SACRAMENTO (Press Release)—Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez (D-Los Angeles) on Wednesday, Jan. 8, announced the creation of the Assembly Select Committee on Campus Climate, which will investigate issues pertaining to student welfare on college campuses. Assemblymember Shirley N. Weber (D-San Diego), who worked as a professor and department chair at San Diego State University for 40 years, will chair the Committee.
“Over these past few years we have seen too many incidents on California college campuses perpetrated by people with malicious intent to harm or demean others,” said Speaker Pérez. “We need to act vigorously to ensure that our campuses are welcoming to all and reflective of the rich diversity of this great state. I have faith that Dr. Weber and the Select Committee on Campus Climate will work hard to examine the environment at California colleges and universities, so that we can learn how to prevent these terrible incidences from occurring again.”
The Select Committee on Campus Climate will evaluate system-wide and campus-wide policies and practices for responding to student harassment and hate crimes and determine what needs to be done to improve campus climate for California students. The date of the first subcommittee meeting is to be announced.
The announcement follows the charging of four white students with hate-crime harassment of a black student. Allegedly they blockaded the door to his dorm room, forced a collar around his neck, made a point of displaying the Confederate flag and referred to him as “three-fifths,” a reference to teh Constitutional provijsion (since amended) counting slaves as three-fifths of a person for the purposes of representation.
“It’s clear from this particularly disturbing incident – one that harkens back to uglier times in our nation’s history – that we still have a lot of work to do to ensure California’s college campuses are safe and welcoming educational environments for every student,” Dr. Weber said. “My committee colleagues and I will be holding hearings over the next year to explore the current campus climate for students throughout in CSU, UC and Community College systems and consider what policy changes are necessary to improve it.”
The members of the Select Committee on Campus Climate are: Assemblymember Shirley D. Weber (D-San Diego), Chair; Assemblymember Tom Ammiano (D-San Francisco); Assemblymember Richard Bloom (D-Santa Monica); Assemblymember Steven Bradford (D-Gardena); Assemblymember Nora Campos (D-San Jose); Assemblymember Susan Eggman (D-Stockton); Assemblymember Paul Fong (D-Cupertino); Assemblymember Isadore Hall (D-Compton); Assemblymember Brian Maienschein (R-San Diego); Assemblymember Kristin Olsen (R-Modesto); Assemblymember Jim Patterson (R-Fresno); Assemblymember Sharon Quirk-Silva (D-Fullerton); Assemblymember Phil Ting (D-San Francisco); Assemblymember Scott Wilk (R-Santa Clarita); and Assemblymember Das Williams (D-Santa Barbara)
*
Preceding provided by the office of Assembly Speaker John Perez