Students ask George Washington U. not to eliminate a project honoring Jackie Robinson’s legacy

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Richard Zamoff, an adjunct associate professor of sociology at GWU, launched the Jackie Robinson Project with seed money from a local nonprofit, and has run it ever since with volunteers and private donations, sharing Robinson’s story in classrooms, at academic conferences, with community groups. [...]

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Zamoff said about $15,000 remains in the account, enough to run the program for another three years without further donations. “It’s absolutely frustrating and mystifying,” Zamoff said.

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The university decided to end the outreach project because of concerns about its management and funding, Gross wrote.

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At the end of the academic year, Gross said, any remaining funds "will be reallocated in a way that continues to honor the Jackie Robinson legacy, such as dedicating the funding to the Africana Studies Program or to the Jackie and Rachel Robinson Society student organization.”

Zamoff said he told Gross he would not submit a budget plan for any activity unless he were guaranteed in writing that by doing do "there is absolutely no assumption whatsoever that we agree to phasing out the Jackie Robinson Project at any time as long as money remains in the Jackie Robinson Project Fund and donations have been pledged to the Project."

Whenever there is a dispute over power ─ and this dispute over donated money definitely falls into that category ─ and one party is lying about the facts ─ and Kimberly Gross is definitely lying ─ then one can legitimately question the underlying motivation for the power grab (or, in this case, fund raiding). I think that what is going on here is that that there is a funding deficit in GWU's Columbian College of Arts and Sciences and someone (Kimberly Gross?) decided to make up the deficit by raiding the account that belongs to the Jackie Robinson Project. How much is racism an underlying motivator? I don't know. It is a fair inference, however, that whomever decided to do this quite obviously doesn't give one flying f--- about how this would affect community relations with GWU ─ to say nothing of how this would negatively impact the targeted local community!

I ferverently hope that GWU alumni stop donating to GWU until GWU makes whole the Jackie Robinson Project.
I also hope that any organizations thinking about donating money/resources to GWU for any/all projects will refrain from doing so until GWU makes whole the Jackie Robinson Project.