Group IX
REGIONAL SEMINAR - "Exploring 'Race' in the United States, Through
the Lens of the African American Experience"
On September 15, 2001 the WRLP Group IX participants boarded a bus
for Atlanta, Birmingham, Montgomery and Selma. During the seminar,
the group visited museums, toured historical sites, watched videos,
engaged African American history researchers, and spoke personally
with many people who lived in these places during the civil rights
movement. These people who the group met with drank from the "colored" water
only faucets, sat in the back of the bus, entered theatres in the
back and watched movies from the balcony. These people knew and walked
with the Rev. Abernathy, Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr. Together
the group listened intently, hung on every word, asked questions,
cried and took it all in.
Through this seminar not only did Group IX participants read about
and reflect upon the leadership of the civil rights movement, they
also walked the very ground that Martin Luther King, Jr. and other
leaders trod. Their detailed study profoundly moved the participants
not just in their general thinking about living life and their leadership
philosophy but in their hearts as well. The call rang out to the
participants to "leave a footprint in this world - to make a difference
with their life."
Seminar Co-Chairs for this seminar included Vicki Washington, Director
of Equal Opportunity & Diversity Programs, UW Extension; JoAnn
Hinz, Assistant to the Dean, UW Cooperative Extension, and Curtis
Gear, former director of the Community Leadership Development Program,
UW Cooperative Extension.
The seminar was designed to achieve the following objectives:
- Explore why understanding diversity and the influence of different
cultures is essential to being an effective community leader.
- Develop a deeper understanding of self (who am I, what do I believe,
why I have these beliefs/values, and how do I feel about differences).
- Develop a deeper understanding of the ways in which my own cultural
values, beliefs and experiences influence my thinking and decision-making
(Heart, head and hand).
- Develop a comfort level and knowledge of processes for understanding
similarities and differences among other cultures.
- Clarify the relevance and implications of supporting and celebrating
diversity to leadership.
- Develop insights about how the history of "race" and racism
in the United States may impact issues in Wisconsin communities
and consider how individual community leaders can apply understanding
and skill in helping to eliminate racism at the local level.
Group IX participants, along with Seminar Chairs, Vicki
Washington and JoAnn Hinz still smiling after their long journey
south to Atlanta, Georgia via motor coach. After the September 11
attacks, the group forged ahead with the seminar, taking a round
trip bus trip instead of flying.
Group IX participant, Susan Larson talks with people
in Selma, Alabama who shared their personal stories about their involvement
in the civil rights movement.
While in Selma, participants met with Mayor James Perkins,
Selma's first Black mayor.
Joanne Bland, (front) Tour Director of the National
Voting Rights Museum and Institute in Selma engages Group IX participants,
(left to right) Jennifer Heaton, Vicki Washington (seminar chair)
Brian Herr, Gretchen Benjamin, Lynn Thompson, Doug Mueller, and Susan
Larson.
Group IX participant, Alan Crossley, right, visits with a member
of the past Montgomery Improvement Association at the Holt Street
Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama. The church was the site
of a mass meeting to determine how long the community would abstain
from riding city buses after Rosa Parks refused to relinquish her
bus seat to a white man. The Montgomery Improvement Association
was a part of this movement.
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