Quick Take
Cabrillo College professor Skye Gentile says recent meetings of the school’s board of trustees have offered students a real-time lesson in poor communication and bad leadership. The meetings, she writes, have allowed students to see examples of tokenism and microaggressions and to discuss the importance of timing, apologies and public accountability. Effective leadership depends less on intent and more on listening, reflection and awareness of impact. Her students, she writes, have been left wondering if the current board represents their interests and values.
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Recent commentary about the February and March meetings of the Cabrillo College board of trustees – including Trustee Steve Trujillo’s March 11 Lookout letter to the editor explaining his remarks – has largely focused on intent.
What did Trujillo mean by his remarks that others felt were racist and inappropriate?
As a communication studies instructor at Cabrillo College, I offer another perspective: let’s discuss what students saw, named and learned from that moment.
During the February meeting, which took place at the start of Black History Month, Trujillo referenced a racist depiction of Barack and Michelle Obama by the current administration circulating online and asked Cabrillo Vice President of Instruction Travaris Harris to respond.
For many faculty and staff, the issue was not simply the comment itself, but the dynamic it created, placing a Black administrator in the position of responding on behalf of a racial group. A few of my students recognized this microaggression immediately for what it was: tokenization. Many of my students have experienced these racialized slights firsthand in classroom discussions.
This was not abstract for them. It was a live example of what we study.
The behaviors were later discussed in the Cabrillo faculty senate, where colleagues referenced Peggy McIntosh’s “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack” and the concept of microaggressions, moments that might be unintended but still carry impact. These frameworks helped name what many in the room experienced but struggled to articulate in the moment.
In higher education, we often say we are co-creators of learning. But what my students witnessed is that when it comes time to live those values, leadership does not always model them. Too often, we continue talking when the moment calls for listening.
In my public speaking classes, I teach what I call the “10 golden rules of public speaking,” which include principles such as ethos, logos, pathos, kairos, delivery, source credibility and practice. Using the board meeting as our case study, we focused specifically on ethos and kairos — how credibility is established (and lost), and how timing and context shape meaning.
While we might return to this moment later in the semester as we study argument construction and faulty reasoning, these two elements alone offered students a powerful lens for understanding what unfolded. They asked: What does credibility look like in this moment? What would meeting the moment have looked like? And perhaps most importantly: When should a speaker stop talking?
As we were unpacking these questions, a student shared that Trujillo had published a March 11 op-ed further explaining his remarks. We paused to read it aloud together. It did not land as the trustee might have intended, but it deepened our analysis.
What emerged was not simply critique, but learning. Students began to identify how public communication functions in real time — how credibility can shift, how attempts to repair meaning can succeed or falter, and how leadership is communicated not only through words but also through awareness of the audience and the moment. Several students have since chosen civic communication as the theme for their upcoming symposium speeches, using this experience as a case in point of what not to do.
And in intercultural communication, we had a host of other conversations, including microaggressions they have personally experienced and how to interrupt these moments.
In all of my public speaking courses, one lesson became clear: Credibility is not built through continued explanation or defense. It is built through the ability to pause, reflect and listen to how others experienced the moment. It requires you to set yourself aside and make space for others to express themselves.
Students also raised a harder truth. They questioned whether the voices currently bending the board’s ear reflect the realities students themselves are living. For the first time, I had students asking how to find out who represents their district.
That observation should give us pause.
It was also not lost on students that responses to the moment were uneven. Some struggled to offer a direct apology, while others overextended themselves. These patterns are not incidental — they shape how accountability and care are experienced within an institution – in this case, Cabrillo College.
I don’t think it’s helpful to teach students that institutions are perfect. They are not. I am interested in teaching them how to recognize when systems fall short — and how to engage thoughtfully within them anyway.
Community colleges are one of the few places where these conversations can happen across differences. When we bring real moments into the classroom, students do not turn away. They lean in.
They analyze. They question. They learn.
And they notice when leaders do not listen.
Leadership in public institutions begins not with speaking, but with the willingness to listen — and to know when to stop talking.
Skye Gentile teaches communication studies at Cabrillo College. An educator, doctoral student and lifelong activist, Skye’s intention centers on the conscious cultivation of climate, mindfulness and equity in higher education.