Rochelle Newton's "Diversity Chat" with Michael Cato [video]

Michael Cato
Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer
Bowdoin College

Rochelle Newton
Assistant Divisional Chief Operating Officer
Duke Health Technology Solutions

Rochelle Newton: So, I'm going to start by asking you to tell us your name and anything you wanna share with us so we can get to know you a little bit better. Yep, so, please.

Michael Cato: Sounds good, I'll be happy to. My name is Michael Cato. I'm the Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer here at Bowdoin College, here in Brunswick, Maine. I've been here just over two years but I have worked in Higher Education IT since 2003, I think that's right, oh no, 2001, what am I saying? So it's been 20 years, next year it'll be 20 years. And it's actually been, it's been a lot of fun. I've worked now for the last six years in small liberal arts institutions and private institutions but the bulk of my career was in larger public institutions. I started at UNC Chapel Hill and down the street from you at Duke, actually I lived in downtown Durham. And then I went to work at UNC Charlotte before coming to Vassar and now here at Bowdoin.

Newton: Excellent and as the Vice President and CIO, can you describe a little bit of your duties and daily interactions are and what involvements you have in decision making and whatever it is that, that job entails?

Cato: Sure, so in our structure, my title means that I am the senior officer, that's the language that we use. I report to the president and I'm responsible for all of the information services across the institution. So many of the things people traditionally think of as IT, the network and the servers and systems but also how IT serves the larger institutional mission. So, everything from security cameras in partnership with our security office, two on the academic side, both the learning management system but as an example, as we're preparing for the fall and we're still working through announcing what our model would be in response to all of the work around COVID, I've been deeply involved in the decision making on how do we explore options for contact tracing to supporting faculty as we, teachers, at least a third of our curriculum will have to be taught online, which is completely new for us as a liberal arts institution and helping us create that distinction between the emergency version we did in the spring and truly building intentionally-designed online courses, my team and I are deeply involved in all of that.

Newton: So I imagine you must be pretty busy.

Cato: A little bit of that, yes, , it's been a lot of fun. It was funny because I said that the spring pieces, the emergency version was a lot of activity but I thought, I think for a lot of us in IT, it's, it kind of leaned into the firefighting side that a lot of us have, kind of have innately just because it's really rewarding to get that instant gratification of solving a problem really quickly but the work for the fall and looking ahead is much more complicated and thankfully for me, it's the kind of thing I really enjoy. Just, it tends to be a lot more stressful, I think, it kinda feels like the stakes are higher.

Newton: That makes sense to me, so how do you and I know each other?

Cato: So we first met, I think because you sent me an email, actually, I better we first got in contact. You'd seen an advertisement for a webinar, I'm sorry, a panel conversation that I was putting together and you introduced yourself and just, we had a quick conversation. I asked you to be willing to join the panel. And we had a really, I thought a really wonderful conversation around issues of diversity, equity, inclusion in one of the organizations that I'm part of. And then recently we did it again with a different organization in a conversation last week. So, I have yet to meet you in person but I've been really grateful to be able to learn from your experiences and tap into your expertise and compare notes.

Newton: I appreciate that very much but, so at the email I sent it, I sent that to NERCOMP or did I send that to EDUCAUSE? Trying to, I don't know.

Cato: I was trying to remember that too.

Newton: Yeah, and NERCOMP and EDUCAUSE are two separate things or is NERCOMP a layer under EDUCAUSE?

Cato: They are separate. So EDUCAUSE is the national organization. Historically there have been a regional organizations as well, and NERCOMP was one of the largest just because the Northeast has so many institutions of higher education here. And over the years, many of the regionals aren't quite as active anymore but NERCOMP has the capacity to do some really interesting work. So I've had the good fortune of serving on NERCOMP's board for the last five years. And there was a project that we were working on, that's where, I think that was the announcement that you first saw, it was a NERCOMP offering. And then what we did last week for it was, for the consortium of liberal arts colleges.

Newton: Yeah, absolutely, thank you so much for that. So let me ask you, so you started in IT almost 20 years ago, can you talk about your journey and what I'm asking is, is have you always felt supported? Did you experience any discrimination or racism as you moved your journey through IT to where you are now?

