Director’s Statement on Anti-Racism

(Waterloo – 11 June 2020) The Project Director and members of Environments of Change and the DRAGEN Lab leadership team stand in solidarity with communities around the world protesting racism, injustice, and inequality.

Though the killing of George Floyd by members of the Minneapolis police department sparked demonstrations in the United States, the roots of the issue extend back to decades and centuries of racism and inequality and are not isolated to that country. Our Project Director calls on political leaders, organizations, colleagues, and individuals to take immediate action against endemic racism and to put a stop to discrimination against Black people, Indigenous people, and all racialized peoples.

Our project leadership team renews its commitment to fight racism in the community, on our campus, and in our workplace. Racism in the academy is evident through under-representation of racialized scholars, students, and leaders in post-secondary education; in their over-representation in precarious employment; in racial profiling; and in discrimination in the hiring and promotion process.

The academy can and must do better. We need to be part of the solution by addressing the inequities that exist and by leveraging our collective knowledge, expertise, and resources to root out racism and inequality.