NSU will celebrate Black History Month throughout February with campus-wide events, including panel discussions, film viewings and other events hosted by university offices and student organizations.
The celebrations will kick off with the opening reception of the 12th annual African Presence art exhibit on Feb. 5 from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. This year’s exhibit features photography by Michael July of people with natural hair and is titled “Afros: A Celebration of Natural Hair.”
Director of Internal Communications at the Office of University Relations Mara Kiffen said this year’s events were planned by a committee with representatives from several NSU colleges and offices. The committee has been planning the events since October, making sure that events don’t conflict. NSU has been celebrating Black History Month with campus-wide events for 10 years.
“It’s unique every year in that each of the schools and colleges try to touch on different subjects and different areas that might be of interest to the NSU community as well as the outside community,” Kiffen said. “We try to keep things relevant to what’s going on in the news as well as society, so those kinds of discussions are always very interesting and bring a lot of people from the community. Everybody wants to talk about it and share their thoughts on it.”
For example, Kiffen said there will be an event titled Race Issues in America: The Ferguson Police Shooting and Beyond on Feb. 8 at 6 p.m. This event will be hosted by the Student Government Association at NSU’s School of Humanities and Social Sciences. The Farquhar College of Arts and Sciences and the Black Student Union will host a panel discussion on Feb. 10 titled Race and the Justice System. Panel members will include members of the Black Student Union, NSU professors and Major Gregory Salters from the Fort Lauderdale Police Department.
A new event this year will be Blacks in Innovation: A Technology Fair, an event for middle school students hosted by the Office of Innovation and Information Technology.
“Every year we try to get bigger and better and I hope that everyone’s continuing to enjoy it,” Kiffen said.
Also on the planning committee is student Stephen Roberts, graduate student in mental health counseling. He and other students will be modeling different forms of natural hair at the opening reception of the African Presence exhibit. Roberts, who has been on the planning committee for the past three years, said Black History Month is important to him because he believes black history is American history.
“I do what I can to impress upon my friends, acquaintances and anyone that I’m around to attend these events because it’s in some of the most unlikely places that we learn things that you may otherwise not have learned,” Roberts said. “So I think it’s important for everyone to attend at least some events, preferably all.”
The final event will be the Second Annual “Let’s Speak Truth,” Poetry and Spoken Word Night, taking place March 12 at 6 p.m. Roberts said this event is repeated from last year because the first event had a great turnout.
“The speakers will be representative of what the month is about and a lot of the pieces will be celebrating the lives and contributions of people of color and African Americans and our music and poetry,” Roberts said.
Roberts said he wants students to know that the events are open for everyone and that it’s a great educational opportunity. He also encourages students to attend and administrators to tell students about the events.
“The events will aim to inspire,” Roberts said. “We want people to explore different avenues and different routes of finding success and getting things done.”
For a full list of events, visit nova.edu/blackhistory/events.html.
