Pasadena City College Flourishes

Earlier this fall, LGBTQ Presidents executive director Terry Allison had the opportunity to chat with one of our co-chairs Dr. Erika A. Endrijonas about her leadership of Pasadena City College.

Terry: Erika, it’s a pleasure to speak with you about Pasadena City College (PCC) and your presidency. When I was a dean at Cal State LA I worked extensively with PCC, which was just down the street from where I lived. How did you come to the presidency there?

Erika: As is typical in some searches, I was not an active candidate out on the market. Previously, I was at Los Angeles Valley College, where I was able to put the college on a solid financial footing and help it to regain full regional accreditation. When the first PCC search failed in 2018, the outgoing president reached out, and by then I was ready to consider.

Terry: You are president and superintendent?

Erika: Yes. In California community colleges there are various types of CEO positions. The president/superintendent typically leads a single college district. One can serve as president in a multi-campus system where there’s a chancellor. And of course, there’s the opportunity to serve as the chancellor of those multi-campus systems. I moved from a presidency within the Los Angeles Community College district to Pasadena City College, a single college district. I’ve now been here almost three years. PCC’s success was definitely a big draw.

Terry: How would you define that success?

Erika: PCC has been known as a very diverse campus that lives its mission of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Just one example: In the wake of George Floyd’s murder, there was a call to action from California’s statewide chancellor of community colleges. PCC has seven locally elected trustees and one student trustee. Four of our public trustees and our student trustee serve on statewide committees for DEI work. The board truly supports all of our students and understand how important the DEI initiatives are for our students to achieve their educational goals.

Terry: I understand that PCC’s exceptional work has been recognized recently in an unusual way?

Erika: You must mean the Mackenzie Scott gift, right? Out of nowhere, I received a once in a lifetime call. The first call was simply that someone wished to speak to me about a potential major gift. When I took that call, I was stunned. “We would like to give PCC an unrestricted gift of $30 million….” When I asked why, I learned that Mackenzie Scott works with a team of advisers who assist her in supporting institutions with a reputation of creating pathways to economic mobility. Ms. Scott also is known for recognizing ethnically diverse, female, and queer leaders. Over 90% of her previous gifts had gone to organizations with BIPOC, women, and LGBTQ+ leaders.

Terry: But you had to keep this a secret for a couple of months?

Erika: Yes. Working with Ms. Scott’s advisers I was allowed to let only a few people know so that when the funds were transferred, we would be able to accept them. The timing ended up being perfect. Ms. Scott announced that round of her gifts the very morning of our Foundation Board meeting, June 15^th of this year.

Terry: And how does PCC plan to use the funds?

Erika: Our foundation endowment grew overnight from $41 million to $71 million dollars. My goal was to think about what would be best for PCC over time. Rather than investing in signature programs that I supported, we set up a process of annual proposals for this funding. I call this “president proofing” the funding. It’s not about the leader’s goals; it’s about institutional goals. As I mentioned, PCC is known for student success. We have the highest combined transfer rate to CSU and UC campuses combined within California. We want to be able to move the endowment earnings to programs to sustain and expand student success. This includes technical programs as well, which we also do very well. PCC will celebrate its 100-year anniversary in 2024. By then we should begin to see just how much this astounding gift contributes to reach our strategic goals.

Terry: There are still challenges, of course. How has your campus responded to the COVID-19 crisis?

Erika: Enrollment is down, as you can imagine, throughout all community colleges in California. We have a funding formula that recognizes 70% FTES, 20% the demographic we serve, and 10% performance metrics. While California has rainy day funds and some great success metrics it’s also holding us harmless for enrollment downturns during the pandemic.

Terry: Would you like to leave us with any big, audacious goals you have for Pasadena City College?

Erika: PCC has the goal to close all equity gaps by 2027. That’s a statewide goal, but one we’re well-positioned to meet. I hired the first cabinet-level chief equity, diversity, and inclusion officer with the California community college campuses. Once she helped us better understand our needs, I promoted the position to the associate vice president level. We are doing everything we can to help all students reach their potential.

Terry: Thank you Erika for your inspiring leadership both of Pasadena City College and of our organization.

