Creating a Safe Space to Talk About Race Page Content Assistant Professor of Social Work Aswood Bousseau Rhode Island College Assistant Professor of Social Work Aswood Bousseau couldn't have foreseen the impact when she started teaching an elective course that examines race relations three years ago. Some of her students shared that she was their first teacher of color. Others knew nothing about race-related matters such as Jim Crow laws. Another student told Bousseau that her course helped him cope after the killing of George Floyd, an African American man whose death at the hands of Minneapolis police officers sparked a global social justice movement last year.