenga, director of Black Studies at California State University, Long Beach.  “By redefining affirmative action as an issue of diversity, pride and justice, it has the fact that in a multicultural society, their recognition and respect of diversity is indeed a justice issue.  And this recognition and respect can only be expressed and reaffirmed in relations of shared wealth, power and status, and only achieved and sustained in the storm, thunder and whirlwind of struggle regardless of reports of current and continuous social sunshine from the smiling weathermen and women of the established order and its allies.”

Isn’t he a great writer?  Love him.

Hence, we need to do what seems almost impossible at this juncture and refrain our diversity programs as reparations and as guarantees, we are still in the business of creating a truly multicultural and egalitarian America.

Finally, and this is hard to hear for university faculty, so please bear with me.  Getting to the racial promise land of milk and honey will not be the result of good deeds, of enlightened administrators following best practices on diversity.

At Wisconsin, the genesis of Shalala’s Madison Plan was a militant minority-led student movement.  Although I hope enlightened administrators and progressive White students work alongside minority groups to recast the diversity efforts at Wisconsin as they did during the Black strike of 1969, as they did in the 1980s when they joined the demands of the minority coalition, and as they have done at almost every moment of racial struggle in our America.

I also note the lessons of history so sickeningly stated by Black abolitionist, Frederick Douglass.  Omar, this is for you.  “Power concedes nothing without a demand.  It never did and it never will.”

Following Douglass’ philosophy, I use this opportunity to make an appeal to minority organizations and their allies at UW and elsewhere.  My friends, to use McCain’s tried expression, you have been too quiet in the last 15 years.  You passivity has delayed racial progress at Wisconsin and in the nation.  It is time for you to once again get busy and demand UW and the nation gives you what you deserve, hope and dream through equal opportunity once and for all.  Without your social mobilization, by which I do not mean voting in elections, the good intentions of this administration to be diversified at UW and I believe this administration is sincere in its efforts.

So without your struggle, it will not produce the desired change.  If you organize, if you protest, if you say enough is enough, you have a chance to transform this HWCU into Dr. King’s vision of the beloved community.  But if you remain apathetic, if you remain only concerned about your individual affairs, if you miss the train of history which is moving very fast, at this juncture, 20 years from today, I may be invited here to address yet again the diversity puzzle at UW.  Thank you.

Chancellor Carolyn “Biddy” Martin

Good afternoon.  Thanks to Steve for that much too positiveintroduction.  Now, I have too much tolive up to and I’m not happy about that; just kidding.  I wish you all a really good afternoon.  I hope you’ve had a great day today.  I wish I could’ve been here for more of theday.  It’s one of the unpleasant parts ofbeing in a position like this that too frequently I end up having to show upfor short periods and then move on, but I hope the day has gone extremely well,and thanks to everybody who had a part in organizing it.  Thanks in particular to those of you whodecided to include me in the program.  Ireally appreciate it.

I’m not going to speak about specific programs today.  As you know very well, I arrived here about alittle over a month ago and started officially on September 1st.  It would be presumptuous and premature for meto start commenting on specific programs at UW-Madison.  So what I thought I would do instead is justsay a little bit about some of the things that are important to me and what Ibelieve is important.

I’m sure that my remarks will echo much of what you’ve heardover the course of the day and much of what you’ve discussed yourselves so I’llbe brief and leave plenty of time for questions and answers or discussionsamong you.

Let me begin with just an obvious list of factors that shapethe context for thinking about diversity in 2008.  I’m not going to say much that’s very subtleor detailed about any of them.  I’msimply going to leave them out there.

Obviously globalization. Obviously, the changing the demographics in the United States,some of which but not all of which are related to globalization.  Stark inequalities not only in the United Statesbut across the world, and stark inequalities that are much too closely alignedwith gender, race and ethnicity.  Theurgent need for talent and creativity as we shift to a knowledge economy, anequally urgent need for collaboration and teamwork in our workforce and evenmore urgent need, I would argue, for understanding cooperation and even loveacross cultures or cultural boundaries.

At the university specifically, we have a unique opportunityin 2008 going forward to diversify the faculty and staff precisely because ofthe very large number of retirements that will occur in the course of the next10 years.