Jeremy Flanigan, media and communications assistant, joined us in October of 2020 and soon demonstrated his dedication to our organization. He used his most recent birthday as a fundraiser for us. Through Facebook’s partnership with Network for Good, Jeremy raised $283 of birthday gift contributions!

Jeremy joins several of our members in making personal contributions and raising funds to sustain our organization. We have listed gifts for 2020 and 2021 on our Donors page: LGBTQPresidents.org/The-Annual-Fund.

As LGBTQ Presidents & Leaders in Higher Education begin to develop grant requests to foundations, these personal gifts serve as an excellent indicator we can cite when applying for financial support. As treasurer of our organization and a donor, I urge you to join our generous contributors by making a gift of any size that fits your philanthropic budget.

Dick Senese

https://conta.cc/3eLgUPv

LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education is proud to announce the election of two officers for 2021–2024 terms. We also are seeking nominations for at least one, and possibly three at-large member positions, pending a bylaws revision proposed for June 2021.

Dr. Richard J. Helldobler, president of William Paterson University of Wayne, New Jersey, has been elected by the board as co-chair of our organization. President Helldobler joins our recently re-elected co-chair, Dr. Erika A. Endrijonas, president and superintendent of Pasadena City College, California, to lead LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education. “I am honored that my colleagues have elected me to this important role, and I am excited to help lead this dynamic organization forward,” says President Helldobler. “LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education has provided me with great professional development opportunities and, just as importantly, good fellowship. I look forward to working with everyone to further advance LGBTQ issues in the academy through its continued growth and expanded reach.” Rich had served as a member at large for the organization since 2018 and generously offered William Paterson University as a host for our first online Leadership Institute—on June 18^th–19^th, 2021. For more on Rich’s background, see his presidential page.

At our annual Members Meeting on January 15, 2021, we also elected Richard (Dick) Senese, PhD, LP, president of Capella University, as treasurer. “I am honored to serve among my peers to support our important advocacy mission. As a proud member of the LGBTQ community and the leader of a preeminent online higher education institution for working adults, I know more can—and must—be done to promote equity, diversity, and inclusion in all fields—but especially in the post-secondary education space. I look forward to lending my voice and expertise to move the needle.”. For more on President Senese, see a brief bio here.

LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education’s bylaws currently call for three members at large. Two members at large are continuing—Rusty Barceló, retired president of Northern New Mexico College and Charlita Shelton, who held several presidencies before her recent appointment as special consultant to the president of Gonzaga University. Now that Rich is co-chair, we definitely have one opening for a member at large. In addition, the board will consider introducing a bylaws revision to membership at our June 17, 2021, Membership Meeting, to change the board membership from “three members at large” to “three-to-five members at large,” expanding opportunities for additional participation. Further, the board will introduce a bylaws revision that names the executive director as an ex officio, non-voting member of the board of directors.

The board has received several expressions of interest and nominations for member at large. If you would like to nominate anyone or volunteer to run, then please send an e-mail to info@lgbtqpresidents.org.

LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education recently spoke with Merrill Irving, Jr., president of Hennepin Technical College (HTC). HTC serves over 7,000 students and offers more than 45 career and technical programs on two campuses in the suburban Minneapolis cities of Brooklyn Park and Eden Prairie, Minnesota.

Terry: Before we plunge into the COVID-19 era, let’s think back a year ago. Who was HTC? What were your goals and how were you achieving them?

Merrill: HTC is Minnesota’s largest technical college and contributes significantly to the state’s workforce development efforts. Over 62% of our students are from underrepresented communities, and we are committed to making educational opportunities more accessible, helping students overcome challenges, and creating equitable outcomes. We work to promote women’s enrollment in non-traditional fields. We have a number of nationally ranked programs in technical fields. For example, according to GradReports we are ranked second nationally in information technology; third in heating, ventilation, and air conditioning; fourth in accounting; and in the top 15 for both culinary arts and automotive technology. We have highly successful programs in manufacturing engineering technology, including automation robotics and fluid power. One of our fluid power graduates was recently hired by NASA.

