Morgan Magazine 2019, Volume 1

MORGAN MAGAZINE

VOLUME I 2019

Building Northwood Commons Groundbreaking Begins a Long-sought Rebirth MORGAN MAGAZINE VOLUME I 2019

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VOLUME I 2019

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President’s Letter At Morgan, the change is good

Reclaiming Sacred Space Northwood Commons groundbreaking begins a new chapter for the city

A New Day at WEAA Programming changes at the radio station aim to increase student involvement

December Commencement Spotlighted Student Achievement and Activism Sen. Elizabeth Warren challenged Morganites to work hard and “change the rules”

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Donor Profile The rich life of Elaine Blackwell, Class of ’49, reflects her hard work and trust in God

Historic Fundraising MSU completes its $250-million Anniversary Campaign

A Banner Year for Study Abroad A record number of MSU students benefited from travel outside of the U.S.

Morgan Students Join Google for Study-Away Program A partnership with the “Big Four” tech firm broadens undergraduates’ career prospects

Cover Story

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Community Involvement Morgan professor is honored for his bold thinking on race

Research Spotlight An MSU faculty member’s theory stirs the thinking on HIV prevention

Morgan Magazine is published by the Division of Institutional Advancement of MSU for alumni, parents, faculty, students, prospective students and friends.

Morgan Magazine is designed and edited by the Office of Public Relations and Strategic Communications.

Opinions expressed in Morgan Magazine are those of the individual authors and are not necessarily those of the University. Unsolicited manuscripts and photos are welcome by email, or by mail with a stamped, self-addressed envelope. Letters are also welcome.

Send correspondence directly to: Morgan Magazine Office of Public Relations and Strategic Communications 1700 E. Cold Spring Lane McMechen Hall, Suite 635 Baltimore, MD 21251 (443) 885-3022 office main PR@morgan.edu Morgan Magazine Staff Interim Vice President, Institutional Advancement Donna J. Howard, CFRE Assistant Vice President, Public Relations and Strategic Communications Larry Jones Director, Public Relations and Strategic Communications Dell Jackson Assistant Director, Web Communications Henry McEachnie Publications Manager Ferdinand Mehlinger Editor Eric Addison Art Director David E. Ricardo Senior Graphic Designer André Barnett Photographer P. A. Greene Contributing Writers Kevin M. Briscoe Donna M. Owens Frieda Wiley

MORGAN MAGAZINE VOLUME I 2019

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PRESIDENT’SLETTER

GROWING THE FUTURE

LEADING

THE WORLD Alumni and Friends, Morgan State University Regent and MSU graduate Kweisi Mfume is well known as an activist, but in our article about Morgan’s WEAA Radio station (page 8), he reveals his philosophical side. “Change is about as natural to the universe as anything,” he says. “The question is, ‘Is it good change, is it change for the sake of change, or is it bad change?”

Of course, it’s safe to say that here at MSU today, the change is all good.

Look at what’s happening at the former Northwood Plaza Shopping Center, which is about to be remade, with Morgan’s involvement, as a beautiful mixed-use venue named Northwood Commons, adjacent to the University’s West Campus. The change happening there today is being built on the foundation of change created by the civil rights activism of Morgan students in the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s, among them our “Donor Profile” subject Elaine Blackwell, of Morgan’s Class of 1949. The cover story of this issue highlights these students’ journey and the redevelopment of the site.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts followed a decades-long line of political influencers who have made their way to Morgan, when she spoke at our December 2018 Commencement and appealed to our soon-to-be graduates to “change the rules.” For those of you who may have missed her remarks in the nationally covered event, a recap of the ceremony is included in these pages.

Our story about the change happening within Morgan’s Study Abroad program features a few of the 115 students who benefited from this ongoing initiative to prepare our students more fully for the global economy, during the 2017–18 academic year. Furthermore, domestic “study away” from Morgan is changing for the better as much as our study abroad. Partnerships such as the Google Tech Exchange, discussed in the article on page 22, are expanding our students’ career prospects and showcasing their talent and innovation in unprecedented ways.

On page 16, you can read about the successful completion of our $250-million Anniversary Campaign, an historic achievement for the University and one that is already providing funds for positive change in many areas of endeavor.

We also highlight two of the many thought leaders among our faculty who are helping Morgan shape the future through policy change: Lorece Edwards, Dr.P.H., who has developed an exciting new theory on HIV prevention, and Lawrence Brown, Ph.D., who was recently honored for his “bold thinking” about race.