Finally, I want to emphasize something that you will almostcertainly have heard from Damon Williams who is one of the national leaders intrying to shift the language and concepts we use to think about diversitytowards something he calls inclusive excellence.  And what I want to say is that everyone needsto recognize that excellence and progress on every front in the universityrequires diversity of people and also of perspectives both.

And all these factors make it imperative that we doeverything we can now to diversify the faculty, staff and student body.  And as Steve just said, and as I’m sure youyourselves know and think, we’re not going to succeed without a very concertedeffort, a clear understanding of what we seek to do and a shared understandingof how high the stakes are.  We alsocan’t succeed if we fail to understand the many complicated obstacles tochange, that is, if we’re not realistic and pragmatic in our approach.  And as Steve cited me as having said atCornell, sometimes, ideology on all sides stands in the way of the forms ofrealism and pragmatism that are so essential in addition to vision andinsistence or what you call the pushiness.

It won’t do to call for greater diversity and hiring, forexample, if we’re not also really focused on helping create the pipeline ofqualified students; undergraduate and graduate students.  If we’re not proactive in our approach tohiring faculty and staff, if we don’t do what Steve just read, cited me, ashaving said at Cornell, if we don’t require of departments and programs that webuild pools of possible candidates and advance of any authorization to search,I don’t think that diversification will actually happen.  I don’t think we’ll succeed if our efforts ofdiversity are isolated from the ways in which we defined educational andresearch success and excellence.

Now, I’m just going to use my time for a few minutes to tellyou why I’ve never liked the term diversity. And perhaps, I should put it slightly more gently and say I’ve neverbeen comfortable with the term diversity but don’t worry because I’m going tokeep using it just as I know all of us will because it’s the coin of therealm.  But if you’ll indulge me for amoment, I’ll tell you why I don’t like it.

First of all, it occurred to me when it became current thatit’s awfully antiseptic, sort of strips the conception of any notion of problemor conflict or complexity.  Now, I shouldsay probably that the word itself doesn’t do this obviously but the uses towhich it has sometimes been put.

Secondly, it’s a flat word. It seems to imply at least in its uses that there are no structuralimpediments and it seems to imply as though the fact of diversity were enoughall on its own.  It also has seemed inits uses to imply that the issues are the same for all groups and allindividuals.  And that simply is not thecase.

It has come to suggest in many places or to imply that wewould have achieved our goals when we have representation from groups that aredefined and fairly static in undifferentiated ways.  In other words, it doesn’t take account of diversitywithin diversity.  And it often deludespeople into thinking the categories that make up a diverse group of people aresimpler than they really are.

Fourth, it has tended to reduce the problem to numbers, tothings that can be counted and things that can be made visible leaving out theimportance of context.  Sexualorientation is a good example, I think. It is often listed as part of what we mean by diversity but when itcomes to articulating goals, it falls out of the equation presumably because itcan’t be counted or it can’t be seen or perhaps because it simply seems tooradical to call for more gay students, faculty and staff.

Fifth, diversity is also framed too frequently as if it’s anend in itself with no necessary link to other forms of institutional culture orchange.  And I would say that the merepresence of people from different backgrounds is not an educational value ifthere’s no interaction and exchange between and among people from differentplaces.

One of the things that gets to me most is that diversity,the term and the concepts, seems to be used as if it’s a goal or a politicalcause that you could either agree with or not agree with.  You could support it or oppose it.  This really bothers me because diversity issimply a reality.  It’s the reality ofhuman difference and that’s not something that can be opposed; that is, one canoppose realizing the best advantages we have the potential to see in ourdifferences but I hate the degree to which diversity has become a sort ofpolitical term that people seem to think can be equated with a cause that we eitheraffirm or oppose.

People are different. And as a humanist, I know that the word reality is something I shouldprobably not be using but there are some realities, and the fact that humanbeings are different from one another is one of them.  It’s often made to seem like an institutionalburden rather than an opportunity to be alive to the world which is how I thinkabout it.  And its overuse has resultedin its seeming intellectually uninteresting to a lot of people, I think.  That results partly from a gap between administrativecommitments and processes on the one hand and faculty and staff and studentexpertise on the other.  And so theintegration of those things is absolutely essential.

