Ibram X. Kendi, director of Boston University’s Center for Antiracist Research, responded to written questions from The Daily Free Press following mass layoffs and allegations of mismanagement of funds. The email interview has been edited according to The Daily Free Press and Associated Press Style punctuation and spelling guidelines but otherwise published in full.

Boston University hired Ibram X. Kendi to lead its new Center for Antiracist Research in 2020, a year marked by a global pandemic and nationwide racial tension. Three years later, after at least $43 million in grants and gifts and what sources say has been an underwhelming output of research, the Center for Antiracist Research laid off almost all of its staff last week.