Your strong support of our institution is critical to continuing Morgan’s “good change.” I thank you for your commitment to the MSU family, and I hope you enjoy this issue of Morgan Magazine.

Sincerely,

David Wilson President MORGAN MAGAZINE VOLUME I 2019

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Reclaiming Sacred Space Northwood Commons Groundbreaking Begins a New Chapter for Morgan and Baltimore

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By Eric Addison

After the event, Wes Hairston and Carolyn Wainwright joined two other Morgan graduates — Sonjia Evans Duncan (far right) and LeVerne Wallace (far left) — to flash “victory” signs for a photo in front of Northwood Plaza. Their pose was reminiscent of the now iconic shot taken in front of Northwood Theatre in 1963.

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Northwood Commons

Civil rights leader Clarence Logan, Morgan Class of 1966

After a 10-year struggle led by Morgan State College students to desegregate Northwood Theatre, victory was at hand.

In the latest push, in late February 1963, more than 415 Morganites had participated in sit-ins at the popular business in northeast Baltimore near the campus, in defiance of the movie theater’s policy barring black patrons, a rule that was backed by Maryland state law.

The students’ well-organized, peaceful protest had filled the jails for six days and attracted attention from news media across the nation and beyond. Finally, on March 2, the theater management had relented under the barrage of bad publicity and reversed its racist policy.

All that was needed now to seal the win was the 90-cent cost of admission to the venue.

“Happenstance that I was in that (newspaper) office when it came through,” says Carolyn Wainwright of Morgan’s Class of

1965, who was then a sophomore elementary education major and a reporter for The Spokesman, Morgan’s student newspaper. “They said, ‘Hey. They finally integrated. We need somebody to go buy a ticket.’ ”

Newspapers had taken a shot of the four students posing in front of the theater before they were admitted. The photo was published first in Jet magazine.

Wesley Hairston of Morgan’s Class of 1966, then a freshman senator in Morgan’s student government, remembers the students’ “scuffle” to get the funds for tickets for himself, Wainwright, student government president Curt Smothers and student government senator Sandra Upshur to see the Disney film playing at Northwood.

“We don’t know where we came up with (the money). But we got it, and we were the first to be allowed admission after being released from Baltimore City Jail,” Hairston recalls. “The four of us went in, sat down, then got up and left.”

Their brief stay was enough for history: a photographer for the Afro-American

(left to right) Morgan students Sandra Upshur, Curt Smothers, Carolyn Wainwright and Wesley Hairston (March 1963)

A grand jury later dismissed all charges against the Northwood Theatre protestors. continued on page 4 MORGAN MAGAZINE VOLUME I 2019

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“I wanted to participate in the movement, and this was the perfect opportunity. It felt good to be a part of the solution.”

— Jerilyn Turpin, Morgan Class of 1965

The first phase will involve 70,000 square feet of retail space, including a Morgan State University Barnes & Noble bookstore, a Starbucks coffeehouse inside the bookstore and 20,000 square feet of office space housing the University’s Office of Police & Public Safety.

continued from page 3 Advancement and Decline Memories of Northwood Plaza Shopping Center after the protest are dim for Wainwright, and Hairston says he never went back to the theater. Jerilyn Turpin (Class of 1965) was a friend of Wainwright long before they became roommates at Morgan and comrades in the protest.

Turpin refused her father’s bail money and was jailed for the full three days of the demonstration. But she, too, has no clear recollection of returning to Northwood Theatre.

“I’m thinking it was more about principle at that point, knowing you could go there if you wanted to,” Turpin says. “I wanted to participate in the movement, and this was the perfect opportunity. It felt good to be a part of the solution.”

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Graduation and career success followed for many of Morgan’s civil rights warriors of that day. Wainwright shined in the field of communications and as a public relations administrator, and she and her husband became community leaders in their neighborhood in Baltimore City, near Druid Hill Park. Hairston returned to Morgan after serving with the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War (1966–67) and in Germany (1967–68). He found success in insurance brokerage, residential mortgage origination and real estate sales and led volunteer advocacy efforts for equal accommodations on the local level as well as nationally. Turpin taught in elementary school in Baltimore City for two years before her 36-year career in social services in Baltimore and in Prince George’s County.

The Northwood Plaza Shopping Center, on the other hand, slowly declined as the decades passed. Northwood Theatre closed in 1981. Most whites fled the surrounding neighborhoods in the 1960s and ’70s as blacks moved in. Patronage of the plaza dropped as suburban malls became increasingly popular, and now, many longtime residents of the area know the strip mall mainly as an eyesore.