I have commented at Cornell, and it might not be true here,on several occasions that at the administrative level, we design all sorts ofcommitments and goals and processes as if we didn’t have extraordinaryexpertise on our own campus, in the faculty, among the students, graduate andundergraduate, and the staff, people who actually work on these very questions,but whose expertise for some reason are not solicited when we’re trying togenerate administrative goals and strategies.

In any case, I’ve often expressed frustration with the term diversitybut as I say, I will certainly continue to use it so don’t worry.

Also, with the term tolerance, I probably would find a lotof agreement here on that, but I think the terms diversity and tolerance areclosely related and they often go hand in hand. I think we’re way beyond the point where tolerance or mere tolerance ofdiversity or difference suffices or does us a lot of good.  We are a plural people whose joint effortsare required to address the world’s urgent problems but on a more positivenote, we’re a plural people interactions among whom are the key to reallyrealizing our full potential as human beings and as groups.

I think most of us in this room probably would feel thattolerance is all too frequently a form of condescension.  Being tolerated doesn’t feel like a gift tothose of us who have felt we have been tolerated.  Being fully included, recognized and engagedis the greater goal.

The goal should be genuine interaction, appreciation,exchange, learning, sometimes conflict, but genuine engagement at the veryleast or to put it in terms I like even better, the goal is to make ourselvesalive to the realities of benign human differences and open to the changes thatfollow from that openness and aliveness. We have to be alive to the differences not only between and amongestablished groups but within what we take to be coherent categories.  I’m repeating that point again because in myexperience, it has been just as important to think about the ways in whichwe’re differentiated within the groups to which we have attachments or withwhich we’re identified as it is to think about our differences from othergroups.

We also have to be open to the differences within each oneof us as individuals.  I think that’sactually the only way to change in the face of learning and engaging with thedifferences in other people.  It’s torealize that, even as individuals, we are not static, sort of internallyabsolutely coherent entities but open dynamic systems ourselves.

At Cornell, I insisted that we add to our more conventionaldiversity goals the goal of developing a more sophisticated language andconceptual understanding and spreading it throughout the community of what wecall diversity issues.  And I think it’sclear that that’s a commitment here and one on which we can all work and towhich we can all contribute.

I want to echo what Steve said, I feel that we’re enormouslyfortunate to have a new vice provost for diversity and planning, Damon Williams.  As you know, I think Damon is a leadernationally in rethinking what it means to commit ourselves as institutions ofhigher learning to diversity, and I support his focus on inclusive excellenceand the ways in which he has conceptualized and written about it.  I support the definition of learning thatincludes diversity at its core, and I look forward to working with Damon andthe rest of my colleagues to see what we can do here to move things forward.

As I said, I don’t want to talk about specificprograms.  I think there are a number ofprograms here that I have at least on a superficial review found veryinteresting and impressive.  I especiallylike the degree to which at Madisonthe Arts are engaged and involved and included as a fundamental part of ourstrategies for enhancing diversity.  Ithink that’s absolutely essential because if it’s not about celebration andexpressivity, if it’s only about administrative and political tasks, then Ithink we’re missing out on part of the beauty of what we mean or think we meanby the importance of diversity and engagement with it.

I do want to reemphasize something that Steve cited me ashaving said, and that I said a few minutes ago myself, and that is it’s reallycritical that everybody play a role in this effort to diversify ourcommunity.  So much that’s importanthappens on the day-to-day level in departments, in programs and other units;administrative as well as academic.  Ithink we all know that.

When it comes to how people feel about being in an institution,so much of how we feel depends on the people we work with day in and day outand on how departments and programs and administrative units are run and howpeople within them interact.  And a lotof the so-called subtle, but to people who have to endure doesn’t always feelso subtle, but what we call subtle forms of rendering people invisible ordiscriminating against them, a lot of those things are just the things thathappen day-to-day in the places where we live and spend most of our time.

If departments and programs and the chairs of those programsand departments and administrative units and other people with responsiblepositions within them don’t assume responsibility not only for ensuring that wehire and retain more diverse faculty and staff, not only for ensuring we admita more diverse student body, but for really determining what happens day-to-dayto people and how it can feel.  Peoplewho tend to be part of normative groups are not automatically going to understandwhat it feels like if you’re not part of what is in any situation the norm tobe rendered invisible by virtue of the tacit assumptions that are made by thosewho hold normative positions and points of view.  It’s not malice on their part, it’s simply aninability or a not yet learned ability to understand what it feels like invarious situations to be rendered invisible.