We are a continuous improvement and learning organization. For example, we recently completed a persistence study and found that black men over the age of 25 are the least likely to persist and most likely to have a hold placed on their enrollment. Donor-directed funds are now helping to support these men to succeed. We also continue to build our cultural competence as an organization. For example, we used the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) to assess our individual and organizational competence level and found that despite previous work and our own assumptions of competence, we only scored at the national average. We need to move from understanding to taking specific actions to improve our results with diverse students, to move from acceptance of cultural diversity to integrated practices to achieve a goal of meaningful inclusion. We hired the YMCA of the North to do anti-racism training with students, staff, and faculty, and the pandemic has not slowed us in our efforts.

Terry: Is there anything else you’d like us to know about HTC?

Merrill: One of our greatest outcomes is our 99% job placement rate of graduates in their field of study. Many students have a job before they complete their program. That’s great for a student population that includes 46% students of color and 25% being the first in their family to attend college. One of our programs in automotive technology, Ford ASSET, brings in students from all over the country to be part of our training program that provides students the skills to succeed in the rapidly advancing automotive industry. HTC generates over $300 million in economic impact to the state of Minnesota each year.

Given the nature of our programs, we’ve faced some real challenges this past year. Over 80% of our courses require some form of face-to-face experience. We have programs in nursing, dental assistant, manufacturing and engineering technology, and many others where students must engage in some form of laboratory or hands-on experience. Moreover, a majority of our students were unable or unwilling to pursue courses completely online during the pandemic. Approximately 25% of our graduates go on to pursue a bachelor’s degree within six years of completing their program at HTC—higher than we originally had thought.

Terry: That segues nicely into my next question. Now tell us about this past year at HTC. How have you adjusted as a campus? Are all your programs still running?

Merrill: We’ve been in the process of slowly returning to normal. First, we had to completely close the College for a couple of weeks in spring 2020. Very few of our faculty had any online experiences. Asynchronous vs. synchronous online learning wasn’t even in their mindset. We had to consider how we could schedule to protect our students’ learning as well as everyone’s safety. We made huge efforts at the beginning of the crisis in implementing effective instructional design, and this took a tremendous amount of resources.

As president of HTC my biggest leadership challenge is fear. Am I going to lose all my students—and then my job? Am I going to catch COVID-19 at work? How do we keep our students learning through a culture of fear? Planning was also a major challenge. How could we look beyond even a week when everything was changing so rapidly? Luckily, we were able to use CARES Act funds immediately to support our enrollment initiatives. Our enrollment was up 25% in summer 2020, but down 10% that fall, and down 13% this spring 2021 semester when no further funds were available. Still, we have met our budgetary goals. Our new normal for the immediate future is a lower level of enrollment.

Finally, we can’t ignore the losses of COVID-19. Three of my family members have died. My leadership team has to work hard to keep up people’s sense of hope—to help manage their losses. Part of that loss is working from home and therefore the lack of social interaction. We are staying focused on our strategic goals and celebrating when we can. This spring we will have a beautiful virtual graduation with a storytelling video about our students. But everything won’t return to the pre-COVID-19 era. Our transfer and general education courses will largely remain online, and we will continue to adapt in-person courses as needed.

Terry: After the killing of George Floyd, Minneapolis has been at the center of a movement to end racial discrimination and to reimagine policing. How has HTC been part of these activities?

Merrill: It was beyond real. Freeways shut down. Buses shut down. Students were marching. And this upcoming spring and summer, we face another challenge with the trials. One thing we did is partner with Wallace State Community College in Alabama. They shared art projects on George Floyd and one of their students wrote a song for us—a beautiful song. You know, I’m a college president, but first and foremost in this society, I’m a black man who has to deal with all that that means.

Then, there’s something many people don’t know. 30% of state police officers come out of our program. Three of four officers charged in the George Floyd killing are our graduates. We don’t teach the techniques they used, but as our graduates have told us, different police departments have different cultures. The work culture is very different as is the ongoing tactical training depending on the location within Minnesota. Our state has a higher standard for peace officers than most, requiring a degree, but HTC must look at what else we can do to improve policing.

Terry: I had no idea you played such a significant role in training police officers in Minnesota. After the killing of Mr. Floyd, has HTC changed anything about your officer training program?

