Yale Bulletin and Calendar

March 1, 2002Volume 30, Number 20



The Afro-American Cultural Center plays an active role in attracting black students to Yale, and in celebrating their accomplishments. Here, members of the Class of 2001 pose at the center's Black Graduates Celebration, which brought over 500 seniors, families and Yale administrators to Battell Chapel last May.



Building ties to the community is a core mission of AACC

When Yale students travel to New Haven schools and other city sites as part of the Cultural Caravan -- the Afro-American Cultural Center's traveling show to educate youngsters about African-American history and culture -- they often find themselves deluged with children's requests for autographs.

The response of the young students and their teachers to the program, which began last spring, has actually been so positive that the Afro-American Cultural Center (AACC) cannot possibly accommodate all the requests for visits by the Cultural Caravan, which is made up of members of several student groups that are based at the AACC. These include the African dance troupe Konjo!, the Yale Gospel Choir and Steppin' Out, a step performance team which has made appearances throughout the Northeast.

The enthusiasm for the Cultural Caravan was evident in early February, when several hundred schoolchildren gathered on the Yale campus to participate in a "journey" taking them through African-American history to the present day, learning along the way about the triumphs and struggles of black Americans throughout time. Yale students illustrated these through stories, dramatizations, dance and musical performances. The event was one of many held on campus in celebration of Black History Month. (See related story.)

"It's obvious that the show really resonates with the children," says Pamela George, director of the AACC and assistant dean of Yale College. "Since we started the Cultural Caravan last spring, Eliada Nwosu, the senior who coordinates the program, expanded it to make it more interactive, and the kids are thrilled with that."

The Cultural Caravan is just one of the ways that the AACC reaches out to the local community with the goal of sharing and promoting African-American heritage and culture. Now in its 33rd year, the center has made community outreach a core part of its mission since its founding.

The center's beginnings date back to the mid-1960s, when a small group of African-American students at the University formed the Yale Discussion Group on Negro Affairs. Several years later, this group grew into the Black Student Alliance at Yale (BSAY), which worked to increase the enrollment of African-American students at Yale and establish ties between the University and the New Haven community. The BSAY, which is still in existence as a resident group at the AACC, secured a center in 1969 where students of African-American and African-Caribbean descent could gather to conduct and host activities, as well as to welcome members of the New Haven community. Originally located on Chapel Street, the center moved a year later to 211 Park St., a location that has served as a sort of second home to many of the students who are members of its resident groups.

Since its founding, the AACC has not strayed from its core objectives, which are to "maximize the academic achievement, personal development, leadership skills and cultural awareness of students of African descent; and to galvanize all ethnic communities to respect cultural differences and communicate and collaborate with each other," says George.

As part of its mission to promote connections between the Yale and New Haven communities, the center offers a variety of programs and events for students and the public that explore the African and African-American experience. These include lectures, musical and dance performances, symposia, films, theatrical presentations, art exhibits, speakers, poetry readings and social functions.

One of the center's oldest initiatives, a tutoring program run by Yale students in the New Haven schools called the Urban Improvement Corps, has been in existence for over 30 years. Since George became director of the center nearly three years ago, the AACC has further expanded its programming, sponsoring an increasing variety of events and programs, such as the Cultural Caravan, that benefit or interest the wider community.

"It has always been our mission to have a link with the New Haven community, but in the past year we have done more to strengthen our ties," George says.

Plans are currently underway for several new outreach efforts, including a student collaboration with a community mentoring program for teenage girls called Helping Our Ladies Learn and Achieve, and a program to inform New Haven high school students from minority backgrounds about how they can prepare for college, which would be cosponsored by Yale's Office of Undergraduate Admissions.

There are 10 undergraduate student workers supporting the efforts of the AACC. Just this year, the center also hired two graduate assistants to help identify community nonprofit programs that are interested in involving Yale students in their community efforts. The two -- Lyneise Williams, a graduate student in the history of art, and Françoise Hamlin, a graduate student in American and African American Studies -- are also developing new initiatives that may be of interest to Yale's graduate students. In addition, George and her staff are working with members of the Black Graduate Network, another of the AACC's 23 resident groups, to increase interaction among graduate students, undergraduates and community leaders.

"We are definitely working on reaching out even further to black communities at large, both in terms of our academic programming and our cultural and social events," says George. One example of this is the new arts and letters magazine Black Ivy, a student-run publication sponsored by the AACC, which invites submissions from African-American students and scholars from Yale's peer institutions and beyond. "Contact," a monthly open mic poetry slam, attracts students from other campuses in the area.

At least one group of students gathers every evening at the AACC, which is also the site of numerous informal social gatherings throughout the year. In addition to those mentioned above, other resident groups at the AACC are the Black Pride Union; the Caribbean Club; the Black Church at Yale; the Yale African Students Association; Shades, an undergraduate a cappella singing group; the Heritage Theater Ensemble; Black College Vote; the National Society for Black Engineers; Prism, an organization of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual students; the Pre-Medical Society; and the activist group When Black Men Take Action.

The center is also home to two civic-minded sororities, Alpha Kappa Alpha and Delta Sigma Theta, and the Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. Yale students of African descent also congregate for "Mental Pabulum," a series of teas at the center which feature presentations by black Yale faculty members, and in a weekly fellowship and Bible-study group.

As part of its mission to promote student ,leadership development, the AACC hosts intercollegiate conferences, symposia and other events that bring noted black leaders to campus. In addition to the notable individuals who visited during February's Black History Month celebration (see story, below), the AACC's guests over the years have included children's advocate Marion Wright Edelman, poet Nikki Giovanni, filmmaker Spike Lee, noted psychologist Na'im Akbar and writer and activist Amiri Baraka.

The AACC plays an important role in helping recruit talented African-American high school students to Yale by participating in open houses for prospective minority students and offering special programs during visits by prospective students on Yale Bulldog Days.

"Many of the students of color who decide to come here have mentioned that they were greatly influenced by what they experienced visiting the Afro-American Cultural Center or the other campus cultural centers," says George. "Our center is a place where they visit and get to know other students, learn about resources or get a taste of what life here might be like for them."

Through her work at the center, George says, she has witnessed tremendous energy and civic-mindedness in Yale students, at both the undergraduate and graduate levels.

"Contrary to the way this particular generation has been described by some, as complacent or disinterested, I think this generation has proven that engagement in the community -- showing that they care -- is very important to them," says the assistant dean. "The students I've come into contact with through my work at the center recognize that black culture not only has value but that they are in a unique position to help open doors for others. They recognize that a lot of our community is still disenfranchised, and they are actively seeking ways to address that problem.

"Yet, in addition, they recognize solidarity across racial lines and are more collaborative than other generations of the past," she continues. "For our most recent Martin Luther King Day celebration on campus, for example, student coordinators who are Asian, Latino, black and white came together for that cause. And that is so central to the AACC mission of working with as many different groups and departments as we can on campus, to strengthen those ties that bind us as a race or an ethnic group but also as a multiracial, multiethnic community."

Further information about the AACC can be found on the center's website at www.yale.edu/afam/.

-- By Susan Gonzalez


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