But these are the kinds of things that have to be discussedand they have to be discussed respectfully and they have to become matters ofconsequence for every unit and every grouping on campus if we’re really goingto make a difference.  It doesn’t do anygood to be silent about them.  It doesn’tdo any good to probably at least initially yell and scream about them, thoughoften, I know, it will feel like it has to come to that.  But it really makes a difference to interactrespectfully and seriously with our coworkers and colleagues and students sothat everybody understands what’s at stake and the kinds of interactions thatwe have on a daily basis unthinkingly that are inevitably leaving some peoplefeeling as though they don’t belong or they’re not as important.

So the department, the program and the administrative unit Ithink have to work hard; everyone has to make this a commitment at every levelof the university, of the institution. But I’m emphasizing where most of us live day-to-day as the place whereretaining faculty and staff and ensuring that students are getting a fair shakeat flourishing at this university is where the rubber really meets the road orhits the road.  Does the rubber meet theroad or hit the road?  Well, I knowsomething happens supposedly between the rubber and the road.

In that space, we really need to be committing ourselves toone another.  You probably noticed that Iused the word love earlier.  I reallythink love in the form of agape is a badly needed emphasis.  And so, without too much embarrassment, Iurge you to think at least sometimes in those terms.

Damon Williams, Vice Provost for Diversity and Climate

Isn't Seema Kapani just beautiful? While the good brother right here is getting us ready with the technology, I’d like to begin by thanking each and every one of you for being here today. I’d like to begin by thanking Seema Kapani for that wonderful introduction. I’d like to thank the brothers and the sisters who invited us to enter the drum and to be a part of the cultural moment and to feel the energy that comes with the rhythm and the beat and I think that that metaphor – that idea of the rhythm and the beat is one that is so important.

We’ll just move to the side. It’s one that is so important because I believe that this moment that we’re sharing here together today is about getting on the same beat, getting in the same rhythm, being in the same key of engaging this work.

I would like to thank the planning team which put this a bit together and I’d like you all to join me in thanking them.

[Applause]

It takes so much time and energy and effort to put these types of us together that we have an opportunity to come and enjoy. And it’s always wonderful and I know that they’re feeling a great sense of accomplishment right now in putting together a very successful and wonderful program. I’d like to thank the Search and Screen Committee which helped me to get here today, particularly the chairperson, Professor Michael Thornton and every member of that committee.

Because the weight and the responsibility that was placed upon them was the onerous one, to create a scenario where they can look at so many different candidates, so many amazing candidates that brings so many amazing gifts to this university, this state, this community at this time.

So I want to thank them for what they’ve done thus far and I also want to thank them for the way that they have remained engaged with me and my work, trying to help to make this transition a smooth one, trying to help invite me into the institutional environment. These brothers have so much trouble that I have to freestyle this whole thing. But that’s okay. I’d also like to thank my colleagues in the provost office. Many of whom are here today.

They have been absolutely amazing again in trying to help me become a part of this environment, each and every one of them and I’m so appreciative of that. All right and I’m so appreciative of that. And last and definitely not the least, I’d like to thank Vice Provost Bernice Durand if she is here. Is Vice Provost Durand here?

[Applause]

Vice Provost and Professor Emeritus Bernice Durand has been a really wonderful asset to this university and to me personally in getting up the speed to hopefully be able to provide the type of leadership that is required in the moment that we are in now. And lastly and I’d like for these individuals to stand, please.

Can I have the Staff of the Office of the Vice Provost for Diversity and Conduct, to please stand?

[Applause]

Ruby Paredes, Paula Gates, and my new graduate assistant Colleen Miller have been absolutely fantastic. It is all that one can hope for to come to work and know that you have the opportunity to live and to work and to be a part of the team which you know is committed to nothing but excellence and nothing but delivering the work.  And as I become further a part of this community, you’ll come to understand how deeply that’s a part of my value system and who I am.

And also I’d like to thank Brother Benia Sia again, for his wonderful words of insights and clarity. This morning, Ruby came to me and said, “Damon, who would be a good speaker to speak on institutional races?”