‘This Sacred Place’ But this past Nov. 1 marked a major turning point in that course, as Morganites, high-level government officials, real estate developers, community leaders and others participated in an historic groundbreaking ceremony to launch the remaking of the shopping center as Northwood Commons.

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Northwood Commons

The Northwood Commons developers — MLR Partners, based in Baltimore County, and MCB Real Estate LLC, based in Baltimore City — will execute the $50-million project in conjunction with Northwood Plaza Shopping Center’s current owners, Northwood LLC, in two phases. The first phase will involve 70,000 square feet of retail space, including a Morgan State University (MSU) Barnes & Noble bookstore, a Starbucks coffeehouse inside the bookstore and 20,000 square feet of office space housing the University’s Office of Police and Public Safety. The project’s second phase will include the construction of up to 35,000 square feet of additional retail space, most of it to be occupied by a supermarket, which will be a welcome addition to the campus and surrounding communities.

The project is supported by millions of dollars in tax breaks obtained through the State of Maryland’s Regional Institute Strategic Enterprise (RISE) Zone program and approved by the Baltimore City Council in March 2018. Morgan is one of only six RISE Zone institutions in the state. Construction of Northwood Commons is slated to begin this spring and be completed in 2020, the same year the University’s new student services building, Calvin and Tina Tyler Hall, is scheduled to open on the main campus.

Two MSU buildings now stand to the east of the shopping center on the University’s still-developing West Campus: the Morgan Business Center, which opened in 2015, and the new Martin D. Jenkins Hall, a behavioral and social sciences facility that came online in 2017.

“…We officially close one chapter in our history here at this location and look to another,” said MSU President David Wilson in his remarks at the groundbreaking. “…This location, the Northwood shopping plaza, holds a special significance for Morgan State University….

Our students, in the spirit of challenging injustices and fighting for racial equality at the time, risked everything…. And they weren’t going to stop until something significant happened.” “…Morgan State University, in partnership with the developers and the owners, is going to be a part of the success of this sacred place going into the future,” he continued. “…We look forward to the transformation, the complete transformation of this location by bringing forth a new kind of town center, one that is continued on page 6 MORGAN MAGAZINE VOLUME I 2019

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Northwood Commons groundbreaking (Nov. 1, 2018)

continued from page 5 going to revitalize the area by bringing much-needed services and businesses to the community with the construction of Northwood Commons.”

Powerful Partnership Sidney Evans Jr., MSU vice president for finance and management, calls the collaboration to develop Northwood Commons “the quintessential public-private partnership” and a challenging enterprise that will bring big benefits to Morgan and its neighbors. “…Collaboration between an anchor institution (Morgan), the community, community-based organizations, private developers, the landowner, the City of Baltimore and the State of Maryland is the type of economic development you want to see in a city like Baltimore, in an urban environment, with the support of all those parties I just named,” says Evans, who adds that he’s worked on the project since his arrival at Morgan 6

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four years ago. Completing the project with Morgan’s continued involvement will protect the University’s $160-million investment of public funds in its current facilities adjacent to the shopping center, boost recruitment of students and provide an economic engine for the whole community, Evans says.

The groundbreaking featured a number of speakers who have played vital roles in the project: President Wilson; Maryland Lt. Gov. Boyd K. Rutherford; Baltimore City Mayor Catherine E. Pugh (MSU Classes of 1973 and 1977); William H. Cole IV, president and CEO of the Baltimore Development Corporation; Maryland State Senator Joan Carter Conway; Mark L. Renbaum, principal of MLR Partners; P. David Bramble, managing partner of MCB Real Estate; Alvin M. Schuster, D.D.S., of Northwood LLC and Paula Purviance, president of the Hillen Road Improvement Association.

‘Different World’ After attending the event, Wes Hairston and Carolyn Wainwright joined two other Morgan graduates — Sonjia Evans Duncan and LeVerne Wallace — to flash “victory” signs for a photo in front of Northwood Plaza. Their pose was reminiscent of the now iconic shot taken in front of Northwood Theatre in 1963. Sandra Upshur, captured in that first group shot, was unable to attend the ground breaking, and Curt Smothers passed away in 2012.

Rich stories from Morgan students of that time abound. Duncan was one of the first three students arrested during the theater protest. She went on to a career as a publications sales executive. Wallace initially served as a coordinator of the protest, keeping a record of the students arrested. But a racist remark from someone at the theater spurred her to join the students in jail.

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Northwood Commons

Morgan Business Center

“A gentleman said something that just struck a nerve in me when I was standing there, and I hopped into the line,” she recalls. “…I was just supposed to be taking information, and I hopped into the line and got arrested.”

