ABSTRACT
The author was employed by an institution that declared "social justice activism" – activism against structural inequities – as one of its core values. Despite their program's purported social justice orientation, the author's White colleagues were dismissive of the pervasiveness of racial microaggressions – subtle, sometimes unconscious, verbal, or non-verbal insults directed at people of Color – in their program. In teacher preparation program, the moment when people of Color broke their silence came during a time our staff called "the Puerto Rico incident". The incident began when a White male student took a board game called Puerto Rico to an end of trimester celebration for the children of Color he was teaching. Students and staff of Color used the incident and the response of White staff to highlight the institution's culture of racism and White supremacy by naming to university directors White protectionism, institutional racism, and racial microaggressions within the program.
