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Posts Tagged: history
Join Black History Month events Feb. 9, 16 and 23
The Black and Allied Employees affinity group has organized a series of events to celebrate Black History Month.The events will be held on Wednesdays from 10 to 11:30 a.m., Feb. 9 through Feb. 23. The purpose of the events is to learn more about the legacy of systemic anti-Black racism in our country, as well as celebrate Black culture and the progress that has been made.
On Feb. 9, Shelley Jones-Holt, Founder/CEO of Leadership Legacy Consulting, will give a presentation on critical race theory.
Jones-Holt has served the educational field for over 20 years as a pK-Adult teacher, principal, district office administrator, superintendent, college faculty and executive leadership coach. Her emphasis on cultural and racial historical literacy is foundational to engaging in a restorative approach to uncomfortable conversations about controversial topics such as race and identity oppression. She believes that adults and children can become literate in history, culture and academics simultaneously by focusing on what we read, how we build empathy through cultural proficiency development and change the future for all through our understanding of the past. Jones-Holt earned a bachelor's degree from UC Berkeley, a Masters from Sacramento State and a doctorate from USC. She has received numerous awards and acknowledgements for her work in equity leadership including being named the 2016 Equity Administrator of the Year by ACSA (Association of California School Administrators).
She is now serving as a racial and educational equity consultant providing training, facilitation, coaching and support to equity driven teams and organizational, legislative, and educational leaders across the nation. She is the founder of Leadership Legacy Consulting, LLC and of the nonprofit Family Legacy 5 focused on providing technical, adaptive and educational support to educators and leaders at all levels. She has expanded her reach to also empower families through family leadership training for all and establishing apprenticeship and entrepreneurship opportunities for youth to thrive in their areas of passion and interest. She has written articles on culturally responsive equity leadership and the five pillars of generational family leadership to support individuals, leaders and families taking strategic action against all forms of oppression through our understanding of systemic racism, developing cultural proficiency, being intentional in our equity leadership and raising culturally proficient families. Jones-Holt's belief is that anything is possible with a focus on your vision, your leadership, your legacy and our support. The real work can only be done by looking inside ourselves first without shame, blame or victimization!
On Feb. 16, filmmaker Imani Mitchell will speak about Black representation in film.
Born and raised in Sacramento, Mitchell was introduced to the performing arts through theater and has performed professionally within Northern California for the last 10 years. She has appeared on stage at B Street Theater, Capital Stage, and Celebration Arts. Most recently, she directed a production of PIPELINE at Celebration Arts and currently serves as a member of their board.
Outside of the theater, Mitchell is dedicated to the art of filmmaking and developing her craft as a writer and director. In 2019, she founded her film company IAM Studios and wrote and directed her first film, “Whirlpool” (soon to be available on Amazon Prime). Mitchell created IAM Studios with the mission to employ and support talent of color and showcase stories that represent the diversity and complexity of the Black experience. Currently, her second film, titled “I Remember Yesterday,” is in postproduction with a plan to be released in April 2022.
On Feb. 23, Sonia Lewis, founder of ASCRIBE Educational Consulting, will speak about the history of voting rights in the U.S.
Lewis is a California native. Her educational background includes degrees in history and psychology from Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia, a Secondary Teaching Credential in Social Studies and a master's degree in education from San Francisco State University.
After spending nearly 20 years in the traditional classroom teaching History/Social Studies and managing a small magnet program, she founded ASCRIBE Educational Consulting. Their focus has always been geared towards educational/racial equity and resource distribution. Since 2009, ASCRIBE Educational Consulting has centered the development of programs and writing of curriculum for marginalized and vulnerable student populations. In addition, her work involves speaking and training around the topics of equity, race relations, and social justice. When she is not working, you will find her loving, nurturing, and advocating for six boys, seven bonus children and two granddaughters.
To register, visit https://surveys.ucanr.edu/survey.cfm?surveynumber=36589.
Black History Month events educate and engage
UC ANR held its very first Black History Month Program in February and the series of events were well-attended and enthusiastically received.
The events were organized by Esther Mosase, climate smart educator based in San Diego County; LeChé McGill, Human Resources business partner; and Keith Nathaniel, UCCE director and 4-H advisor in Los Angeles County.
“There were a total of five speakers and an average of 163 participants in each weekly session,” said McGill. “Attendee feedback has been great so far and the planning committee plans to send out a survey to collect more input in the coming week.”
If you attended the live event, the committee would appreciate if you could take five minutes to fill out the evaluation survey. Your feedback helps ANR coordinate more events like this in the future.
If you missed a session, you can watch the recordings. All but one session (session 3) was recorded and posted on the UC ANR YouTube page. The sessions and links are below.
Session 1: Sonia Lewis, founder of ASCRIBE Educational Consulting, spoke about “The Black lived experience is a matter of history.” https://youtu.be/eFJLRnnxp5U
Session 2: Mary Blackburn, UCCE family, consumer sciences, health and nutrition advisor in Alameda County, delivered prose about her journey from working on a farm as a girl in the South to earning her Ph.D. at UC Berkeley. A virtual tour of the National Museum of African American Culture & History was followed by a video and discussion about what happened to all the Black farmers. https://youtu.be/IyuM51UKdAo
Session 3: Sacramento farmer Chanowk Yisrael talked about "The Importance of Food Sovereignty" and led a virtual tour of Yisrael Family Farms.
