A Moment with President Tomás Morales – February 2023

Black History Month is a celebratory time of year here at Cal State San Bernardino. The planning committee typically schedules a robust calendar of talks, panels, films and other events on campus, with the highlight near the end of February: the Pioneer Breakfast. For over a decade, the Black Faculty, Staff, and Student Association has held this celebration both of honorees and of scholarship winners. 

In 2019, Prince Ogidikpe, then-president of CSUSB’s student government or ASI, said this: “When I hear Pioneer Breakfast, I think of legacies that have come before us inspiring current students. I always want to participate in the hopes that I too can make someone’s life different and better. It is also an avenue for students from low-income, socioeconomic backgrounds to benefit. It helps a lot. The Black History Month makes me feel like, yes, we, the Blacks, matter. It signifies that we are important and needed.”

But support of the African American community at CSUSB is intended to be a year-round focus, built into the structure of our university’s commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion. A community initiative out of the James R. Watson and Judy Rodriguez Watson College of Education has been addressing the higher dropout rates and the lower high school graduation and college-going rates of African American men in our nation. Project Impact’s aim is to increase the diversity of teachers in the region by intentionally recruiting men of color, with a specific focus on African American and Latino males.

It is not only seeing a face at the head of the class which looks like many of the students in that classroom, it is having someone who those students feel understands them and knows where they are coming from. The data we have backs this up, along with the lived experience of Watson College of Education Dean Chinaka DomNwachukwu, from his days as an East Los Angeles K-12 teacher. 

Project Impact had its first cohort of 10 students in the spring of 2020. Fall 2023 saw its fourth cohort, this time comprising 30 students. Recognizing that tuition could prove a burden, covering tuition costs has been a goal from the beginning. But recent realizations that living costs, which can’t be addressed by a paying job during the weeks of training for California credentialing, has led the program to begin considering transitioning to a paid internship model.

While CSUSB’s Watson College of Education continues to direct the program, the goal is to replicate it in school districts throughout the region and beyond. We are all about student success here at CSUSB. But success in college begins with success in students’ elementary, middle and then high school years. With the goal of ensuring that all of our young people have access to  the levers of success, Project Impact is providing a practical and robust tool for our male communities of color to become teachers.

To learn more about Project Impact, please visit its website. Supporters and cheerleaders of its efforts are always welcome.