Merrill: We immediately worked on diversifying the groups who advise us on our program. For example, a black police officers association now is represented. We are also working with Minnesota State University, Mankato to create a new degree program related to cultural competency. Our police training program is integrating more empathy training. As you probably know, there’s often great suspicion of police among black people and other underrepresented groups. There is cultural suspicion of the profession. We are trying to focus on barriers to equal representation in the police force. They are more social and cultural barriers than educational ones.

On a personal level, I have stepped up my activity to help change our culture. I have chaired a law enforcement advisory commission for Minnesota State Colleges and Universities. I just participated in a Mossier’s Proud to Work summit on anti-racism. That’s just one of my many commitments to address racism and to promote full equality and inclusion of LGBTQ communities.

Terry: What leadership lessons helped you to serve as president of HTC during these tumultuous times?

Merrill: Coming into this crisis, I had already learned to lead comfortably being me—a young, openly gay, black man. During my career so far, I have found a push for leaders in higher education to conform, and that’s not me. I think my unconventionality helped me as well as my core values of trust, honesty, and integrity.

Terry: What further leadership lessons have you learned or shared during this past year?

Merrill: One thing that I’ve learned is the power of listening … and giving some more thought before answering right away. Empowering others to act. In this Zoom world of Hollywood Squares I found that everyone was focused on me—looking at me for all the answers. I focused on how to leverage and empower other leaders. I learned that everything doesn’t require a reaction. Before I might have said, “I’ll look into that and get back to you.” Now, I’ve gotten to the point where he can say, “I don’t know.” As a leader it’s important to learn when you don’t have control and when you can’t predict what’s next. That offers a sense of freedom.

Manhattan School of Music is a venerable New York City institution, situated in the Morningside Heights/West Harlem neighborhood. Founded in 1918, MSM is one of the world’s premier conservatories of classical music and jazz. Recently, musical theatre has become an added focus. President James Gandre, formerly a dean and later provost at Roosevelt University in Chicago, earlier served as a student affairs administrator at MSM. Jim returned to MSM as president in May, 2013.

Terry: Jim, first, how in the world is MSM operating in the age of the pandemic? How are you teaching music in this new era?

Jim: Well, to say that we’ve changed our methods and way of operating would be an understatement. We are all dealing with moving to a virtual environment, but a virtual environment in the performing arts has additional hurdles. How does one perform when there are limits on numbers of people in a room and when you can’t be close to another? Of course, I’m biased, but I have to say our staff and faculty accomplished Herculean things on behalf of our students. First, we allowed our students to choose whether they wanted to learn on campus or be 100 percent remote. And, for those on campus, most of the classes they have in person are performance courses while the vast majority of their classes—about 80 percent—are online. For most of our classes, our faculty didn’t try to replicate what we did pre-pandemic, knowing that we couldn’t get close to that experience online. Instead, they decided to create new and different experiences. These included more focus on chamber music repertoire and in the case of opera and musical theatre, creating filmed versions of opera and musical theatre, recording indoors, and filming outside while physically distanced. These strategies have greatly expanded the learning of our students and it is likely that we will use much of what learned and continued to do some of this work once we are out of the pandemic. If anyone would like to view some of our students work, you can visit this site to see all of our livestreamed or prerecorded performances: https://www.msmnyc.edu/livestream/.

Terry: So, you have been able to maintain nearly all your desired enrollment. That’s quite an accomplishment! Tell us a bit more about your student body and where they go after graduation.

Jim: Our students come from more than 50 countries and nearly every US state. Indeed, 50 percent of our students are from outside the United States. So, as you might imagine, the pandemic had the potential to hit us particularly hard. We budgeted for a 10 percent decrease hoping that it wouldn’t be worse. The good news is that our enrollment was only eight percent down this fall and looks like we might get to only seven percent down for the spring. After graduation, our students, like students at all colleges and universities across the country, go on to a variety of careers. Of course, many of our students become professional musicians. We have Emmy, Tony, and dozens and dozens of Grammy Award winners. We have multiple members of every major symphony orchestra in America. Every major opera company has our graduates on their stages every year! Each year at the Metropolitan Opera alone, we have four to five dozen graduates performing either on stage, as music coaches, or as musicians in the orchestra. For me as president, it’s such a joy to go to Lincoln Center or Broadway or almost any jazz club here and see our graduates at work in nearly every performance. I take enormous pride in their accomplishments.

