The Pan-African Student Success Center — a new facility designed to help Cal State San Bernardino students with advising, tutoring, internship and scholarship resources, as well learning about their own culture — was formally opened at a ribbon-cutting ceremony Monday held in the university’s Santos Manuel Student Union Cross Cultural Center.

“This is a milestone not only for our university but for the surrounding communities,” said Anthony Roberson, committee member and SMSU facilities coordinator. “This center will give our students the opportunity to engage with faculty, staff, alumni, and community partners.”

CSUSB President Tomás D. Morales told the audience of nearly 200 students, faculty, staff and visitors that the center will help current and future students.

“The grand opening of the Pan-African Student Center is an exciting event for our campus and the local community,” Morales said. “It is the result of a collaborative effort that involved many segments of our campus community, none more engaged than our students.”

Funded by the SMSU, the center will offer African American as well as other students peer-to-peer advisement, referrals, tutoring; resources leading to scholarships and internships; critical thinking development; African American club and organization support; faculty, student and staff collaboration, Morales said.

“Today we see the realization of those visions with the grand opening celebration of this center. It truly is a proud moment for all of us, establishing a resource that will benefit current students as well as the generations who follow,” Morales said.

Morales shared that recent data indicates a reversal of previous trends that saw a drop in African American student enrollment.

The data shows:

  • A one percent increase in African American high school graduates from San Bernardino and Riverside counties;
  • From those same Inland Empire schools, there was a nine percent increase in African American graduates who completed the A-G curriculum;
  • At CSUSB, applications from African Americans seeking to enter as freshmen increased by 19 percent; and enrollment increased 23 percent this fall as compared to fall 2016;
  • Of the African American freshmen who enrolled this fall at CSUSB, 70 percent came from local school districts; 13 percent are from other districts within the Inland Empire; and 13 percent came to us from outside the I.E.; and
  • For African American students seeking to transfer into CSUSB this fall, applications were up 11 percent; admission increased 24.5 percent; and enrollment improved by 30 percent over fall 2015.

Along with Morales, speakers included Cassandra Butcher, Alex Avila and Damarea Parker, the co-founders of the university’s Black Scholars Matter, which proposed creating the Pan African Student Success Center.

“The Pan-African Student Success Center is a cultural space for people that look like me, feel like me and identify like me. This is a space for you,” Butcher said. “In this center you don’t have to work twice as hard. You can be who you are and that will be enough. If you ever felt like no one cared about you on this campus, we want you to know that this center cares about you.

“You won’t just be another name or another face. People will know your name, your face, your major, and thinking about your future career goals, interests and aspirations,” Butcher said. “This is a space for you.”

The center’s opening emphasizes that there is much work to be done, not only for the future but also to preserve the legacy of civil rights accomplishments, Avila said.

“In speaking with a civil rights activist on marches and protests, he talked about legacy, he talked about legacy in metaphor. Legacy is like a seed. When you plant the seed, you must water the seed and nourish the seed for it to continue to exist,” Avila said. “So legacy must be nourished, must be watered, taken care of.”

Parker, who also sang the Black National anthem to open the ceremony, said the center’s work has just begun.

“We need to educate, advocate and empower our students on campus to build connections in the community, to strive for excellence in all endeavors, create a sense of self ownership through hard work and research,” Parker said. “There are only 5.9 percent of African Americans on this campus today. But these 5.9 are our future business owners, professionals, educators, nurses, officers and Congressmen and women.”

Prior to the event, Parker said the center “supports a sense of self-worth through ownership of academic excellence, career development, cultural competency, and civic encouragement for people of the African Diaspora,” and added that the center is not just for African American students but for all individuals who identify in some way with Africa through its culture, history or society.

“I just want to thank all the people who were a part of the process in making this happen and making it a reality,” said Parker.

To help celebrate the grand opening, Morales donated artwork that was purchased during the 46th annual student art festival on campus last June.

“Amplitude,” by Ashley Woods, was born from issues highlighted by the Black Lives Matter movement. It features a series of photographic portraits cut and positioned to create objects that suggest the complexity of identity within our multicultural society.

“It is my extreme pleasure to donate this significant work of art to the Pan-African Student Success Center,” Morales said. “It is my sincere hope that all those who utilize this wonderful resource will draw inspiration from this exceptional piece created by a fellow CSUSB student.”

For more information regarding the event or the Pan-African Student Success Center, contact Damarea Parker at (909) 537-3519 or by email at damarea.parker@csusb.edu.

About California State University, San Bernardino

California State University, San Bernardino is a preeminent center of intellectual and cultural activity in Inland Southern California. Opened in 1965 and set at the foothills of the beautiful San Bernardino Mountains, the university serves more than 20,000 students each year and graduates about 4,000 students annually. CSUSB reflects the dynamic diversity of the region and has the most diverse student population of any university in the Inland Empire, and it has the second highest African American and Hispanic enrollments of all public universities in California. Eighty percent of those who graduate are the first in their families to do so.

For more information about Cal State San Bernardino, contact the university’s Office of Strategic Communication at (909) 537-5007 and visit news.csusb.edu.