Football's Trey Paster and women's rowing's Jameson McKenna will be part of a contingent of student-athletes from the Pac-12, Big Ten and ACC who will visit Selma and Montgomery, Alabama this weekend as part of an educational experience about one of the centers of civil rights.

Two student-athletes from each team in the Pac-12 will join their counterparts from the Big Ten and ACC, along with select administrative staff, to participate in a variety of immersive and interactive experiences. The group will march across the Edmund Pettis Bridge – the site of the 1965 "Bloody Sunday" attack, visit the Rosa Parks Museum and engage in robust discussions and debriefings about their experience.

"I think anytime our student athletes have the opportunity to interface with historical spaces, to be able to feel viscerally and touch tangibly the places that they perhaps have read about in textbooks or heard about from afar – to see them up close and personal where it really becomes reality is always powerful," Cal Associate Athletic Director for Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Belonging and Justice Dr. Ty-Ron Douglas said. "And to do that in community with other student-athletes across three major conferences is also powerful."

Paster and McKenna were chosen from a pool of applicants across Cal Athletics and have engaged with Douglas, who is also traveling to Alabama, in two pre-trip meetings to prepare themselves for the visit. They also already have plans to meet after the trip to reflect and discuss ways they can impart their experience in Alabama on others.

Douglas, Paster and McKenna have prepared for the trip by researching the different museums and centers they will be visiting. They also watched the movie "Selma," which was nominated for Best Picture at the 87^th Academy Awards.

"We're not just being educated while we are there," Douglas said. "Each of us who are making the trip are taking time to prepare to enter the space. We're not just getting on a plane and going."