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On July 12, after serving nearly seven years as FAMU’s president, Dr. Larry Robinson announced his resignation, effective Aug. 4, 2024. He plans to take a year-long sabbatical and return as a professor in FAMU’s School of the Environment, where he’ll continue to act as a leader and mentor.
EDUCATION
SOCIAL MOBILITY AT FAMU
Dr. Larry Robinson battled inequality with each new graduate by DAVID EKRUT, PH.D.
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rom humble origins to becoming the president of Florida A&M University, Dr. Larry Robinson is an inspirational figure in the Tallahassee community. After his parents separated during his formative years, Robinson and his five siblings were raised by his extended family in Memphis, Tennessee. Despite being of limited financial means, he always knew he would go to college. “It would have taken a train to stop me,” Robinson said of his dedication to higher pursuits, explaining that going to college was ingrained in him and his brothers and sisters at an early age. “My grandmother just insisted that one day we were going to go to college.”
30 September-October 2024 TALLAHASSEEMAGA ZINE.COM
Robinson and his siblings were firstgeneration college graduates. Though his mother graduated from high school and started college, her education was derailed after starting a family. Still, she got to see Robinson earn his degrees from Memphis State University and Washington University in St. Louis, respectively, before dying from cancer in the mid-’90s. “At one point I wanted to find a cure for cancer,” Robinson said. He had an idea in high school to develop a vaccination for cancer. This idea was ahead of its time. Recently, the United Kingdom’s National Institute of Health has partnered with BioNTech SE and hospitals across the country to administer personalized mRNA vaccines for the treatment of cancer. photography by THE WORKMANS