Phillip Atiba Solomon

Activist, Change Agent, Educator/Teacher, Scientist

The year Phillip Atiba Solomon started his PhD at Stanford, NYPD officers mistook Amadou Diallo’s wallet for a gun and shot him 41 times. Since then, Dr. Solomon has devoted himself to understanding how people think and talk about racism in order to prevent racially disparate behaviors – particularly in policing. His work identifies the need to shift how we define racism: not as a defect of character, but rather a pattern of behaviors that are measurable and changeable. As a researcher and a Black man, Dr. Solomon serves as translator to help communities and law enforcement understand each other and address problems that have for centuries been unsolvable. His passion led him to co-create the Center for Policing Equity, an organization that leverages behavioral science to diagnose the roots of racism in public safety in order to eliminate them. CPE’s evidence-informed approach to justice has shaped public safety policies in dozens of cities. Dr. Solomon lives in New Haven, CT and is the Carl I. Hovland Professor of African American Studies and Professor of Psychology at Yale University.

Philadelphia, Prince, and SCUBA diving

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