And I said, “Why, I know a native son at this particular institution who will be wonderful if we could invite to come home and it’s an auspicious occasion to have with us – with him, a tandem with us today. He is the individual that I could think of I’ve had a learning relationship with for many years, studying his work from afar, thinking about his work from afar, trying to extend the discussion that he is a part of the leadership of – trying to engage that discussion in different ways.

One of the beautiful things about a research university is there’s a place of ideas. It’s a place of endless possibilities. It’s a place to come together. It’s a place to disagree. It’s a place to diverge. It’s a place to pivot. It’s a place to have new ideas that emerge in the canon.

As I’ve walked around this institution over and over again, I’ve consistently been confronted with the same thing, over and over and over again. We are struggling with respect to campus diversity and the need to find the way to turn the corner. We need to find the way to create real change. How can we do it?

Where do we start? How can we truly make a difference? We had multiple diversity plans. But is it enough? Can you tell us what to do? Can you help? We need divorce.

[Laughter]

[Applause]

Save me, Obi-wan Williams. You are our only hope.

[Applause]

My response to those individuals that I’ve seen on the street is that there are no magic diversity bullets as Brother Benia Sia said earlier today. The challenge is one that is systemic. The challenge is one that’s great. As we look at and we dissect the issues to any lengths, it is the challenge of incredible weight and incredible challenge and honors. But it’s so wonderful for me to be a part of a community that I know is deeply committed to making a difference, deeply committed to transformation, deeply committed to change.

And I say this humbly. I take so seriously the responsibility that has been given to me to be a part of the leadership discussion, to help to shape what that vision might look like. This work takes time and commitment. Although we would hope that soon as we alter the plan and we roll that plan out, it’s going to look like the blue and the red curve.

But the reality as I know that many of you know and understand is that the work is one that’s deep and is intrinsic and is one that is, if we are lucky, we are going to make positive sustainable games overtime. But the focus for us must be relentless, persistence, and effort. That’s the legacy that we carry as we continue to lift this work.

Now, I do like to think of myself as a Jedi knight. And as soon as you, soon as my artwork arrives at my office, you will come to understand that—a Jedi knight becoming wise in the ways of the force.

The force, which in this particular instant is, how do we engage in the process of change, organizational change? With issues of diversity in the apple cart that we are trying to move forward—issues of races, of sexes, on homophobia and all other types of Islam and issues that we have in apple cart. How do we engage this work? And so, oftentimes I will go into meditation and I will consult with Wise Master Yoda.

[Laughter]

And in a recent consultation, he said this to me, “Strongest is the culture of discipline.” College and universities are most resistant to change. Nebulous and multiple goals they have. Hyper decentralized environments are prevalent. Shared governance confounds the greatest of leaders.

Faculty and staff – they live long in the life of the campus. [Laughter] Conflicting ideas regarding diversity and excellence persist. Loosely coupled systems make the future difficult to see. Ritualistic and symbolic are their planning efforts, not focused on real change and deep transformation difficult would be the process of transforming the culture with this one.

Difficult will be the process of moving beyond plan and promise. Difficult will be the process of achieving dynamic diversity leadership for the future. Strong you must be in your resolve. Proceed forward with caution.

[Laughter]

[Applause]

Those of you know that this work is about culture change. As we move beyond plan and promise and we think about the next iteration of our work, we know as Brother Benia Sia indicated to us today that this work must be about culture change. The model that I have here to left is one that I adapted from the work of Edgar Schein, the legendary MIT organizational learning professor and also Peter Singay, the author of several works about the change process.

And one of the things we talked about is what exists at the broadest level of culture, the geospatial dimension of culture. It’s the pictures that are on the walls. It’s the type of buildings that we have. It’s where we center our cultural center. It’s what we do to create that environmental tapestry of culture and I think Brother Benia Sia showed us some illustrations of how we’ve made mistakes in the past

As we think about culture though and we continue to move from the outermost realms of culture to what exist at the center of culture is the mental models and the assumptions that we have about this work.

