Community Building Discussion with Yolanda Sealey- Ruiz, Ph.D.

The Institute for Critical Race and Ethnic Studies and the Academic Center for Equity and Inclusion are cosponsoring a virtual event, “Marshaling Courage: An Interactive Talk with Yolanda Sealey-Ruiz, Ph.D.,” on Wednesday, January 25, from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m. Dr. Sealey-Ruiz is an award-winning Associate Professor at Teachers College, Columbia University. Her research focuses on racial literacy in teacher education, Black girl literacies, and Black and Latinx male high school students. 

Community building is an essential part of our shared humanity, which is even more essential in times of trouble and uncertainty. In honor of the life of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., we invite you to join us in this community-building opportunity.

Many of us at St. John’s are engaged in a variety of social justice endeavors within the campus and outside. This work absorbs our time and provides few chances to come together for discussions that allow us to celebrate our differences while developing a shared language that serves as a foundation for mutual support and growth.

Adjectives like ‘troubled’ and ‘uncertain’ are used here because of global trends like the mainstreaming of authoritarianism. We now face attempts to stop the expansion of democracy, such as the banning of books, opposition to the teaching of racial histories, increasing limitations on voting rights, anti-immigrant sentiments, increasing gun violence, the devaluing of essential workers, and anti-Blackness. These injustices are accompanied by the escalating climate crisis and a rise in dangerous rhetoric, much of it intended to sow racial, ethnic, and religious divisions. Many of these social ills contribute to the injustices we are in constant conversation about at St. John’s, e.g., discrimination based on race, gender, class, sexuality, and ability.

Please join us at this event where we will form sharing circles to discuss the sources of our strength and help each other to build the courage to face what lies ahead in these times.

Registration is required.