Terry: And who teaches at MSM?

Jim: Our faculty are amazing! The folks who teach privately—one-on-one weekly lessons—are national and international artists such as world-renowned violinist Pinchas Zukerman, the great jazz bassist Ron Carter (also an alumnus!), or the Tony Award winner Randy Graff. Approximately 50 of our faculty are members of the New York Philharmonic, Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, and Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, as well as members or former members of chamber ensembles such as the Tokyo and Juilliard String Quartets. Collectively, our voice faculty have performed on all of the greatest opera stages of the world and have performed thousands of times at the Met Opera alone. This kind of conservatory training is very much patterned after an “old-world” artist/mentor-student model.

Terry: You’ve had some great success at building financial support for MSM. Tell us about that.

Jim: MSM has not had a great record of fundraising throughout its more than 100-year history. When I arrived back at MSM in 2013 (I was here before from 1985–2000), we were still doing great things training our students, but fundraising, which my former boss Chuck Middleton used to say provided the “margins of excellence,” was lackluster. We first stabilized our enrollment which had been seesawing for years. We began to show our board and our loyal, but small group of donors that we could be fiscally responsible and move towards greater heights. At that point, we took on what was for us a big project, a $16.5M renovation of our main performance space. We accomplished this on time and on budget, not an easy feat anywhere, especially in NYC where things normally cost more than almost anywhere else in the States. Once that was accomplished, we turned to the endowment. Just in the past half year, we have grown the endowment through cash and irrevocable pledges by more than $4M and we’re in a quiet campaign to raise $7M more during the next year. If we do this, our endowment will grow to $42M which is the size of our annual budget. This is not where we want to be, of course, but when I arrived the endowment was in the low $20Ms, so this will be a big achievement and milestone.

Terry: Schools in the arts have a long history as LGBTQ-friendly environments. What would you like to highlight about MSM’s support of students, faculty, and staff?

Jim: It’s true that arts schools have historically been more friendly to the LGBTQ community than others, but I wouldn’t say this was completely true or universal. Although I was out during my entire time at MSM—1985–2000 and when I returned in 2013—I had many colleagues here during my first tenure who were afraid to come out. I was a finalist for the presidency of a sister institution a decade-and-a-half ago and later found out from two different members of the search committee that the board chair said to them he wouldn’t allow a gay president and stopped the search. The good news is that today much of that has changed and nearly disappeared at these institutions (heterosexism, like racism, sexism, and other -isms, still exists on some level even in the best environment). I remember that when I was offered the presidency here, the board chair and I were talking and at one point he stopped and said, “How does Boris feel about this?” I answered that he would be thrilled, and the chair said, “Good,” and moved on with the rest of the conversation. You know, each year my husband Boris (Thomas, JD, PhD) and I host all of our identity student groups in our campus home and we always ask the questions “When did you first know I (Jim) was gay and how did that make you feel?” The two most common responses are “proud” and “safe.” For them, to see oneself in the leadership of the college is so critical. This is especially true for students from non-Western countries for whom my presence as an out gay man is nearly unbelievable as it simply would not happen in their countries.

Terry: I should mention that president Gandre’s husband, Boris Thomas, has attended several of the meetings and institutes of our organization.

Jim: Being the “first spouse” of any institution is a tough job. You’re nearly as visible as the president, you most often have some obligations to be “on” at various events (and for MSM at lots of performances), but you most often don’t get paid and most often the spouse has his/her/their own profession that has nothing to do with the institution with which he/she/they is intrinsically linked. Boris is amazing as the first spouse. He really enjoys the people here and the campus loves him and is always asking about him when he’s not at events (I sometimes think they like him far more than me!) My presidency would not be as successful without him, that’s for sure.

Terry: Congratulations to you both! I look forward to listening to more of your streaming content (https://www.msmnyc.edu/livestream/).

Jim: Thank you!

As we welcome Terry Allison in his new role, it’s time to thank our previous Executive Director and one of the co-founders of our organization, Charles R. “Chuck” Middleton.