Cato: So I'll give you the short answers first, have I always felt supported? No, have I experienced issues of racism and discrimination? Yes, haven't always been overt, thankfully there hasn't been that many of them that have been, as directly challenging though, I've had a few, it's sometimes they're super subtle. I had a, I was IT director at this point and because of where I was working, I had one of the master keys for the building that my college was part of. So it was, the university systems, so there were seven colleges that make up the university and we had just built a new building, it was a beautiful, beautiful facility. We were just in, I think maybe two years in. And because I had a master key, we had one of the adjunct faculty members had gotten locked out and she found one of the students who work on my team and he found me 'cause he knew I could help. We got her in, a couple of weeks later, it happened again. And she went and found the students to ask for the help. And she asked for me as the janitor. And I was wearing a suit and tie at the time she met me. But the context clues about how I was dressed, just didn't seem to re-reconcile with the fact that I look like I do and the fact that I had a master key. So sometimes, this things like that and the student that she asked happened to also be a black student and he and I had some really interesting conversations about it, he laughed first. He's like, I can't figure out how she could possibly think you're the janitor. But then as we talked about how those impressions start to show up in certain really destructive ways as well in searches that I've been part of, sometimes when I'm a candidate or when I'm on a search committee and we're reviewing candidates. I had a really, I was on a search once, we were looking at a group of candidates who come to campus. Out of the group, only one was a, happened to be an African-American woman. And the feedback we got from the faculty about her was, well, we're not sure she's ready for promotion, right? They kept saying she, she presented herself really well but we're not sure if she's ready for promotion. Yet she already had the position at her institution, so it would be a lateral for her. The other candidate who actually, there's would have been a promotion for, no one said anything like that about. And the way the feedback came in and we could tell the feedback was from the same individual. So it was really stunning to see the contradiction. And so knowing that things like that are at play. And in that particular case, I was grateful because the committee was responsive to a couple of us. And I was one of those leading voices, bringing in conversations about internal, excuse me, about bias and how it manifests in searches and really for, putting in a framework so that we could be more, much more intentional about how we would address issues like that. So in that case, we chose to exclude all of the faculty feedback we received because it was so clearly laced with bias. And it was a difficult decision for many of my faculty colleagues on the committee but I was really proud that we could get to that point to just embrace the fact that there's these, the feedback was problematic. So we therefore could not use it in our decision making. So I've had number of experiences like that.

Newton: Yeah, so I have a-two part question, one you may know the answer to, one you may not. Among clerk, how many black or brown CIOs are there?

Cato: That one I know the answer to. So I'll answer it two ways though, because last week, clerk for the, I think only the second or third time in their history voted to expand the membership. So clerk now is 75 institutions. of those institutions, if my math is correct, six of us are people of color, three are black, two are Indian background and one gentleman is Hispanic. And so those numbers, I mean, they're, it's, that's six out of 75 is one thing. But before the vote to expand, we were 70 and there were, I was the only black CIO, long story that had just shifted the week, a couple of weeks before. And there was one Hispanic CIO and two gentlemen who are Indian. So the numbers are really, really low for that group. And it has been something. I joined when I came to Vassar in 2013. So for the last seven years, I've been part of conversations about how do we at least get better at acknowledging and addressing the issues that are clearly at play? 'Cause I've told them multiple times, the first time I walked into one of the clerk conferences, I looked around and said, wow, this is the widest space I have ever been in, in a really long time, right? With a couple 100 people in the room. And like I said, there's only a handful of people who looked, who were brown at all, people of color at all. And only one or two at the other time at that time, sorry, who looked anything like.

Newton: Do you know that information for the less liberal arts for more generic? And I don't want to say generic but colleges like private colleges, public colleges that do not fall under the umbrella of clerk. Do you know how many CIO's are black or brown or female or whatever?

Cato: Yeah, that's a great question that the data at the last more reliable information I had is a couple years old. And at that time there was a, it was a group that's no longer operate. They've been folded under EDUCAUSE. So some of the data will be updated through them. And I did single digits, it was 4%. And then went down to 3%, then went back up to 4% of our African-American of higher education CIO's who responded to that particular surveys but it's a survey, right? So the one thing I was not able to dig in with them is how much representation were there from HBCUs in the survey itself and the instrument itself? So call that, I believe it's 100 HBCUs in the country.

Newton: Yeah.

Cato: And one really interesting point for me as I talked with command and actually we probably should be explicit historically black colleges and universities know what the acronym stands for. But as I've talked to colleagues who don't necessarily have a background of knowing about HBCUs, those are institutions have never been segregated. And I find that just stunning to it just as a factual acknowledgement that at the time that this, that our country has wrestled with issues of race and inclusion, the one group that many have sometimes challenged and said, well, why do these exist in the first place? They themselves have never segregated. They've always welcomed students from different backgrounds.

Newton: Yeah.

Cato: And so that shows up in one place that's really interesting for me. When I look at the people who hold the CIO seats across HBCUs, you can find much more diversity, often among those groups, than you'll find in other places. And I think that's a wonderful thing but the drawback has been, that has also decreased the total number of black CIOs that are in higher education because the institutions that those were the places that it would happen more regularly are now being more inclusive at the same time that the rest of the community is not doing the same thing.

