Hollis joins dynamic team at College of Education in disrupting status quo

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Leah Hollis’ time with the Penn State College of Education may have just started, but it would be a challenge to find anyone better qualified to help the college fulfill its stated mission. Having arrived in August as associate dean for access, equity and inclusion, Hollis brings to Penn State an impressive educational and professional background.

One of her passions is for eradicating workplace bullying, especially against women, people of color and members of the LGBTQ community — the groups targeted most often, said Hollis. Hollis has run her own consulting group which has done work for a variety of clients, ranging from supervisors merely looking to improve workplace morale to helping institutions create policies about bullying and harassment.

“These are sticky, tough issues,” Hollis said. “I've done that kind of work with different institutions, and there's always diversity in the mix. This job is a combination of my practice and my research. That's how I ended up in this space.”

Unfortunately, some of these problems continue to exist, said Hollis, even locally. Hollis said she recalls, shortly after starting, that someone contacted police to report her as acting suspiciously, despite her merely going about her day-to-day activities. She said she believes the culture of “see something, say something,” while initially intended to prevent large-scale tragedies before they happen, can lead people to engage in their biases by perceiving certain groups of people as “suspicious” based solely on appearance.

“We've got to stop that because I should be able to park my car without being harassed on the way to my apartment building,” Hollis said. “Somebody should be able to walk to work without being pulled over because they ‘fit the description’ — and the ‘description’ always has race or color in it. We as a Penn State community, I think we are making strides and people across the University are working on these things. That's why I'm pleased to join them and their efforts also to communicate to folks.”

She said she wants to form a coalition or join other community groups that will tackle issues of inequity head-on by continuing to have necessary-but-difficult conversations with not only people at the College of Education and Penn State as a whole, but the larger community as well. Despite her short time here in State College, Hollis has also been appointed by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to Centre County’s advisory board for the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission (PHRC).

“One of the things I really want to do is put together a coalition regarding town and gown issues and discrimination in our community,” she said. “Somebody falsely called the police on me; it was a lie. False police reports are criminal acts. But I also recognize a number of our community members go through the same thing. And so, I'm working with different groups to form coalitions about education so when it happens — and it happens everywhere — but when it happens, how do we keep our community safe, even though it's after 5 o’clock and everybody's gone home? I’m very interested in forming that coalition or joining other groups doing this work, such as Strategies of Justice led by Terry Watson (assistant director of academic advising and student disability services for Penn State World Campus) to educate folks on how to handle racial intimidation.”

For that and many other reasons, the importance of respect in the workplace cannot be overstated, Hollis said, citing the oft-used line that “people don’t leave jobs, they leave people.” As someone who has devoted her career to helping people from different groups foster respect for one another, she said at the College of Education she sees faculty and staff who not only talk about wanting to be an inclusive, anti-racist institution, but also strive to make it happen.

And for all that Penn State has to offer — especially to a big football fan and former student-athlete such as her — it was this workplace culture that ultimately swayed Hollis’ decision to come to the University.

“Sure, I'm interested in the reputation Penn State has and I'm trying to get myself in there to see a football game, and all that stuff is great,” Hollis said. “But I see and work with these dedicated people every day and that's why you come to any place is to get to work with some fabulous people.”

That type of workplace culture was evident to her even when she was interviewing for the position, Hollis said.

“Recently, we had a meeting in which Dean Kim Lawless reiterated her concern about ‘We're going to treat each other well,’” Hollis said. “It was part of a discussion about something else. Just kind of a congratulatory message, ‘Hey, let's keep it up because everybody is needed from the work-study student all through administrative assistants, staff, directors, faculty, dean, whoever. We're all going to treat each other with civility and respect.’ Coming out of my research background, that's huge. And that's what got me to the Penn State College of Education — the people.”

In addition to following her beloved Pittsburgh Steelers, Hollis, a native of Johnstown, Pennsylvania, said she likes to spend her free time writing, traveling and occasionally cooking her favorite food items like crispy salmon and lentils and making coconut cake from scratch.

During her travels, Hollis said, she’s been to places that have provided a lot of beautiful sights but also allowed her to see how poverty affects many of the people living in those places. That has stayed with her, has shaped her perspective on life and demonstrated the importance of making education accessible for everyone.

“I was in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil before the 2016 Olympics,” Hollis said. “You want to talk about abject poverty? They had shanty towns that go up the side of the mountain. And there's one electric line that would start at the top and come down the mountain. And then in each shanty there was one light bulb. Then it would go to the next. The other place that I saw that just had abject poverty was Egypt. It was July and it was so hot. And as I'm walking down the sidewalk, the sidewalk moved and underneath it was a little girl and her two siblings, and they were using this ash and cardboard to protect themselves from the sun.”

Hollis calls the ability to get an education — not only in the strictly academic sense, but also in terms of learning and developing a marketable skill — a “game changer” that can allow people the means to earn a living wage to provide for themselves and their families.

It has steeled her resolve to ensure anyone who wants to can get a quality education free of discrimination or harassment, regardless of their means.

“That's what we're here for,” Hollis said. “Everybody should have a right to feel like they belong, to feel like people care about them, that they're important and valued.”