After a six-decade career in both public and private institutions of higher education, Chuck retired as Roosevelt University’s 5th president in 2015. Subsequently he served as Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the City Colleges of Chicago. Chuck is a Senior Consultant at the Association of Governing Boards (AGB) and serves as a mentor to the American Council on Education (ACE) Fellows Program. A British historian, in recognition of his academic achievements, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society in 1989. In addition to his passion for and work in higher education, Chuck has always been active in civic and community engagement. His service encompassed advocacy for inclusiveness and social justice for all people, with a personal focus on the LGBTQ Community. Over the years he has served on numerous Boards of not for profit organizations including those of ACE, SAGEUSA, and PFLAG National. The first publicly acknowledged out gay male president at the time of his Roosevelt appointment in 2002, Chuck was a founding member of the LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education in 2010. After his retirement he served as its Executive Director, pro bono, until 2019.

Chuck and his husband, John Geary are now settled happily in California. They have been generous with their time and also generous donors to LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education. Thank you so much for your contributions to our organization.

PRESS RELEASE

LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education is pleased to announce the appointment of an Executive Director, Dr. Terry L. Allison of Indiana University South Bend. As chancellor of IU South Bend from 2013-18, Allison joined the young organization after his appointment at IU and has been an active member since 2013.  Dr. Erika Endrijonas, Superintendent-President of Pasadena City College and the organization’s current Co-Chair, notes “I am excited to welcome Dr. Allison as the Executive Director because he both knows how the organization evolved and he has some great ideas for how to expand our reach in support of LGBTQ leaders across all sectors of higher education.”  He served as co-chair of the program planning committee for the organization’s first two national institutes, was a member of the Finance Committee, and served on the Executive Board as Secretary/Treasurer of the organization from 2016-2018. He also has led several discussions at the American Council on Education (ACE), the American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU), and other venues on LGBTQ leadership in higher education. Allison will begin his part-time Executive Director position with LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education on August 1, 2020. The position was previously held by Dr. Charles R. Middleton, retired president of Roosevelt University of Chicago, Illinois.

Terry L. Allison is now Professor of English, teaching online in the English, Liberal Studies, and Theatre programs at Indiana University South Bend. He will continue to serve in this position while fulfilling the Executive Director role. Allison’s PhD is in Literature from the University of California, San Diego.  Prior to Indiana University South Bend, he served as Provost at Governors State University, and prior to that was Dean of Arts and Letters at California State University Los Angeles. He also worked in a number of faculty and administrative capacities at California State University, San Marcos, coming to that campus in its second year of existence. Allison has published literary, theatre, performance, and film criticism and is the author of CSU haiku. 

LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education advances effective leadership in the realm of post-secondary education, supports professional development of LGBTQ leaders in that sector, and provides education and advocacy regarding LGBTQ issues within the global academy and for the public at large. The organization counts over 100 members who currently or formerly served as presidents or chancellors from all sectors of higher education in the United States and Canada. LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education has held three international conferences since 2015. Members also meet regularly at annual meetings of the organization and have organized programs at ACE, the Association of Governing Boards (AGB), AASCU, and at state and regional conferences of community college leaders.

For further information about this appointment or LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education, please contact Dr. Erika Endrijonas at eendrijonas@pasadena.edu.

Susan E. Henking ponders how, in today’s challenging environment, college presidents should fight to sustain the best of what higher education has been and can be.

In November 2014, I marched the streets of Chicago with my partner and many others in response to a grand jury’s decision not to indict a police officer in the shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo. I did not do so easily. And yet, I walked.

I was a college president.

I knew that Amy Gutmann, president of the University of Pennsylvania, had lain down with students performing a die-in at her home and said, “Black lives matter.” And I knew that controversy swirled around her choice.

I knew that predecessor presidents, in the 19th and 20th centuries, had used their prestige, moral stature and bully pulpits to take stands around much more than the higher education reauthorization bill or the role of financial aid. Some of their positions appall me — and some seem to me to have been right. Most crucially, their willingness to speak to public issues of import that were both directly and less directly relevant to their immediate mission and job descriptions inspire me. They make me think about what has changed in the role of the college or university president in more recent years.