Newton: Yeah, so let me ask you a question about diversity and inclusion. So as of late, many organizations have rushed to create DEI positions and team leads and things of that nature but even with your school and anyone else you may know, do you see that these people who are DEI's or diversity inclusion officers, do you see them having the power to actually bring equality to their institutions and to their organizations?

Cato: Yeah, I, it depends on how they were brought in, why they were brought in and what they are positioned to do? And in my experience, some of the, I was at an institution that wrestled with whether to create a vice president for diversity and inclusion position, ultimately decided not to do it. I can come back to that in a minute. I think it was the, I think that that choice was shortsighted. But bringing someone in the argument that was made against it was that others might think, now that we have someone here, I can wash my hands of it. I'm not part of the solution anymore, right? But the alternatives doesn't actually force everybody to actually part of it either, right? So it's, it's not just about creating the position. It's also, are you really committed to doing the actual work? And we've been, I've been really fortunate. I started here literally on the same day as our vice president for diversity inclusion, Michael Reed, is his name. And I have been really impressive watching him work because his focus is leading by influence. I don't know if he's actually used that language but that's what I've observed over the last two years. And there's in fact, I'll make the comparison to my own role. I have often watched and it's really tempting. Once you have a position of authority with some authority to it, it's often tempting to lean on that authority to make people do things because your position, you have the positional authority to make it happen. That tends to be far less effective over time, right? So the people who are really effective don't lead with that. And you better, that becomes your option of last resort that you're much more about building coalitions and partnering with people and contributing your own resources, doing things that you can to help bring people to a shared understanding of where you're trying to go. I find that really effective chief diversity officers are doing that all the time. So no matter what power they may have positionally, it's still all about influence because at the end of the day, I think it's about making the case for diversity first, really helping people understand what is it, we can get out of this, right? So that it's not, it is the right thing to do. I'm not disagreeing with that at all. But I think if that's your only argument, that's a really steep hill to climb versus if we have a shared understanding that is beneficial to us as an institution, then there's something that we can all lean into to start moving in that direction.

Newton: Yeah.

Cato: Sorry, long answer to your question but that's kinda how I've come to think about it.

Newton: That's perfect. It's perfect answer. I'm going to ask you a question about me and I want you to give me your opinion. So I grew up in a little town of South Carolina called Walterboro and my mother was my paternal aunt. She was my father's older sister and she raised me. She only had a fourth grade education. And so she was a domestic, is she right when we have these uncomfortable conversations for me because she would just say, get a good education and get out of South Carolina. That's all she ever said to me. She wasn't particularly affectionate or loving but she was always on that tangent doubt. And so I had gotten a scholarship and I was walking, my first day, I was walking onto the campus and there were these kiosks and there was a white gentleman there and his exact words were, we are trying to bring Negroes into computers. This was in the mid to late seventies. At first, I didn't know what a computer was. And then I had heard the other N-word, never Negroes but the other N-word, so I was struggling with what that meant. And at first I was going to just keep all my past path but then he said, we'll pay you $30,000 immediately. And for someone who grew up poor,

Cato: Yeah, absolutely.

Newton: I'd won the lottery. And since then, probably 25 or so years of my experience has been in the private sector and of late, it's been in the public sector, working in higher education or elementary education. I didn't get my first college degree until I was 45. And I got two, I graduated the top of my class, summa cum laude. And then I got my masters, I got executive master in public administration and back to my undergraduate, my undergraduate degrees are in psychology and literature. And my doctorate is in higher education administration. And my current employer and with my current employer and with all the other things that I do, I'm well known, I'm often called to speak on diversity advocacy for black and brown men and women. And to share my thoughts about emerging technologies for those communities. Why is it, and let me just say one more thing. I am not the easiest person to get along with because I don't take a lot of crap if you will, I'm not going to let you bully me or push me around, so I think I've gotten this stereotype attached to me that I am an angry black woman. But why do you think it is that the highest I've ever rose, was a director of IT and that I would, that I probably will never be a CIO in my lifetime?

