A panel of experts — including two College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences faculty members — will discuss the intersection of racism, justice, and community resilience during an InclusiveVT Week 2000 webinar. 

Virginia Tech’s Outreach and International Affairs will sponsor “Racism, Justice, and Community Resilience,” the first in a new series of OIA Conversations, on Wednesday, September 9, from 3:30 to 5:00 p.m. To register for the webinar, which is free and open to the public, visit outreach.vt.edu/conversations. The flyer can be downloaded here.

Panelists will include: 

  • Mac Babb, chief of the Virginia Tech Police;
  • Brandy Faulkner, the Gloria D. Smith Professor of Africana Studies in the Department of Political Science;
  • Karen Jones, political action chair of the Montgomery County-Radford City-Floyd County NAACP and editor-in-chief of ColorsVA Magazine;
  • Wornie Reed, director of the Race and Social Policy Research Center and a professor of Africana studies in the Department of Sociology; and
  • Michael Williams, assistant director of Virginia Tech’s Student Success Center.

Julie Walters Steele, director of the Reynolds Homestead, will moderate the discussion. Questions may be submitted ahead of time or during the webinar. 

The goal of the series is to raise awareness of local conditions and how they are linked to global communities of color. The conversations are meant to spur reflection, learning, and continuing dialogue surrounding systemic racism and communities across the commonwealth of Virginia and around the globe.