As I look back to November 2014, I know that my uncertainty about marching came in part from forces that shape today’s college presidency: the need to raise money, the complexities of admissions and enrollment marketing, financial storms, board leadership, social media eruptions that end presidencies, and much more. Of course, I was also concerned about the relevance of performative or expressive politics rather than policy change. But, I admit: it was mostly worry about my then institution and role that hampered me.

Then, as now, I asked myself what it might mean to be an inside leader with outside values — a college president who remains responsible both to the institution and its many constituencies and to the broader concept of citizenship and higher education’s claim to shape the public good. Had I, perhaps voluntarily, given up my freedom of speech or academic freedom by taking on the role of president?

What was the relation between my institutional role and my own views as scholar or citizen? Seeing higher education as contributing more than the simple sum of our impact on individuals, I wondered why we as presidents seem so silent. Yes, we have lobbying organizations in Washington — a whole alphabet soup of them — and many of us write op-eds and speak in various venues to the value of what we do. And yet …

I also asked myself about outsider — or, to use Malcom Gladwell’s oft-repeated terminology — outlier colleges and universities like the one I led in 2014, Shimer College. That institution was outside the mainstream of higher education in terms of various markers, including our very progressive values. Was our — or my — capacity to disagree with the powers that be in some arenas possible because we were so fragile in other ways? So, dare I say it, tiny and potentially irrelevant, allowing me to slip beneath radar screens as, for example, my peers elsewhere could not?

Today, my uncertainties remain.

I know what I have done when it comes to public speech as a college president. I am proud that I walked with those who knew the Ferguson decision was a negative judgment on our country’s capacity to address matters of race and policing. And I am proud of the letters I’ve signed, statements I’ve made and campus policies I’ve sought to bring forward. Like other presidents, I have signed on to statements about DACA and guns on campus, for example. I have supported other presidents who took on issues like divestment and boycotting with their boards, rescinded honorary degrees from sexual predators, and filed amicus briefs or engaged in lawsuits about matters of educational and public concern. I have written op-eds rejecting Religious Freedom Restoration Act laws and arguing against gun violence. I have worked to identify how to divest higher education advertising dollars from venues supporting white supremacy and advocated for refusing National Rifle Association dollars.

Such matters seem more and more urgent today, as the economic situation of higher education declines; as matters of central concern to civil society such as free speech, diversity, freedom of the press and education itself are under attack — and as racism, misogyny and other bigotries are on the rise; our roles in shaping lives and civil society are undervalued and misunderstood; and, perhaps, our impact is weakening. The situation facing us today is more serious than it was even in November 2014. I know many of my former peers have been important voices in opposing the Muslim travel ban, refusing support from corporations benefiting from child internments, supporting racial justice and making evident our commitment to the rights of the LGBTQ community while fighting on other fronts to sustain the best of what American higher education has been and can be.

Today I ask, however, not what can we do but what must we do?

I remain unsure where the line in the sand is for myself and for college presidents more generally. Yet I know we must not ignore the question. Leadership, perhaps, is the willingness to struggle in public — and to do so strategically so that our uncertainty does not mean we do too little, or act too late, in the face of well-organized hostility. This is our time and our responsibility.

From today’s vantage point, I would say: we must do more. All of us.

I stayed quiet about my HIV+ status for 30 years, but no longer. It’s time to fight again, like we did in the ’80s

By Raymond E. Crossman, Ph.D., President of Adler University, Co-Chair of LGBTQ Presidents in Higher Education.

Since November’s presidential election, I have had an uneasy feeling of déjà vu. It took me a while to put my finger on exactly what I was remembering. Until I realized, it’s 1985. Now, just as then, we are living in a time when the president’s actions are leading to harm for marginalized people around the world.

My vantage point on 1985 is that I grew up in the 1980s in New York City in the midst of the AIDS epidemic. It was likely the latter part of the decade that I acquired HIV.

I have lived with HIV for about 30 years, and yet this disclosure is a new one for me to offer in my professional life. I am a university president who has been out as a gay man across my career, but up until now, disclosure about my HIV status has been on a need-to-know basis.

Why am I making it public now? Because of the parallels between then and now. In 1985, the president not speaking one particular word caused us injury and death. In 2017, the president speaking many incendiary words is causing injury and death.