Cato: Yeah, so it's a, I'll, so let me start with this. The, I think this is true for anyone, for all of us, right? But there's of said, fair degree of preparation, which you clearly have, right? Far more than I do, right? My highest degree an MBA, right? But there's also opportunity, preparation opportunity, good luck and mentorship, right? Having someone who's mentoring or advocating on your behalf when those opportunities turn up. And I think that that combination getting that right combination and that's where the good luck pieces, fits in, right? Because there's a bunch of this, we don't actually control and anyone who has an arrogance to say, I constructed my career and this is exactly, it's all about me and I got everything I wanted, I think back to President Obama, one of the last commencement speeches he gave in the last couple of years of his presidency, he talked about luck, I think he was talking to a graduate, a bunch of graduates. And he said, look around and just, I want you to acknowledge the good fortune that played a part in you being here. Yes, you were smart, yes, you were accomplished. Yes, you worked hard but I don't want you to have the arrogance to think that anyone who didn't get here is less than you are, right? That there was a significant amount of luck that played into you being here and he said this for himself as well. And it was a whole bunch of consternation about that at the time. But I definitely count that for myself because I, my undergraduate experiences, I have a degree in zoology. I did two years of medical school and I failed out of medical school, it's the first time I'm saying this on a venue that's public. It's not a secret, I talk about it because it's, 20 years ago now but losing my life's dream at that time and then trying to figure out what I was going to do instead, was a really difficult multi-year experience. I'd always had an interest in computers. I was a computer science minor my first year, just, there's a whole bunch of things I was able to lean on. But then I had really good opportunities. And some people who cared about my career and the success of my career but I had nothing to do with this was all about them deciding they wanted to invest in me. And what I tried to do in response is to do the same for them. And just because I know that, I think about those pieces when I'm having conversations with colleagues who I'm just getting to know, I can only imagine all of the different ways, especially because you came up in this much earlier than I did at a time that people could be much more alert and be, get away with it, right? People have to get really creative now, which they still do mind you and I can still talk about but it just requires a lot more. And the fact that I came in at a different time, I think allowed me to approach this in a way that was, I didn't have to have the same guards around me, protections around me that I'm sure you had to just to navigate the spaces that you were in, right? I've had to have the good fortune and I'll add to this, the fact that I failed at a medical school before I began my IT career, also did something for me that I didn't, it took me years to grasp. I didn't fear losing my job, right? So I would walk into conversations when things got sticky. I was fine just, and I wouldn't necessarily, I wasn't always the most vocal person in the conversation because I didn't feel I always had to be but I was much more comfortable working behind the scenes and building relationships and trying to advocate for the direction that I needed to go. And a couple of times where it was clear that wasn't going to happen anymore, I decided, okay, it's time for me to leave. And I've left more than once, I've left roles because I knew that the dynamic was going in a place that was not going to match with my ethical code and my own values, right? So that's the most I can contribute to it 'cause I, I think that if, if this is about how far do we progress? All of those pieces are at play at any given time. And I think unfortunately for people of color broadly, for African-American, specifically for African-American women, right? These pieces get harder and harder and harder. I still have the advantages of being male, right? That I walk into a conversation with a search committee and my, me being aggressive as perceived as a leadership quality, right? Whereas for so many women, you being the same person is perceived as, oh, she just too pushy and all these other negative attributes that come from it. And maybe they don't say it out loud anymore but they're certainly influencing how they make decisions and promotions because yeah, you know, she just doesn't quite resonate with me the same way, and which is where my work, I'm bias is like, okay, I need you to make the effort of telling me what you need because a generalized statement like that could represent too many things that could be taken for granted and pushing ourselves for that. Again, I'm giving you a long answer but that's, those the kind of things I think of.

Newton: Yeah and I appreciate that very much. And I agree with you wholeheartedly. Luck has to play a part because I think if you, as you mentioned, President Obama, who would have guessed a Senator from Chicago would have given a speech at the Democratic Convention event, would become the president, I mean, because we've had a couple other people try to become president, I think Jesse Jackson had tried, I don't remember who the other black person was but there was one other person that tried and failed. And probably because they were also labeled, if you will, as something and the other, and to see President Obama become President Obama was almost life changing for me. I mean, you know, I cried, I prayed. I was just so grateful but also prayed that he did not get assassinated 'cause I was still praying.

Cato: Oh, all the way through his candidacy, all the way throughout, .

Newton: Yeah, that was my other prayer, I was, he was this really elegant, well-spoken, just very dignified black man. And probably there was a good portion of American society did not want to see a black man have that much power. So my prayer was always for him to survive and get to be a successful president as he has been. So, and so to follow that when I told you about myself, I could tell you stories that were probably make your hair stand up on your head, even though you don't have any hair up there, But I have learned to let it roll off my back. If I don't get a job, I'm not going to be upset about that. If I apply and I don't get a call back, I'm not going to be upset about that because like you said, I'm almost at the point that I'm not afraid to be fired or to be let go because I've been in this game for a long time and I have a couple of mentors, both white males and they are nice but I have, I can say specifically, one of them who has a really high power at my university, has never said, you should hire Rochelle. Or a course I've been trying to teach for years, it looks like gender, poverty and race through the lens of current and emerging technologies. I've been trying to teach this course for at least five years at my institution, at my, where I went to school and it got no bites at it. And I don't wanna be a tenure track faculty. I wanna be an adjunct or a pop professor. You know what I mean. So I find it difficult and my question to you is, is that, so how do we change this for the Rochelle's that are behind me? Because my career is literally done. I've only got a few more years to be what I want, what I am now and I hope to retire as a professor but more specifically, what do we do for the Rochelle's that are coming behind me?

