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Carl A. Fields, pictured here, became the University’s
Assistant Director of Student Aid and its first African-American administrator
(the first such individual at any predominantly white university in the
United States) in 1964. Though only 12 black students then attended
Princeton, Fields pioneered policies to increase enrollment and retention
of African-American and other minority students by creating unique and
innovative support mechanisms within the University and local community.
He also helped to establish the nationally influential Association of
Black Collegians (ABC) and conceived the Frederick Douglass Award, now
annually given to the graduating Princeton senior who has contributed
“unselfishly towards a deeper understanding of the experience of
racial minorities.” Fields later became Assistant Dan of the
College and Chair of the University’s Human Relations Committee.
In 1971, he helped to create Princeton’s Third World Center, dedicated
to promoting diversity, equality, and pluralism at Princeton and beyond.
In tribute, the Third World Center was renamed the Carl A. Fields Center
for Equality and Cultural Understanding in 2002, five years after his
death.
- To learn more about Carl Fields, see Café
Vivian picture #53.
- To learn more about diversity at Princeton, see
quotation #6, 10, 13,
14, 20, 23,
29, and 31, and Café
Vivian picture #26, 29,
53, 59, 60,
and 72.
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