How Dozens of Pro Athletes Came to Study Activism on a College Campus

At first, David Wall Rice wasn’t wild about working with the National Football League. It’s a hierarchy topped by white billionaire owners who are “trading and making money off of the backs of black men,” said Rice, an associate professor of psychology and an associate provost at Morehouse College.

So when his higher-ups asked Rice if he’d be willing to develop curriculum for a workshop co-sponsored by the league, he hesitated. But then he thought about what he could teach, and to whom. The workshop would be designed for professional athletes who want to become effective activists. Rice was promised control over the curriculum. And a hero of his, Harry Edwards, a civil-rights activist who is a professor emeritus of sociology at the University of California at Berkeley, was already involved.

So Rice said yes.

That’s how 30 current and former professional athletes came to be sitting in a classroom at Morehouse this week, studying social justice. They scribble notes on nonviolent protests. They attend talks on Martin Luther King Jr., a graduate of Morehouse, and listen to insights from the Olympic gold medalist and current chairman of the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, Edwin Moses. They prepared ahead of time by reading articles and watching videos.

For Rice and other Morehouse scholars, the three-day workshop, now in its second year, represents a chance to extend their teachings beyond the traditional classroom, to people who are in a position to be widely heard. “What I really am interested in,” Rice said, “is looking at identities” in the workshop. “Once you find yourself and are comfortable with who you are, you’re able to be a sharper democratic instrument.”

Groundswell of Advocacy

In 2016, when the NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick took a knee during the national anthem — and the country took notice — some NFL executives met to ponder a question: How would they respond to athletes who wanted to drive social change?

The NFL had already been working with the Ross Initiative in Sports for Equality, a nonprofit that is the brainchild of Stephen M. Ross, who owns the Miami Dolphins and wants to “improve race relations” through sport, said Erin Casey Pellegrino, vice president for communications, events, and marketing at RISE.

The “groundswell” of athlete advocacy was picking up steam, she said. So RISE and the NFL, along with Edwards, the Olympian and the civil-rights icon John Carlos, several sports commentators, and representatives of other pro sports leagues, got together to discuss what should be done. A workshop for professional athletes, they decided, would be a good first step.

Morehouse was a natural place for discussions about advocacy and activism, Rice said, in part because its enrollment is young black men. The historically black college’s history, and its alumni, are intertwined with the civil-rights movement and other social-justice movements.

The sessions aren’t focused solely on scholarship. The athletes, who this week include the former NFL linebackers Takeo Spikes and Corey Mays, also learned practical lessons, Pellegrino said. “You’re going to learn things like, where’s the best place for me to start a foundation? What’s the difference between nonprofits? How should I choose which state I file in?”

At the workshop, the athletes also listened to advice from Moses, a hurdler who is a pioneer in the anti-doping field. Moses said he was invited as a bridge between the history of social activism and what professional athletes are dealing with today. He talked about being a 20-year-old track phenom from an HBCU that had virtually no athletics budget, up against mostly white sports media that would describe him as “angry” and “difficult.”

Now professional athletes make a lot more money, and are connected to a lot more resources, than they did in Moses’ heyday. (He won Olympic gold in 1976 and 1984.) That money can give them “power and leverage” for their causes, he said, “if used properly.”

For Mikki Harris, the workshop is an opportunity for athletes to examine perceptions of themselves as they blend in with the Morehouse community. Last year the athletes attended a Crown Forum event, a tradition at Morehouse that often involves guest speakers.

‘It Speaks to Who You Are’

This year Harris, a senior assistant professor in the journalism and sports program, led the athletes in an identity exercise. On notecards, they wrote down words for three categories: false impressions that strangers have of you, impressions of you from people who know you well, and what you think of yourself. Most people have lots to write for the first category and little to write for the last, Harris said.

Doing that internal work leads to a larger impact that “may not be felt today,” Harris said. “It may be felt generations from now. But if you have that comfort in knowing that the work that you’re doing does make an impact, and it speaks to who you are, and you can enjoy that process, that allows it to live beyond you.”

Illya E. Davis said he wanted to use the workshop to take the figure of Martin Luther King Jr. down from the rafters and “allow him to be a human being.” Davis, a professor of philosophy and African-American studies, taught the athletes about the ideas of King and Howard Washington Thurman, a theologian, philosopher, and mentor to King who is probably an unfamiliar figure to most of the athletes, he said.

Davis said he wanted the athletes to understand that King was like any other person, and that they can do as well as he did at imparting a message. When making a protest, he said, they should choose a cause not so much because it has an impact on their own lives but because it would help liberate someone who doesn’t have the same resources.

“I’m trying to be more suggestive than pedantic. Obviously I don’t want to tell them what to think,” Davis said. “But I should be able to irritate them in their positions of power in such a way that they should think deeply about extending themselves … in ways that help others who don’t have access.”

The professor said he wanted the athletes to understand the platform from which they speak. When they talk, people will listen.

“I can kneel every day before class and nobody will say a word,” Davis said. “Kaepernick does it? Look what we have.”

Emma Pettit is a staff reporter at The Chronicle. Follow her on Twitter @EmmaJanePettit, or email her at emma.pettit@chronicle.com.