The Speaker

Ronnell Higgins has served as Chief of Police at Yale University since 2011 and was additionally named Director of Public Safety in 2015. In his 20-year career with Yale, he has been instrumental in significantly reducing crime, earning a reputation for driving sustainable initiatives that continue to ensure a safe campus and community by preventing crime, championing exceptional relationships, and building community trust through collaboration with stakeholders, leaders, and members of both the University and City of New Haven communities.

Through his leadership at Yale, Chief Higgins has introduced a number of programs that have directly impacted safety on campus—from his weekly BlueStat meetings with focused operational and solutions-oriented reviews with staff to promoting a culture of collaboration and communication with leaders city-wide. Drawing on thought leadership of the highly respected Vanderbilt University, New Haven, New York, and University of Pennsylvania police departments, Chief Higgins has benchmarked key strategies that have delivered exceptional value at Yale University. Recognized as a facilitator of greater integration (merging both the urban and the academic), he has advanced the training and professional development of security officers and safety managers as well as fully integrated and maximized the use of public safety systems throughout campus, bringing technology to bear.

Very active in the community and within the industry, Chief Higgins was appointed Commissioner to serve on the Commission on Racial and Ethnic Disparities in the Criminal Justice System by Connecticut State Senator Martin Looney and appointed a member of the Police Officers Standards and Training Council (POSTC) by Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy. He is an Executive Fellow with the Police Foundation and serves as an Executive Board Member with My Brothers' Keeper Mentoring Initiative. Chief Higgins is past president of the South Central Connecticut Chiefs of Police and serves on the executive board for the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives for Connecticut (NOBLE). Chief Higgins was named one of the 21 Most Influential Leaders in the Security Industry by Security Magazine in 2017.

Complementing his professional background, Chief Higgins holds a Master's degree from the Naval Postgraduate School Center for Homeland Defense & Security and a Bachelor's degree in Law Enforcement Administration from the University of New Haven. He is also a graduate of the FBI's National Academy and holds a certificate in Law Enforcement Education from the University of Virginia. Additionally, he successfully completed the Crisis Leadership in Higher Education seminar at Harvard's Kennedy Graduate School of Education. Chief Higgins is an Adjunct Professor of Criminal Justice at the University of New Haven.

The Workshop

Campus Inclusion and Freedom of Expression: Hateful Incidents on Campus : Friday, April 17, 2020 02:30P

Recent events on college campuses—and in greater civil society—have too often juxtaposed the values of diversity and inclusion against those of freedom of expression, when these values can and should be mutually reinforcing. While college students believe in the First Amendment, many are willing to entertain restrictions, such as policies that restrict language and behavior that are intentionally offensive to certain groups, when they perceive a conflict with other values and beliefs. Caught in the crosshairs are college and university law enforcement leaders, who want to promote robust discourse in their communities, but do not want to negatively affect the student experience or compromise the learning environment.

Colleges and universities simultaneously embrace the ideals of inclusion and freedom of expression, indicating that these two ideals are of mutual importance to American democracy.

Yet realizing these two ideals is challenging, especially in today’s social and political climate—an environment that has yielded an upsurge in hate crimes, violent or hateful acts, and hateful rhetoric, including by those who enter campus communities either in full view or under the protection of anonymity. As reported in The Chronicle of Higher Education, hate crimes on college campuses have increased 25 percent from 2015 to 2016. In response, campus law enforcement leaders are rightly concerned about their students’ physical safety. Even when physical danger is not immediately present, hateful incidents on campus trigger fears that violence may come next. Moreover, certain symbols project violence—such as a noose hanging from a tree, a racial incident that has occurred on numerous campuses over the past year. Institutions now are wrestling with how to understand and minimize the community-wide impact of such hateful acts on campus.