Board of Trustees May 19, 2017

WHEREAS, on May 1, 2017, Black female students who are members of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated were targets of a hate crime and that distinguished organization includes as a member American University's first Black woman Student Government President;

WHEREAS, an attack on any AU community member is an attack on all of us and AU is working with investigative and police authorities including Campus Police; the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department; the FBI; and the Department of Justice U.S. Attorney to solve this crime;

WHEREAS, American University has worked diligently to live up to its mission and values and create a truly diverse and inclusive campus community, but the University leadership and Board acknowledge that despite our intentions and invested efforts there is much more to do to achieve our ideals; that parts of our community do not feel supported and included and the campus experiences of Black and other minority students lag behind;

NOW THEREFORE, be it resolved that the Board of Trustees will work more emphatically with the American University leadership and the campus community to address systemic racism in all of its forms and will seek new and stronger ways to address it; will commit full support to the investigative and police authorities to find those responsible for this bigoted hate crime and bring them to justice; will strive to make AU a model campus on matters of diversity and inclusion for all of our students, staff, faculty, administrators and alumni and will address incidents of hatred, racism and bigotry in more effective ways; and to these ends we stand committed.