Contact: University Relations
Phone: 410.837.5739

Join us tonight for UB’s, “Divided Baltimore: How Did We Get Here? Where Do We Go?” class to be held on Sept. 21st beginning at 5:30 p.m. in the Town Hall in UB’s H. Mebane Turner Learning Commons, 1415 Maryland Ave., will feature four guest lecturers focused on the topic of the economic costs of structural racism. The class is free and open to the public. Seating is limited, and only students formally enrolled in the course are guaranteed a seat.

Guest lecturers and their topics include:

· Cassandra Jones Havard, professor in the University of Baltimore School of Law and an expert in financial services regulation, will present “Fringe Banking and the Financially Excluded”;

· Steve Isberg, associate professor of finance in UB’s Merrick School of Business and a senior research fellow at the Credit Research Foundation, lectures on “Credit, Control, and Banking: Slavery Still Exists in the 21st Century”;

· Aaron Bryant, the Mellon Curator of Photography at the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, reviews “The Look of Poverty”;

· Dominique S. Moore, an attorney licensed in the District of Columbia, Maryland and Pennsylvania and specializing in the areas of Family Law, Real Estate Law and Real Estate Development, discusses the impact of structural racism in the real estate market through the presentation titled “A Century Later – The Impact of Structural Racism on the Current Real Estate Market.”

Following about an hour of discussion from these lecturers, a question and answer session will be offered. After that, the course will break out into its normal undergraduate and graduate sections for further discussion.

For both Divided Baltimore students and community participants in our Monday forums, I have new recommendations for readings, following on my first recommendation that you read Ta-Nehisi Coates’s “The Case for Reparations.”

In its September issue, The Atlantic published “Letter to My Son,” an essay adapted from his book, Between the World and Me (Spiegel & Grau, 2015), which we have also mentioned previously. See: http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/07/tanehisi-coates-between-the-world-and-me/397619/

In its October issue, you can find his article, “The Black Family in the Age of Incarceration,” which revisits the 1965 Moynihan Report, in effect updating it and rehabilitating it.   See:  http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/10/the-black-family-in-the-age-of-mass-incarceration/403246/

I share these articles, because they provide an excellent background for what we will be addressing in upcoming communities forums–on housing segregation and family wealth (9/21), employment (9/28), education (10/5) and the justice and court system (10/12).  An updated schedule will be posted on Monday, September 21.

Although I recommend both articles–indeed all three by Coates–I strongly recommend for our forum on segregation and the courts Parts IV and V in the “The Black Family in the Age of Incarceration,” in which Coates reflects on the construction of blacks as criminals and as fugitives.

Please feel free to comment in order to expand the conversation.

OSI-Baltimore announces first round of Baltimore Justice Fund grants

OSI-Baltimore will offer thirteen grants, totaling $337,500 to assist in improving police accountability and increasing racial justice and opportunity for Baltimore residents in the wake of the Baltimore Uprising. Read article here:

https://philanthropy.com/article/Small-Baltimore-Charities-Win/233193

http://us1.campaign-archive1.com/?u=4f3121ed8cc04b818039ac93f&id=8e327d0ad0&e=81d882ac7b

Next Tuesday, September 29th, the event listed below is taking place at the Enoch Library. The event is very relevant to our ongoing discussion and Stacy Patton’s article, Yes, I cheered for the Baltimore “Rioters” written after the uprising, was a very compelling read.

OSI-Baltimore presents Media Bias And Black Communities
September 29, 2015, 7:00pm
Enoch Pratt Free Library
Wheeler Auditorium
400 Cathedral Street, Baltimore
For more info visit: http://www.audaciousideas.org/events/media-bias-and-black-communities/

http://www.damemagazine.com/2015/05/11/yes-i-cheered-baltimore-rioters

Contact: University Relations
Phone: 410.837.5739

The Sept. 21 edition of the University of Baltimore class, “Divided Baltimore: How Did We Get Here? Where Do We Go?,” to be held beginning at 5:30 p.m. in the Town Hall in UB’s H. Mebane Turner Learning Commons, 1415 Maryland Ave., will feature four guest lecturers focused on the topic of the economic costs of structural racism. The class is free and open to the public. Seating is limited, and only students formally enrolled in the course are guaranteed a seat.

Guest lecturers and their topics include:

· Cassandra Jones Havard, professor in the University of Baltimore School of Law and an expert in financial services regulation, will present “Fringe Banking and the Financially Excluded”;

· Steve Isberg, associate professor of finance in UB’s Merrick School of Business and a senior research fellow at the Credit Research Foundation, lectures on “Credit, Control, and Banking: Slavery Still Exists in the 21st Century”;

· Aaron Bryant, the Mellon Curator of Photography at the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, reviews “The Look of Poverty”;

· Dominique S. Moore, an attorney licensed in the District of Columbia, Maryland and Pennsylvania and specializing in the areas of Family Law, Real Estate Law and Real Estate Development, discusses the impact of structural racism in the real estate market through the presentation titled “A Century Later – The Impact of Structural Racism on the Current Real Estate Market.”

Following about an hour of discussion from these lecturers, a question and answer session will be offered. After that, the course will break out into its normal undergraduate and graduate sections for further discussion.

CONSTITUTION DAY 2015 at UB

The University of Baltimore School of Law will mark Constitution Day with a discussion of the importance of the U.S. Constitution to the daily lives of Baltimoreans in the context of the Freddie Gray case.

The event is Thursday, Sept. 17 at 5 p.m. in the Moot Courtroom. We hope to see you there!

