In a move seen as a win for HBCUs and a potential boon for diversity in America’s intelligence community, Howard University on Wednesday announced that recently ousted FBI director James Comey has been appointed to an endowed chair on public policy.
“I am pleased to welcome Mr. Comey to Howard,” Howard University president Wayne A.I. Frederick said in a statement. “His expertise and understanding of the challenges we continue to face today will go a long way in sparking rich discussion and advancing meaningful debates across campus.”
As the 2017-2018 Gwendolyn S. and Colbert I. King Endowed Chair in Public Policy at Howard, Comey is slated to deliver the opening convocation address on Sept. 22.
The appointment of Comey won high marks among former intelligence community members for what it means for diversity, including from former CIA director Leon Panetta.
“I think the appointment of former FBI director Comey to a public policy chair at Howard University is an important move both for Howard as well as for James Comey, because I think that campus is renowned for diversity and for trying to deal with the challenges facing our country,” Panetta, co-founder at chairman at the Panetta Institute for Public Policy, said Wednesday in a phone interview with Diverse.
Dr. Edna Reid, a retired FBI intelligence analyst who is now an associate professor of intelligence analysis at James Madison University, said Comey’s appointment could do much to expose students to careers in the intelligence field, which Comey himself has lamented suffers from a lack of diversity.
Reid said part of the reason African Americans are so few and far between in the FBI is because the federal agency’s historical relationship with the African American community “has not been very positive.”
