The Southern Association of Colleges and Employers extends deep concern for our colleagues, students, and friends in the Asian, Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Community after the tragic events that occurred in Atlanta, Georgia earlier this week.  We condemn the acts of violence, discrimination and hate crimes displayed toward the AAPI community.             

Hate crimes have grown exponentially across the country over the last year. The Stop AAPI Hate, database was created at the beginning of the pandemic as a response to the increase in racial violence and has received 2,808 reports of anti-Asian discrimination between March 19 and December 31, 2020.

As our nation suffers through the civil unrest we’ve witnessed as a result of the killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery these last few weeks, we, as a Board of Directors on behalf of the Association, reaffirm our commitment to diversity and our opposition to racism, prejudice, hatred, exclusion, and bigotry. Every one of us has the power to find opportunities to acknowledge and value all human life.

The troubling acts of violence we’ve witnessed lately are indications that our country continues to suffer from racial injustice. At the most recent SoACE conference in Memphis, we were reminded during our visit to the National Civil Rights Museum that “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. ...Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly” (Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Letter from the Birmingham Jail). Knowing our country’s history of systemic racism is the best way to equip us with changing things today and in the future.