Session 4: Panel discussion with Black farmers Dennis Hutson, Donald Sherman and Will Smith discussed their challenges, how UCCE has helped them and ways UC ANR could further assist in connecting them with resources. https://youtu.be/VyJxo1dREM0
Sonia Lewis to speak Feb. 3 for UC ANR Black History Month
February is Black History Month, an annual celebration of achievements by African Americans and a time for recognizing their central role in U.S. history.
Celebrate with ANR colleagues on Wednesdays at 2 p.m. in February. UC ANR Black and Allied Staff in collaboration with the UC ANR Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Alliance will host the activities.
Feb. 3, 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. – Sonia Lewis, founder of ASCRIBE Educational Consulting, will speak on “The Black lived experience is a matter of history.”
After nearly 20 years in the traditional classroom teaching history and social studies and managing a small magnet program, Lewis founded ASCRIBE Educational Consulting. Their focus has always been geared towards educational/racial equity and resource distribution. Since 2009, ASCRIBE Educational Consulting has centered on the development of programs and writing of curriculum for marginalized and vulnerable student populations. In addition, Lewis' work involves speaking and training around the topics of equity, race relations and social justice.
The California native holds degrees from Spelman College in Atlanta in history and psychology, a secondary teaching credential in social studies and a master's degree in education from San Francisco State University.
Feb. 10, 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. – Virtual tour of the National Museum of African American Culture & History
Feb. 17, 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. – Virtual tour of Yisrael Family Farms
Feb. 24, 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. – Black Farmers Panel Discussion with Q&A
Register at https://ucanr.edu/survey/survey.cfm?surveynumber=32671.
For more information or to offer suggestions, contact Esther Mosase, climate smart educator based in San Diego County, at enmosase@ucanr.edu.
Join UC ANR Black History Month celebrations in February
February is Black History Month, an annual celebration of achievements by African Americans and a time for recognizing their central role in U.S. history. Mark your calendar for Wednesdays starting at 2 p.m. in February to celebrate with ANR colleagues. UC ANR Black and Allied Staff in collaboration with UC ANR Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Alliance will host speakers and other activities are being planned.
Feb. 3, 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. – Keynote speaker Sonia Lewis
Feb. 10, 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. – Virtual tour of the National Museum of African American Culture & History
Feb. 17, 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. – Virtual tour of Yisrael Family Farms
Feb. 24, 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. – Black Farmers Panel Discussion with Q&A
Register at https://ucanr.edu/survey/survey.cfm?surveynumber=32671.
For more information or to offer suggestions, contact Esther Mosase, climate smart educators based in San Diego County, at enmosase@ucanr.edu.
UC archivist begins curating UC Cooperative Extension history
“It is a wealth of information about their activities, and I think it will be a really great resource for research,” said Lisa Vallen, a professional archivist who is working in the UC Merced library under a memorandum of understanding with UC Agriculture and Natural Resources.
The logs, plus annual reports and a collection of photos dating back to 1916 are among the first documents that Vallen will review as she embarks on a year-long pilot project to curate and preserve the history of UC Cooperative Extension.
A native of the Midwest, Vallen earned a bachelor's degree at Lake Forest College and a master's degree in library and information sciences from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). While completing her graduate degree, she worked on preserving the UIUC library physical collection, digitizing theses and dissertations and processing a collection of author H. G. Wells' personal correspondence, publishers' correspondence, and other printed materials.
Vallen wrote about her experience with the H.G. Wells material on the UIUC Non Solus Blog. She quoted a letter written by Wells in 1945 to his brother Frederick about his frustration at not being credited for predicting the atomic bomb 30 years before it was dropped during World War II.
“I'm all right & everything misses me. I explained the inevitableness of the atomic bomb half a century ago & it is rather infuriating to have all these journalistic halfwits explaining that here's something Mr. Wells did not foresee,” the letter said.
Vallen has also written about the challenge of digitizing old, brittle publications in an effort to provide a usable surrogate for books that can no longer circulate due to their fragility.
“In many cases, we hold the only copy of record and it is incredibly important for this copy to be preserved and readily accessible to our users,” Vallen wrote in the UIUC Preservation Every Day Blog.
In her UC Cooperative Extension work, Vallen found that Merced County office has 393 cubic feet of historical items, totaling about 164,000 in number. There are photographs for which copyright must be established, publications that may already be digitized by UC ANR or UC Davis, weather and climate data, and plant and insect specimens that may or may not have historical value.
“First we'll be going through and identifying materials, arranging the materials, recording metadata, such as date, author and title to create descriptions,” Vallen said. “And then we can begin digitizing.”
UCCE in Ventura County is also part of the pilot. Vallen said the county office has 700 photographs dating from 1916 to the 1950s, and many are mounted on cards with hand-written captions.
“Photos on their own are great, but when they come with context, it has additional value,” she said.
Humboldt County UCCE historical items will round out Vallen's work under the current MOU, but staff and academics at all UCCE offices are encouraged to locate historical materials for preservation, including annual reports, project summaries and raw data.
“They don't have to do anything with it, just hold onto the material they have,” Vallen said. “Even if they think something isn't historical or I wouldn't be interested, I'd still like for them to hang on to it until I have a chance to view it.”
