Starting with the Promises: Moving from Inspirational Words to Institutional Action in Addressing Systemic Racism

This special session aims to examine engineering departmental/program level public statements in response to the novel coronavirus pandemic and American racism in the year 2020 (RACISM-20). Specifically, this session will catalyze a critical discourse regarding the cultivation of anti-racist engineering environments through considering the responses to a crucial national moment as reflective of the initial institutional positioning [1]. The intended audience for this special session includes all stakeholders in the engineering ecosystem to thoroughly consider institutions and the associated messaging conveyed through their anti-racist response statements. A specific focus is on members of engineering and computer science higher education environments inclusive of students, staff, faculty and administrators for whom the work has implications in both classroom and research environments. The hope is to have an audience diverse in institutional representation, geographical location, disciplinary area, status/rank, and identities. This session invites all to join an interactive discussion that addresses the role of the institutional response and accountability in seeding anti-racist endeavors [2].