Cato: Yeah, I think that the piece for me, mentorship and advocacy, there's a term for it that I'm forgetting, I think people call it champion, right? Someone who is behind the scenes, championing your course, right? And, that people, sometimes conflate the two together and I don't think they necessarily have to be. And I have watched a lot of people who were really great mentors but then they don't champion on behalf of the people who they've got in those relationships with, right? And, so that only does so much for them whereas someone who is also willing to champion and perhaps all they can't do, they don't have the capacity to take you on as a mentor and to have you, have that kind of relationship with them but they are willing to, behind the scenes suggest, hey, I think you should apply for this. Or I'm in the process for this, can you send me your information, 'cause I wanna make sure you get into the pool as well. That piece has to happen as well. And that needs to be broader than just black people doing for black people, right? 'Cause that's long been part of it and I'm still a big believer in it. And I'm part of some organizations that, that's part of their mission. But I think that the needle really starts to move, especially because of percentages, the numbers of us are so as low, we also need to have others who are willing to do that and be part of that conversation, right? And there's going to be a lot of blow back on that it had already happened in a number of places. But that to me is the way that this starts to change. And so I've been grateful to be able to do that. The times I'd have opportunities to but it is also part of the conversation. I think we need to be, make sure we are being intentional about having with everyone. If you really wanna move the needle on this and you want it constructively contribute to it, every time you're involved in a search or a hiring process, make sure you advocate to have a diverse pool every single time, right?

Newton: Right.

Cato: Even if it's a consultant that you're bringing in and you already know someone, if that person is not a diverse candidate, go find another candidate that is to make sure that you were considering that and you're challenging yourself and challenging the process all the way along. That is a decision that we all can make and not everybody does.

Newton: Absolutely, that's absolutely perfect. And I will just say, I am proud to know you and I've been following up, I Google your name and look at some of the work you've done and it's been outstanding and one of my students, one of the students in the law school, we have something called Boston Black Laws, Black Laws Student Association. And one of my Boston student said to me, he said, skin folk aren't always kinfolk. For a minute I had to think, okay, what does this mean? But after I started thinking about it, I started recognizing that although we may be black, we're not always each other's best advocate. We're not always the best to compliment or acknowledge greatness and people that look like us because we're afraid that if we give too much acknowledgement of another person, we're taking some from ourselves, whereas our white counterparts don't have that issue because if they get fired, if they get promoted, if they get a raise, whatever it is, there's no concern that their skin in the game is going to cost them any harm or cost them their ability to advocate.

Cato: Yeah, it's interesting. So I definitely see your point. For me it's been, I think are the stakes for us are higher. I do think that there is a lot of my non-black colleagues, my white colleagues who also don't advocate for others but I don't think they worry about if I make this recommendation of a person of color, of a black candidate and things don't work out, that people are going to look at me and look at the next black candidate differently. And that's a layer, two of it that I think we have absorbed over time. That's really getting in the way of some of this work happening.

Newton: Absolutely.

Cato: Right, so if I think someone's not ready, then how about I give them the feedback on where I think they've got opportunities to grow and some suggestions on ways that could happen, perhaps I can contribute to helping that happen as opposed to not putting them forward, because I don't think they're ready and then not telling them the feedback as to why, right? That's a very different set of choices.

Newton: That's exactly right. I gave a talk a couple of years ago about search committees. So if you're hiring a president or some high level officer, you're a search team should include the lowest person in that organization and I'm not talking about like again to relate, maybe the newest person in IT, or the newest person in administration. And it should be a set of every aspect of your organization. So if you're going to hire a CIO, for example, you hire the least trained IT person, you put the least trained IT person on that search committee. You put someone over in finance and administration on that committee. You put someone that's athletics on that committee because if this person is going to have to interact with all these people, he's diverse voices will get you more likely the best candidate because that least person is going to ask a question that you and I probably would never think to ask, right?

Cato: Yeah, think about, yeah.

Newton: But we have been there for such a long time, it doesn't cross our mind. But if you have that person who's brand new to the industry, he or she may have a perspective that we may not have. And the other part of that is, you're probably a little younger than I am but there used to be something called, The Old Boys Network, right?

