From the Desk of Dean Jane Ashdown, December 2014

Initiated by faculty from the Ruth S. Ammon School of Education, Conversations on Race—an event held once every semester on the Garden City campus—has grown to include more than 200 faculty members, students, alumni, administrators and staff from across the University.

On October 13, the organizers hosted a campus-wide event in the Thomas Dixon Lovely Ballroom with a focus on personal experiences and perceptions of racism, especially in response to the tragic deaths this year of Eric Garner on Staten Island, New York, and Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri—unarmed black men who were killed during confrontations with white police officers.

Event facilitators Lyudmila Bryzzheva, Ph.D., an associate professor from the Ammon School, and Perry Greene, Ph.D., associate provost for faculty affairs and institutional diversity, provided some guiding questions for roundtable discussions that lasted two hours. They reminded us that listening to each other is just as important as talking.

I had the opportunity to participate in a discussion group with Anne Mungai, Ph.D., chair of the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, Susan Lambert, director of the Faculty Center for Professional Excellence, Dr. Greene, Robyn Milliner ’09, M.A. ’10, an Ammon School graduate, and members of the Future Teachers Association.

Conversations on Race is sponsored by the University Diversity Committee, the Collaboration Project, the Center for African, Black and Caribbean Studies, the Faculty Senate and the Changing Nature of War and Peace initiative. I am certainly proud of the contribution of Ammon School faculty, students and staff to this important series. The next Conversations on Race will take place in Spring 2015.

Listening intently at their table are (from right to left) Jane Ashdown, Ph.D., dean of the Ruth S. Ammon School of Education, Perry Greene, Ph.D., associate provost for faculty affairs and institutional diversity, Susan Lambert, director of the Faculty Center for Professional Excellence, and educational technology graduate student Jose Diaz. (Photo by Kyana Valerio.)