Charlotte universities partnering on racial healing efforts. Here’s how you can help.
Three Charlotte universities are coming together to promote racial healing in the community, and they hope residents will get involved, school officials said Tuesday.
UNC Charlotte, Johnson C. Smith University and Queens University of Charlotte have formed the Charlotte Racial Justice Consortium — part of a larger national initiative by the Association of American Colleges & Universities.
The consortium was selected as a Truth, Racial Healing & Transformation Campus Center, which aims to prepare the next generation of leaders “to dismantle the belief in a hierarchy of human value,” according to a news release.
The Charlotte universities plan to launch a Charlotte Racial Equity Leadership Fellows program this year. Six students from each campus will join “a year-long reflection of Charlotte’s history of racism and its connection to each university, while exploring racial equity and developing leadership skills,” according to the consortium release.
The fellowship will culminate in “unique, student-led projects” on each campus to “foster truth, racial healing, and transformation,” campus officials said.
The broader Charlotte community will be invited to join “Racial Healing Circles.”
“Charlotte has the interest and bandwidth to listen and work collaboratively towards anti-racism, racial equity and transformation at the individual-, group- and system-levels,” said Susan McCarter, social work professor at UNC Charlotte, said in the release. McCarter is a principal investigator on the project.
Initial consortium representatives include Tehia Starker Glass from UNC Charlotte, Kistenberg from JCSU, McCarter from UNC Charlotte, LeAnna Rice from Queens University of Charlotte and Rabbi Judy Schindler, Rabbi emerita of Temple Beth El and director of the Stan Greenspon Center for Peace and Social Justice at Queens University of Charlotte.
JCSU is the only historically black college or university included in this year’s 13 U.S. higher-ed institutions selected for consortiums, said Cindy Kistenberg, associate professor of communication and theatre at Johnson C. Smith University, in the release.
The Association of American Colleges & Universities will support the effort through a national advisory committee.
“Given the growing divisions in our country, the launch of (such centers) reminds us of the possibilities for healing and unity in our society,” said Tia Brown McNair, executive director of the Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation Campus Centers nationwide, in the release.
This story was originally published January 29, 2020 at 6:00 AM.