Cato: Oh, absolutely.

Newton: Today we call it, hormone social reproduction. We prefer to be with people who look like us, you know? And so in a lot of ways for people like you in yourself, in your position, in your advocacy and the work that you do, you are able to be a voice, you can speak and you don't worry about whether your voice is going to cause you any harm, I.e you lose your job, get written up, whatever it is, your voice is powerful and what you've done for the entire university and other places you worked speaks for itself. So if you were to recommend that you hire Joe, who just got his Microsoft certification, you don't have to worry about it. If Joe turns out that he's not going to come to work on time or he's harassing someone, that's not something you have to worry about 'cause you have a track record of doing very great things. So, thinking, .

Newton: Go ahead.

Cato: I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you, Rochelle. Is just that you make a point that I wanna circle back on because I had an experience at an institution where it was made blatantly clear to me that that was not the case. That despite my role, no, despite the fact that I was hired into the role that I was to do the type of work that I was doing, I had a couple of, one department in specific but it was other places was happening as well. That continued to make it clear that they trusted the judgment of other people more than mine. People who had no experience in the field, right? That it just kept coming up. And it got to the extreme case in a search process that they disagree with and mind you, this, I'm on the search committee, right? So there's three people on the search committee, we've done the interviews. They've talked with two other people as well. And when it came time to decide who was going to go to the final round, I said, look, I have concerns about this one candidate for these reasons 'cause I don't think they met the pieces we're looking for but I appreciate, I have one voice out of three. The other person on the committee agreed with me. The department was so upset with me, not their colleagues that they went to the Dean to override my decision.

Newton: Right.

Cato: Right? And so I got dragged into a meeting with the entire department, small institution. So it's now call it eight, nine people around the room and they spent the first half hour of the conversation berating me. Michael said so and so, I don't know how he can think that so and so, is true, not speaking on behalf of the candidate that they really wanted to bring in but for berating me.

Newton: Right.

Cato: And the entire room was white except for me.

Newton: Right.

Cato: And I sat there in total awe that one, that this would be, that they would be so clueless as to how I would receive this. And one of the reasons that I later left that institution is my colleague also, didn't appreciate what that does to me that you let the conversation happen. So in the end, deciding that, yes, I'm not going to override Michael's decision. That's trivial, you actually let you, I had to sit through this, right? Which is, I mean, what message do you think it tells me about, I actually have the role, none of you are CIOs, none of you have actually hired technical teams, which is what we were hiring for. I'm on the committee to contribute my expertise. And instead of saying, well, we feel strongly about the candidate and advocating for the candidate, you belittle me, right?

Newton: Yeah.

Cato: So those things still happen. And so it's not that, I don't wanna give anyone the impression that I don't think it can happen to me anymore, that it doesn't happen to anyone else. I don't think that's true. And I think that's been one of the great frustrations that for me, is coming out in the Black Lives Matter Movement. And a lot of the conversations we're having now is that people are getting a chance to just be clear, just understand, no matter the role we're in, no matter how much success we've accomplished, no matter what experiences and accolades we have, no matter how much we make, no matter of title, any of that doesn't matter to certain people, to certain large segments of people, unfortunately. The starting point is still, you are a black woman, you are a black man, you are a black professional. And the black part comes first to the negative, right? And so my administrative assistant, my research assistant, you name it, someone to the side, there was an ancillary role in this. Their voice is equal to yours in my mind.

Newton: Right, absolutely. And in jobs I've had, I've been called names. The name I hear most often is that I am passive-aggressive and took a long time I thought I knew what that meant but then I had to go to the Oxford dictionary to look up what passive-aggressive meant. And then I said, okay, this is not who I am but I do understand why I'm being called his name. And so I think that for me, every time we were on a panel together, every time we were talking, I see such beautiful professionalism to no bias. No, already pre-thought concept of how this should go or not but really a very thoughtful panel and very thoughtful questions and agendas. And I think that speaks to your character immensely. And so if someone else doesn't recognize that count that their problem and not yours.

Cato: And I appreciate that, Rochelle.

Newton: My every experience with you has been absolutely exceptional. So let's talk, we only got about seven minutes. So let's talk a little bit about eight minutes and 46 seconds. Have you seen the video?

Cato: I, you mean, the Dave Chappelle Show? I'm sorry, No, no, no.

Newton: No.

Cato: Yeah, sorry, I'm so sorry. Yes, we were talking directly, yes, I did see the video when it first started. Yes.

Newton: Yes.

Cato: Yes, and I haven't been able to watch it again but I felt it's important to watch it the first time.