It’s how we think about this work. It’s how we teach our courses. It’s how we engage with our students. It’s how we greet young persons when they are coming through the lunch line. It’s the ways that we answer the phone. It’s the ways that we accept people into our world or not. It’s the way that we are intentional about evaluating and assessing the work that we do everyday to make sure that it lives up to the promise and the challenge, particularly at the place like the University of Wisconsin because we are indeed as we talked about issues of representation, access and equity in a battleground state. Make no mistake about it. Just up that road in Milwaukee as ground zero. And I know that I speak in harmonious unison with each of us in this place.

So as to mentor models and assumptions that we bring about how we do our work even those and I say this with love and respect who are in the beloved community. In addition to them folks, they didn’t count the day. I think that this institution although it has made mistakes and to quote from my new colleague, my good colleague Seema Kapani, this work is not mother’s milk. This work is difficult and challenging but I do believe that this is a community that the glass is half full.

I do believe that this is an environment and an institution that has been more intentional than most. At times, that intention as we know historically is encouraged by activitism and protest. At times, that intentionality has come from the system level, trickling down. At time, that intentionality has come from dynamic leaders who had a vision from where we might go.

And we see that vision activated across campus in hundreds, if not over a thousand programs, offices, initiatives – things that are taking place on a day-to-day basis – the people program, the posse program, the Chancellor’s scholars program, the first way of learning communities. The list goes on and on and on and on.

As I come to this institution, oftentimes I hear a conversation about what we are not doing right. I hear a conversation about how challenging it is. And one of the things I say is we have to embrace the successes that we’ve been able to put together because that is the only way that we continue forward struggling in this work. Also, as I look in this environment, I oftentimes feel like it’s a fish bowl and there’s a fish in the tank just swimming all around. Those fish have a lot of energy but they’re disconnected. They’re operating on separate agendas.

They give in to the culture of hyper decentralization. They need more focus. They need program review assessment. They need to figure out where our most powerful leverage points are. We have to figure out how we can be more than the sum of our parts. It’s a part of the question for us. To ask the question of how we might bring together strategic leadership for the future.

It must be a conversation up, down and across the university—A conversation that brings together multiple different types of groups—One that is steeped in evaluation; one that is steeped in finding synergies; one that is steeped in than each of us being reflective leaders that thinks about our practice no matter what our practice is. It’s about achieving alignment and for me, importantly, about coalition building. It’s for each of us whether you be Chancellor Biddy Martin. You be myself. You be a member of the faculty. You be a student.

You be a member of our grounds team. You be a member of our custodial team. You be a member of our administrative support team. That each of us has the courage to lead; the courage to try to do more than we’ve done in the past; the courage to say things to others that are not a part of the process.

It’s about approaching this work in a humble way and I am deeply humbled by the opportunity to be here with you today. I’m deeply humbled by the opportunity to help to carry this moment for us institutionally. I approach this work beyond politic and agenda. Now one of the things that we’ve prepared and I want it to hold it up for you is what I refer to as a oh-oh strategic transition framework. And each of you I hope will leave here today with one of these.

Because one of the things I deeply believe in is that plans are worth nothing if we don’t read them and put them in the activation. So these plans are in each of your registration materials that you received. If you do not have one, I encourage you to get one before you leave. More importantly, I encourage you to read it. And most importantly, I encourage you to become a part of the conversation of some of the ideas that are outlined here, not in terms of “I think that we should build strategic relationships with HBCUs so we can diversify our HWCUs”.

[Laughter]

Not that this plan says, “We must prioritize disability issues above all others.” Not that this plan says, “We must really focused first and foremost on XYZ issue because one of the things I believe would be a mistake.” Would be for me to, in a flawed way, attempt to offer a vision or to even be a part of trying to craft a vision with a small team of individuals until I at first became a part of a conversation.

Oh-oh…all right. Everything about my work as a scholar, as administrator, as educator, centers on issues of diversity, inclusion and change and one of the reasons why our team works so hard to push this document out in this way is because we want for the Office of the Vice Provost for Diversity and Climate, the Chief Diversity Officer unit for this institution to act as strategically and with as much excellence and with as much sense of clarity and purpose that this work demands. Their four primary goals are articulated here.

