6WRM0203Short2_Why Race Matters Transcript

I mean, I'm glad that folks are starting to pay attention to this more because the issues aren't new. We've been talking about the same issues for probably a hundred years now, right, when it comes to the achievement gap and the challenges that we're seeing in our communities around education and higher education, but I think that our campuses tend to focus on, how do we recruit them, how do we get more and more here, how do we do that, but there's never a retention strategy. 

It has to be a part of everything that you do. It transcends department. 

So it can't just be the multicultural office or the D&I office, or we can go and see the VP of Diversity/Inclusion, and then, we're good. That's not how this works, right? Because that one person or that one office is not in that classroom with that student who has a racist faculty member. But what we can do is, I think, what we're trying to do is recognize that there are structural issues that are gonna take some time to address, but then how do we equip our students and our team with the tools to navigate the structures that exist already? 

- Angela: Watch more Why Race Matters online and on the PBS app on your phone, tablet, Roku, or any other streaming device. ECHO is on.