Newton: Yeah and what did you think about that? What were the thoughts that came to your mind? Did it raise any fears for your own safety for people, your family, your friends? Did it raise any kind of consternation for you?

Cato: I have a four year old son.

Newton: Yeah.

Cato: So my first thought went to him.

Newton: Yeah.

Cato: Right, my four year old son is biracial but we've been really clear with him. The world is going to perceive you as black, you are black. I think you are, you, your mom's family, my family, you are all of those things but we don't want there to be any confusion, right? You, that is something for you to be proud of, you are black, you are a Jamaican, you are, all these pieces make up who you are.

Newton: Right.

Cato: And that was the first thing that I thought of.

Newton: Yeah.

Cato: So it was a mix of frustration and anger, the casualness of all of the officers but especially the one who's kneeling on him in the moment. Even as people are advocating to them, you were literally telling them, you were killing him. And they just stood there. That part there, the first time I saw the phrase, Black Lives Matter, some of our students had put them up around my institution. They put the signs up but I'd never, I didn't hear. I, this was in the early days, I think they had just found it on the web and they put the signs up and I started crying the first time I saw the sign 'cause I, I had this dual response of proud of them that they were willing to say clearly, My Life Matters.

Newton: Right.

Cato: And so angry that they have to.

Newton: To say that, yes, right.

Cato: Right, that it can't be assumed that my life matter is like everyone else's does.

Newton: Yeah.

Cato: And I kept thinking about that as I watched that video the first time 'cause this is what we've been talking about, frankly, my entire life and longer, right? That this is the same message. So in some ways I'm grateful that a lot of people are kind of coming to that realization now that oh, wow, this really is messed up. Like there really is something here. I'm grateful and I'm frustrated that it took, how many videos did it take, right? But it felt like this one was just the right combination of circumstances and perhaps a lockdown, I don't know. But I'm grateful and frustrated again that we've been talking about police misconduct. My, literally my entire life. I grew up in New York city in Brooklyn, in the nineties, right? This in the early, in the late eighties, we were talking about that then, right? And we were having those experiences then, literally every black male I knew in my college experienced with the exception of perhaps one person, when I would, we would actually talk about this, only one guy would ever say, yeah, I've just never had that happen.

Newton: Yeah.

Cato: Everybody else had their own story.

Newton: Yeah, absolutely and I think going back to 16 and 19, we went from a noose, a whip, assassinations to outright murder. Someone said to me in one of these chats, someone has had their knee on my neck, my entire life. This is figuratively, not literally. And that the clan has moved from hoods to suit, you know? So they're still there. Don't get the idea that this is a equal society. And you can see that and those that lead our country, who like to instigate things and call names. And I think any leader, I don't care whether you lead a band, whether you lead the march-across the streets and get something to eat or whatever, if you're calling people names that does not speak well to your intelligence because even if you think those things, you can keep them to yourself, maybe sharing with your family but you don't in a public space say, this person is nothing or he's not smart or whatever it is. I just think that's such poor leadership to call names to people and not understanding. So let me ask you this part of the eight minutes and 46 seconds. Have you ever been in harm's way, have you ever had an encounter with law enforcement or a white person where you thought that you may be harmed or you were unsafe?

Cato: Yeah, I've been pulled over by the police because I looked at a cop 'cause I drove past him on the highway and so he found the excuse to pull me over and they want to search your trunk. That's like there was, and so every time I had to make the call of, do I allow it to happen when I know you don't actually have a right to? And they frame it as a question and yeah, and the guns are always there, right? And then, and they unclip it when they're having a conversation with you and it's like, yeah, well, you stopped me for speeding, why are you reaching for your weapon?

Newton: Well, right.

Cato: Yeah, one of my college friends that we were, he got arrested, he now has a record actually from in-college because we got pulled over for speeding. And he and I were in the back seat, right? And but because he woke up, he's one of those people who wakes up slowly and he didn't answer the cop when he asked him what his name was, he got arrested for it. And they charged him with an obstruction of justice.

Newton: Wow.

Cato: Because he was in the back seat that of a car that was stopped for speeding. No drugs, no anything like, just because he did not answer the question.

Newton: Yeah.