One is for me to become a part of the University of Wisconsin community. Two - for me to generate that in depth understanding of the campus diversity, dynamics at play here. Three - for me to continue to build the Office of the Vice Provost for Diversity and Climate—build in terms of mission, vision, web environment, hiring staff, building the office. And lastly and most importantly, over the next 12 to 18 months to really clarify where our priorities are as an institution as we are moving forward in a post plan 2008 world.

Now how do we get there? Number one, I see my work very much nested within a broader institutional context that includes the Provost Office, Chancellor, government structures, foundations, student life, dean of students, student organizations, the Wisconsin Alumni Association and Alumna, schools systems, the Madison community, schools and colleges—nested and connected in different ways to all of those entities and others that are not mentioned here.

I see as key and essential partners in this work. Others who are part of what I referred to as a lateral diversity infrastructure, meaning those other areas that are across the institutional environment in terms of the diversity and climate committee, the MDCs, the equity and diversity committees, and the various diversity offices and initiatives that exist institutionally.

There are six major strategies that will be a part of this process of hitting on those four goals. Number one, I will continue with individual and unit joint up meetings—many of you in the room whom I have already met with. I think Paula informed me that I think that I spoke in front/interacted with close to 2000 people already and indeed it has been a pleasure to do so. But we will be continuing forward with those and I know that some individuals we have scheduled already and others we will be scheduling them and their teams going forward.

Transition roundtables which will be thematic discussions that will center on different types of topics, for example, one on staff government issues, one on disability issues, one on gender issues, one on LGPTQ issues, several different types of thematic conversations. I say this very publicly here and it’s being recorded for prosperity. I do not view myself as the vice provost for black folks. I do not view myself as the vice provost for race and ethnicity.

I view myself as the Vice Provost for this evolving idea of diversity. But in the same instance too, I depart from an esteemed well, Brother Benia Sia offered us today and that my conceptualization of diversity is not one that has been de-racialized. My conception of that idea is not one that losses sight of historic issues of access and equity.

But mine is one that believes that a more powerful conversation comes from a collective conversation. And I believe that I’ve been grooming myself to be prepared to help us with that conversation. The third major strategy is diversity capabilities retreats. One of the things my good colleague Dean Julie Underwood said to me in my joint up meetings with her is and I paraphrase, “One of the most powerful things that you can do here, Damon, is simply getting people in a conversation doing similar work who maybe don’t talk to one another and I don’t know if Dean Underwood is still with us today but I take greatly from that advice as I have from others and will continue to find that space to bring those conversations together. Fourth and I will require the assistance of the MDCs, the ENDs and importantly the deans and divisional heads of this institution.

It’s the engagement of a campus-wide diversity audit to see exactly where we are disaggregated in terms of school, college, unit, division, where we are in terms of demographic change or lack of change, where we are in terms of programmatic initiative, where we are in terms of greatest successes, greatest continuing opportunity areas and also too would like to encourage all of the areas to create a rationale for why this work is important to the school of business.

A rationale for why this work is essential within the athletic department. A rationale for why this work is absolutely of magnanimous importance in the school of education because I believe in defining those rationales institutionally. We create an opportunity and a space to find our stride with respect to this work. Additionally, I would be engaging an external review team who would be visiting the institution going forward asking several questions.

I think the external eyes oftentimes help us to have greater clarity with respect to areas. My intention though is not to bring in a team and to waste my money and this institution’s money by having them tell me lessons we already know. We know where to disaggregate it and decentralized. We know we’re fragmented. We know we got a ton of things going on.

I don’t want to replicate the great work that was done by Dr Nells and Dr. McKea in 2003, two mentors and colleagues of mine who visited in a Mid-plan 2008 visit. But what I do want to do is find some specific areas and go deep, some specific areas and to go deep.

And lastly, we’ll be working with our communications department and several others to really build a variable bust diversity communication strategy. I think that a more effective communication platform would be absolutely essential to helping us to come together as a stronger community and also would be important in letting people know how they can become engage in this conversation.

I see each and every one of these activities as being part of what Jim Collins, the Stanford Business School professor talks about in terms of getting people on the bus. One of the things I know very keenly is folks say, “Damon, all those areas don’t report to you. How are you going to provide that type of leadership?” I believe that’s a very simplistic way of thinking about leadership.