CONSTITUTION DAY 2015 at MICA

Art has long been a method of expression, and artists throughout history have been instigators of change-engaging society in conversation about pressing issues. Established in 2005, Constitution Day continues the College’s tradition of leadership in raising and exploring important political issues. Melissa Harris-Perry headlines this year’s Constitution Day 2015 at MICA which includes the event “Black Lives Matter” and features the ACLU’s Reggie Shuford and artist Titus Kaphar.

The event is Thursday, September 17 from 7-9 p.m. at MICA in the Brown Center, Falvey Hall. A limited number of tickets are available.

For more information, visit https://www.mica.edu/Constitution_Day_2015.html.

Flashback Friday: Footage of Pennsylvania Avenue from the 1968 WMAR documentary, “The Soul of Baltimore”.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/30i53i9u5v9dllp/ClipUB.mp4?dl=0

The Economic Engine of Maryland, an op-ed article written by Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, announcing the first of many initiatives that have the potential to affect change in Baltimore City.

$5 million grant will provide job training for hundreds in Baltimore, an article in the September 15th edition of The Baltimore Sun regarding Baltimore’s new job-training program. This topic is closely related to Divided Baltimore’s September 28th forum on transportation and employment.

University of Maryland, University of Baltimore and many Baltimore City students find space to discuss the civil unrest and events of this past Spring and Summer. Details can be found in the article Law, Social Work Students Tackle Freddie Gray Course, published by the Baltimore Sun.

Create opportunity to prevent Baltimore unrest, an op-ed article written by University of Baltimore alum, D. Watkins. Mr. Watkins’ collection of essays, “The Beast Side” (Skyhorse: Hot Books), debuted on Tuesday, September 8th.

September 8, 2015

Contact: University Relations
Phone: 410.837.5739

The Sept. 14 edition of the University of Baltimore class, “Divided Baltimore: How Did We Get Here? Where Do We Go?,” to be held beginning at 5:30 p.m. in the Town Hall in UB’s H. Mebane Turner Learning Commons, 1415 Maryland Ave., will feature three guest lecturers focused on the topic of segregation and the various forms it takes across Baltimore communities. The class is free and open to the public. Seating is limited, and only students formally enrolled in the course are guaranteed a seat.

Guest lecturers and their topics include:

Seema Iyer, associate director of UB’s Jacob France Institute, director of its Baltimore Neighborhood Indicators Alliance and research assistant professor in the University’s Merrick School of Business, speaking on “Mapping Justice and Equity in Baltmore”;

Lawrence Lanahan, freelance journalist and producer of WYPR’s “The Lines Between Us” series, on “The Lines Between Us”;

Siobhan Hagan, audiovisual archivist in the University’s Langsdale Library, on relevant materials in the library’s Special Collections.

Following about an hour of discussion from these lecturers, a question and answer session will be offered. After that, the course will break out into its normal undergraduate and graduate sections for further discussion.

Suggested Reading for 9/21:

Coates, Ta-Nehisi. “The Case for Reparations”: http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/05/the-case-for-reparations/361631/

Here Coates makes the argument for how segregation impoverished Blacks and why reparations is therefore something we must consider.

Jargowsky, Paul A., The Architecture of Segregation: Civil Unrest, the Concentration of Poverty, and Public Policy. The Century Foundation, 2015. http://apps.tcf.org/architecture-of-segregation

What happens in Baltimore is not unique to Baltimore. This very recent report compares a number of American cities.

To understand why we are offering the Divided Baltimore course, and especially why a historical context is necessary, one need only reflect on the Kerner Commission Report of 1968, excerpts from which follow here:

From the 1968 Kerner Commission Report on civil disorder came the following Recommendations for National Action:*

Introduction
            No American—white or black—can escape the consequences of the continuing social and economic decay of our major cities.
Only a commitment to national action on an unprecedented scale can shape a future compatible with the historic ideals of American society.
The great productivity of our economy, and a federal revenue system which is highly responsive to economic growth, can provide the resources.
The major need is to generate new will—the will to tax ourselves to the extent necessary to meet the vital needs of the nation.
We have set forth goals and proposed strategies to reach these goals. We discuss and recommend programs not to commit each of us to specific parts of such programs but to illustrate the type and dimension of action needed.
The major goal is the creation of a true nation—a single society and singe American identity. Toward that goal, we propose the following objectives for national action:

>Opening up opportunities to those who are restricted by racial segregation and discrimination, and eliminating all barriers to their choice of jobs education and housing.
            >Removing the frustration of powerlessness among the disadvantaged by providing the means for them to deal with the problems that affect their own lives and by increasing the capacity of our public and private institutions to respond to these problems.
            >Increasing communication cross racial lines to destroy stereotypes, to halt polarization, and end distrust and hostility, and create common ground for efforts toward public order and social justice.

We propose these aims to fulfill our pledge of equality and to meet the fundamental needs of a democratic and civilized society—domestic peace and social justice.
…

Conclusion
            One of the first witnesses to be invited to appear before this Commission was Dr. Kenneth B. Clark, a distinguished and perceptive scholar. Referring to reports of earlier riot commissions, he said:

           I read that report … of the 1919 riot in Chicago, and it is as if I were reading the report of the investigating committee on the Harlem riot of ’35, the report of the investigating committee on the Harem riot of ’43, the report of the McCone Commission on the Watts riot [of 1965].
         I must again in candor say to you members of this commission—it is a kind of Alice in Wonderland—with the same moving picture re-shown over and over again, the same analysis, the same recommendations, and the same inaction.

These words come to our minds as we conclude this report.
We have provided an honest beginning. We have learned much. But we have uncovered no startling truths, no unique insights, no simple solutions. The destruction and the bitterness of racial disorder, the harsh polemics of black revolt and white repression have been seen and heard before in this country.
It is time now to end the destruction and the violence, not only in the streets of the ghetto but in the lives of people.

*Report of the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders. New York: Bantam Books, 1968, pp. 23-29.