Cato: Yeah. And if he'd resisted, when they were arresting him, yeah, he would have been in that same situation. And yeah, so it's, but the threat of violence has long been there. I did a ride along in, when graduate school, I chose to do a ride along with, I was doing a public health class and I realized I had never had a conversation with a cop that didn't start with, let me see your license and your registration? So I decided I wanted to do a ride along with them. And I have long tried to think about what if I thought, if I saw the world through their eyes, right? So I have a working theory at this point, that part of the challenge has been the fear, illogical or not but the fear of black faces and black skin and black men, especially but this is clear, it happens for black women as well. Right, and there's this level of fear that is so often there, that when they're now in law enforcement, when someone is in a position of law enforcement and they have the charge behind them and the weight of the state behind them and a weapon at their hip, acting on that fear becomes a lot easier to do. And then the system has repeatedly said that a cop who rightfully, they fear for their life, that's a reason enough to take someone else's life. And the jury's like, yeah, it actually makes sense for me to be afraid of, Tamir Rice was one of the ones that I found so frustrating.

Newton:  Yes.

Cato:  He was literally a child, literally a child and the cops chose to kill him and the jury and the DAs, are like, yeah, that actually makes sense that you'd be afraid, 'cause and they kept emphasizing how big he was, right? That's always the case, it's all about the fear. That's the fear makes sense because this was a big black man. I'm 5'7, I routinely get confused in the higher Ed IT space for my colleagues who are much bigger black men, right because all people see is my skin.

Newton: Right.

Cato: So repeatedly been through these guys are 6'2, 6'3 or more and I'm repeatedly confused for them. And I'm always like, I don't understand how you people possibly think I look like him.

Newton: Yeah.

Cato: Hey, just for height alone.

Newton: Yeah. You know, a lot of our leadership in higher education have now been awoken, if you can say that, awakened, if you can say that, I don't know if that's absolutely true or not but there's been tons of speeches by the presidents and the provosts and the deans and directors and all those things have all come out and given statements about what has happened in about the place where our country is. And every time I hear one or read one, I shake my head because it seems like almost every single time they missed the mark, we're going to do something about this. We're going to make it, we're going to make, do our best effort to beat back the systemic racism or whatever it is. And the simplest thing for them to do is to hire, to promote, to pay, to include not speeches, not taskforce but to actually do something. So in my office, my part of my job, I said, there are probably less than 10 black professors out of maybe 70, 80, 90, I don't know what the number is but a lot and so few and when someone says, well, we're going to do something about it. What are you going to do? Are you just going to say, here's our policy, we're going to form a task force and we're going to talk about this and this? You have similar thoughts about that?

Cato: So I do and that's one of the reasons I'm grateful to be where I am, right? We have actually done a lot more on the expanded hiring, on the faculty side. Like I said, myself and Michael Reed both started at the same time for the institutions, at least to the best of my knowledge and the 250 years history, we are the first black senior officers. And now there's two of us out of nine, right? And my role has nothing to do with diversity inclusion, right? So this is, other than I contribute to it because it's important to me and in the organization, right? But I'm saying that my role doesn't carry that responsibility explicitly. And I think those are the kinds of choices that will actually move the needle. Mind you, we still have a lot of pieces that we still need to do. And I'm grateful that there are activities happening. But I agree with you just talking about it and even the question of it feels like having a chief diversity officer, is at least a starting point. And if you're not willing to do that, then I question pretty much everything else, right? Because someone needs to help lead the conversation about how do we clarify why this is important and then do the work of moving it? And not having someone who can serve at that focal point that extra, provide that expertise is just going to make it so much harder for people to do it because it continues to be, well, we don't have them in the pool in the first place. Well, what did you do with your, creating your pool and creating your candidates and your job description and are you partnering with those associations that already exist, right? That you can tap in, tap into for accountants and attorneys and whatever those place, those positions that you're hiring for. But without that expertise, it makes it much harder to do.

Newton: Absolutely, well, we have two minutes. I'm leaving it to you to say whatever you wish to say. I will say this was the video, it's converted. I will send you a link to it. You can watch it and tell me whether I can upload it or not, okay?

Cato: Sure, I appreciate that, Rochelle. And I just want to say, thank you. I have learned a lot from you in the couple of months that we've had some exchanges and I'm really, really grateful that you're willing to lend your voices just to the work that I have done here. And I'm happy to be able to take part in the work that you're doing there as well. I look forward to continue our partnership moving forward.

Newton: Absolutely and I did, all you, if you're going to do a discussion on webinars, something that you need, another voice, count me in, just, you don't even have to worry about it. I know Rochelle's going to be there and I will be there.

Cato: I really appreciate it.

Newton: I support your career, what you're doing. And it is such a wonderful pleasure. I'm not Christian but I am a spiritual. I believe that God puts people in your place for a reason. I think you and I, coming together, it's one of those examples of God's hands. So thank you.

Cato: I appreciate that.

Newton: Thank you and stay safe and stay in touch, don't forget about me.

Cato: We'll do, same to you, take care.

Newton: Take care, thank you so much, Michael.