But what I’m more interested in is the process of engagement. What I’m more interested in is putting forth the vision that we collaboratively put together and we have a coalition of the willing. And we all become engage in this work in different ways. I believe so deeply that each of us can become what Debra Meyerson ascribes to and discusses as tempered radicals. Now, Brother Benia Sia told me earlier today, “He was just a straight up radical.” And I’m with that.

But I believe that for the majority of us would be tempered radicals—tempered because we live every day inside these spaces, inside this institution, on these payrolls but radical because every day we tried to make a difference in this environment, every day as a full professor.

You look to give some of those idiosyncrasy credits that you have away. Every day you love to do your job better, every day, as tempered radical. I think it very important in terms of moving to a place as strategic leadership for the future. We continue to build upon the work that’s going on in the learning communities and the leadership institutes because I believe that it’s in crafting leadership development moments for students, faculty, staff and administrators to understand how to engage this work in different ways that we open up the possibility of the future. And importantly, I believe in multiple types of implementation strategies for making change happen.

Now, oftentimes what I did for this institution, they ask me, “Well, you know we need accountability. We don’t have accountability. And one of the things I oftentimes say is that accountability is probably one of the most absent discussions that exist in all of our education, diversity included. I believe that three essential systems are so important to activate a plan whatever is to come beyond plan 2008.

One is an accountability system to drive change. Two is an orchestration system or an entrepreneur or an incentive system to encourage change, to bubble up. And three is the relational system which is one of goodwill. Now we know in higher education in terms of doing this work that the accountability system is probably used this much. The incentive system is probably used this much and the relationship and goodwill system probably extend somewhere to the roof of this institution.

But we know as well that in terms of their power as change enabling strategies, the inverse is true. The relationship and goodwill system is about this powerful. The incentive system is about that powerful and a conversation about accountability if implemented with some real “teeth” can become the most powerful of all.

Now, one of the things I say all the time is that the conversation of accountability is one that has to be a collective one. It can’t be one that I propose upon on the table or committee proposes to put on the table. It has to be a moment that we come to institutionally. What my job is to help us understand where those practices are and to help us engage a conversation and then it requires the institution’s will to move those things forward beyond that. As I move to a place of conclusion and I hope I have not thrown us too far off calendar.

If so that I want to talk about native time, personation time, CP time, cultural competitory time. I want to talk it up to one of those things and understand that whatever will happen from here is happening as it is to be and will be. Now, how many folk in this room today are familiar with the “Price Is Right”? [Laughter] OK. “The Price Is Right”. Now you know the “Price Is Right” Bob Barker would come up and he had one of the very nice tailored suits and he’d say, “Susie Cue! You’re the next contestant on ‘The Price Is Right’.” Susie Cue comes down. Susie Cue gets in the front row. And Susie Cue sitting at that front row and you know eventually she gets up on the stage or Robert Cue gets up on the stage.

And the first challenge they have to do when they get on to get to the showcase showdown is they have to do what? Spin the wheel! So there’s this big gigantic wheel that exist and they put their hands on that wheel and inevitably the person will give it a spin as Robert will give it a spin and it goes, “TOOT, TOOT, TOOT, TOOT” and the wheel will go just a little bit “toot, toot, toot, toot”; and then Bob will say, “Now Robert, you are going to have to get your back into it if you want to get it moving now. You are going to have to really put some energy into it.”

And so Robert will put his hands back on the wheel and he gives it a good giant spin and it will “TOOT” and it goes “TOOT, TOOT, TOOT, TOOT….” Now one of the thinkers that I’m a deep student of is Jim Collins as I mentioned before, the author of the book “Good To Great” and one of the things he talks about in this book on organizational excellence is he asked the question, “How do organizations that are good go from good to great?”

And he talks about a number of different principles in this. But one of the things he talks about is he talks about understanding and building a flywheel of excellence, a strategic flywheel of excellence. One of the things I want to be a part of helping us understand is what is strategic diversity inclusive excellence flywheel of excellence will look like?

And I am hopeful that each of you will join me in putting your hands on that wheel and I believe deeply that if we put our hands on that wheel and continue to turn that wheel, eventually we can get the breakthrough results we want and we will continue on this journey that we are on.  Thank you each and every one for being here today. Thank you for indulging me today. I am honored and privilege to be a part of this beloved community. Have you all an amazing remainder of the forum.