It is difficult to explain what 1985 was like for me, when today’s prevailing narrative about the Reagan years and the 1980s is fond nostalgia. Fondly is not how I remember the 1980s. Sickness and death were everywhere around me.

I did not get tested when the HIV test became available in 1985, because no treatment was available and because I was scared. But I was sure I had acquired the virus that was revealing itself across my friendship and partner circles.

The government knew an epidemic was raging through marginalized communities, and public health strategies were available, but government policy reflected indifference and inaction. President Reagan did not say the word AIDS until 1985, after over 5,000 known AIDS deaths in the United States, and well after the scope of the coming pandemic was understood.

I was certain – as were many gay men – that few cared if we all died, because we heard those words often and from many. I believe the vitriol and volume of the hate speech of the 1980s has receded from most people’s memory. It has not receded from mine. I believed that dying from AIDS was simply part of being gay.

Today, I wonder whether many immigrants – and many people who might look like immigrants –feel now how I felt in the 1980s. I cannot know the contemporary experience of many marginalized groups, but I can imagine that many people – Muslims, women, people living with disabilities, people of color standing up against institutionalized racism, people at the intersection of these and many more identities – feel as abandoned by the state as I felt then.

The parallels between then and now are why I am disclosing my HIV status publicly. My status and my story are what I have to offer. We saved our community from extinction in the face of government- sanctioned indifference, hatred, and oppression. I not only survived the plague, but have achieved some level of success, as a university president, perhaps in part because of what I learned in surviving.

To be clear: We did not beat or cure AIDS in the 1980s. Many of us died across a protracted fight with society and the government. Our success was more for gay white men than it was for women, people of color, and people living in poverty and prisons. And millions around the world continue to acquire, live with, and die of AIDS in the shadow of indifference, hatred, and oppression. But we secured a specific and significant success, and I am here to tell about it.

Others have documented how Gay Men’s Health Crisis (GMHC) and ACT UP forced the government to respond to the public health crisis of HIV. My story is that I participated in that solution as a young person.

In 1985, I was 20. I expected to die within a few years. I felt powerless amidst sickness and death, anticipated symptoms and illness on any given morning, and yearned for an outlet for my sadness and anger. Fortunately there were wise elders to tell me what to do. I did not fully understand what I was doing when I volunteered or went to a protest. I was simply doing what those elders who led GMHC and ACT UP told us to do – without appreciating the leadership, strategy, and focus of our advocacy and political action.

The orchestrated posing of hundreds pretending to be dead in front of federal buildings, the relentless closing down of traffic and commerce, the messaging that straight people could not ignore – I participated in these actions, gradually understanding them as a solution, and sometimes choosing them over less productive behaviors that a kid pursues if he believes he’s living under a death sentence.

I find myself back in the 1980s as I listen to President Trump. But I’m not a kid. I am instead the product of schooling by wise elders and by 30 years of HIV.

I do ask myself why I didn’t disclose more publically until now. My list of answers is long and psychologically revealing: fear of repercussions (many real, some imagined), a desire not to be pitied or summed up by my status, a need to focus on others and to be useful, my own internalized heterosexism and homophobia, a need to remain private in a very public job.

Or, perhaps it’s that I was waiting to use this asset of mine when it’s most needed.

Students at my university – a university which is explicitly focused on social justice – ask me what to do right now. Black and brown students ask how to stand up to hate and violence. Queer students ask what it means that the Department of Education is led by someone who has supported discrimination and conversion therapy. Students ask how to translate their passions into actions that will matter. I realize they think I’m an elder who has answers, and I see they’re more ready than I was in the 1980s. I realize too I have some answers that I’ve learned from the successes and failures of the 1980s – lessons about leadership, strategy, and focus of advocacy and political action. I know how to fight for my life and an oppressed community and how to win.

Recently, Larry Kramer, one of the founders of GMHC and ACT UP, offered observations similar to mine. He said, “It’s the early days of AIDS all over again. I didn’t think this would ever happen. It makes you want to cry.”

I’ve cried too, Mr. Kramer. And I’ve paid attention. My tears are dry, and I’m ready. We have precedent and credentials to secure social justice.

Raymond E. Crossman, Ph.D. is president of Adler University. He is a social justice advocate and a psychologist.