I’ll be spending much of my day today at local activist Roy Jones’ Beacons of Light Conference. The conference celebrates the efforts of activists who protested to integrate the Rutgers campuses in the late 60s.
There are fantastic panels throughout the day, and the closing Plenary Speaker is Dr. John Carlos whose Black Power salute on the 1968 Olympic podium made Olympic history (6pm).
I hope you’ll stop by if you have a chance, and please say hello if you do!
Beacons of Light: The Black Student Protest Legacy at Rutgers–Camden
(Featuring Olympic Medalist who raised the Black Power salute, Dr. John Carlos)
Welcome to the homepage for Beacons of Light: The Black Student Protest Legacy at Rutgers–Camden. We invite you to join us on Wednesday, March 30, from 8 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. for a full day of panels and discussion about the history of student protest and desegregation at Rutgers-Camden and the surrounding areas. All panels will be held in the Multi-Purpose Room of the Campus Center. The event is free and open to the public, but registration is required.
To find out information about parking, click here, and to register for the conference, click here. The conference schedule is below.
Continental Breakfast
8 to 8:55 a.m.
Opening Remarks
Phoebe Haddon, J.D., LL.M, Chancellor, Rutgers University–Camden
9:00 – 9:20
Panel 1: The Rutgers–Camden BSU 7 Legacy
9:30 to 10:50 a.m.
Moderator: Marie Downs (CCAS ’69)
Panelists:
- Harry Amana, Professor Emeritus of English, UNC Chapel Hill
- Malik Chaka (CCAS ’70), African Affairs Specialist-Int’l Dev. Practitioner
- Roy Jones (CCAS ’70), Executive Director of the National Institute for Healthy Human Spaces, Inc.
- Freda Boddie Jones
- Dr. Don Liebert, Professor Emeritus of Sociology, Whitworth University
- Myrna Williams (CCAS ’69)
This panel revisits efforts towards desegregation Rutgers University, specifically focusing on the Rutgers–Camden campus and the students who led the charge. It explores the general campus climate and the specific forces that motivated efforts towards increasing student and curricular diversity, highlighting the seven students who chained and occupied the Rutgers–Camden campus center in the spring of 1969. Several practical changes resulted from their revolutionary actions, including, but not limited to, the creation of an Urban University/EOF Program, the implementation of a night law school option, the adoption of a more inclusive admissions policy, and the renaming of the Rutgers–Camden Library in honor of Paul Robeson, the third African American student to enter Rutgers University.
Panel 2: Black Student Protests in NJ and Beyond
11 a.m. to noon
Public Conversation:
- Dr. Brandi Blessett, Assistant Professor of Public Policy and Administration
- Dr. Wayne Glasker, Associate Professor of History and author of Black Students in the Ivory Tower: African American Student Activism at the University of Pennsylvania, 1967-1990
The desegregation of higher education was not just a university-wide phenomenon, or even a regional one. It was a movement that was fomented by the political and social unrest of the 1960s and prior decades, of which higher education desegregation was just one result. In the words of one historian of the movement, the democratization of higher education, as well as the black studies departments that emerged from it, was a “bureaucratic response to a social problem.” This conversation explores the national reach of academic desegregation. From the University of Pennsylvania to San Francisco State College, collegiate integration occurred as a result of a broad range of socio-political factors at home and elsewhere.
Lunch
Noon to 1 p.m.
Performance by UCC Brass Band
Panel 3: Camden City and Civil Rights
1:10 to 2:40 p.m.
Moderator: Cheryl E. Amana-Burris, Esq. (CCAS ’73), Full Professor, North Carolina Central University School of Law
Panelists:
- Malik Chaka (CCAS ’77)
- Yolanda DeNeely, Community Activist
- Dr. James E. Johnson, Public Historian
- Dr. Mahdi Ibn-Ziyad, Adjunct Professor of Religion and Philosophy
Although present numbers might not suggest this, Camden had been a largely white city for most of its history and throughout the first half of the 20th century. Its two main high schools, for example, Woodrow Wilson and Camden High, had mostly white student populations, and what is more both schools were unreceptive to meeting the curricular and social needs of its students of color. This panel explores agents for desegregation as it relates to Camden city, from its political leaders and faith-based organizations to its institutions for public education. The discussion includes reflections from community organizers, school administrators, and political movers who were active in the integration of Camden city and its institutions during the 1960s and afterwards.
Panel 4: Rutgers–Camden Today: Academics and Diversity
2:50 – 4:20
Moderator: Dr. Keith Green, Associate Professor of English and Director of Africana Studies
Panelists:
- Dr. Stephen Danley, Assistant Professor of Public Policy and Administration
- Stacy Hawkins, Associate Professor of Law
- Markenzie Johnson, Student-Activist and Black Lives Matter Advocate
- Alicia Ojomo, President, African Students Association
- Tom Knoche, Retired Adjunct Professor of Urban Studies
The final panel of the day examines the state of diversity as it relates to Rutgers–Camden at the present moment, specifically focusing on such issues as faculty of color recruitment and retention, student demographics, and diversified programming and curricula. It simultaneously honors the strides that have been made in terms of social justice and representation while also seeking to call attention to continuing ways that desegregation and diversity are unfinished projects. The panel is composed of the current leadership of Africana Studies, the Committee on Institutional Equity and Diversity (CIED), the African Students Association (ASA), as well as faculty and students active in the arenas of social justice and equal opportunity.
Remarks
4:30 to 4:50 p.m.
Dr. Nyeema C. Watson, Assistant Chancellor, Rutgers University–Camden
Alumni Association Reception
5:00 to 6:00 p.m.
Closing Plenary Speaker
6:00 to 7:30 p.m.
Dr. John Carlos
Rutgers University-Camden Chancellor Phoebe A. Haddon, in partnership with Rutgers American Association of University Professors, welcomes Olympic gold medalist and activist John Carlos to the Rutgers University-Camden campus. Carlos’s Black Power salute on the 1968 Olympic podium made Olympic history. In the decades since he has pursued successful paths in professional sports, education and global humanitarianisms. Among many honors, Carlos accepted the Arthur Ashe Award for Courage for his salute at the 2008 Espy Awards.
Dr. Carlos will serve as the closing plenary speaker for the day-long “Beacons of Light: The Black Student Protest Legacy at Rutgers-Camden” conference. A reception, sponsored by Rutgers University Alumni Association, will precede the talk. Guests may attend the Carlos Lecture and reception without registering for the conference. The reception is free but registration is required.
Click here to register.
Share it!