Her arrest during the Northwood protest was one of many civil rights actions she engaged in as a member of the Civic Interest Group (CIG), which had Morgan

students Clarence Logan, Lyle Roberts and Walter Dean among its leaders. After graduating from Morgan in 1965, Wallace, an education major, taught in the Baltimore City Public Schools then went on to a groundbreaking career as a human resources executive for Eli Lilly and Company and for large Silicon Valley firms.

“As a Morganite, seeing the campus expanding and growing the way that it has over the last 15, 20 years, is phenomenal,” Hairston said. “The first time I came up Hillen Road and saw that Morgan State University sign (on the Morgan Business Center), you know, a tear came to my eyes.

Wainwright and Hairston are both delighted by the Northwood redevelopment plans and say they’re deeply touched by Morgan’s recent physical growth.

“When I remember the campus as it was when we came — in 1961 in Carolyn’s case and in 1962 in my case,” he added, “it’s a whole different world.” n

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A New Day at WEAA

By Eric Addison

“Students have to work with on-air professionals and see what they do and how they do it, understand deadlines, understand priorities and understand a news operation, which is so very vital.”

— Kweisi Mfume, Chair, MSU Board of Regents

Kweisi Mfume, chair of Morgan State University’s Board of Regents, has 40 years of memories from a career in public service that includes long tenures on the Baltimore City Council, in the U.S. House of Representatives and as president and chief executive officer of the NAACP. But those challenging experiences have not diminished his recollections of the struggle to launch Morgan’s radio station in the 1970s.

“I was a student here, and we were hoping and praying that we would have a station before we graduated in ’76,” Mfume says.

Howard University had started WHUR Radio in 1971, which was “quite a blow,”

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he adds with a laugh, citing the historic rivalry between the two Historically Black Institutions. “There were about six or seven of us (involved in the effort).”

The prospects were daunting for the student group that made its case to MSU President Andrew Billingsley. Finances were tight for the University’s existing, core activities, let alone for a new radio station not included in the budget. But after 10 months of petitioning by the students, Billingsley agreed to help move the project forward.

Next came a protracted battle with the Federal Communications Commission to obtain the broadcast license for the sta-

tion and, when the FCC finally relented, a dispute over the new station’s call letters.

“They were about to give us any set of call letters. And we said no,” Mfume recalls.

“We wanted WEAA: We Educate African Americans.”

The “student” advocates for WEAA were recent MSU graduates when the station first went on the air with its provisional license to broadcast 18 hours a day.

“I threw the switch, Jan. 10th, 1977 at 3 o’clock in the afternoon, and it came on, broadcasting. And thankfully, that switch has not gone off. The station is still there….” Mfume says. “I was the program

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Programming Changes at Morgan’s Radio Station Aim to Increase Student Participation

By Eric Addison

director and an on-air personality at the time.”

WEAA 88.9 FM now broadcasts 24 hours a day, seven days a week with a signal that reaches much of the state and an audience of thousands of listeners. The public radio station celebrated its 40th anniversary with a concert and other activities in 2017. More than just another media outlet, the station is considered a vital community institution by many listeners in Baltimore and beyond.

But even in WEAA’s earliest days, Mfume says, its programmers were looking far ahead and anticipating change.

“…Just as we put together that very first programming format, trying to designate hours and designate times and designate slots, we knew that what we were doing in January of 1977 would have to evolve.

And whether that evolution was every two years or every five years or every 10 years, there had to be an evolution, because the world was evolving, the community was evolving, and their aspects and their listening habits were evolving. And the society was evolving and changing.”

Change Has Come DeWayne Wickham concurs. Wickham, a veteran journalist who has worked with USA Today and other prominent me-

dia organizations, is dean of Morgan’s School of Global Journalism and Communication (SGJC), of which WEAA is a part. In October 2017, he announced a major redo of the station’s programming lineup, including an expansion of news and talk show content, schedule changes for several music programs and new times for the syndicated programs Democracy Now! and Latino USA. New on-air voices included Karsonya (“Kaye”) Wise Whitehead, Ph.D., of Today with Dr. Kaye; Faraji Muhammad of For the Culture; Joshua Johnson of NPR’s 1A; Mykel Hunter on Mornings with Mykel and Robert Shahid, host of Masterclass with Robert Shahid, which takes a deep dive into music. The Marc MORGAN MAGAZINE VOLUME I 2019

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Steiner Show, a longtime feature on the station, was discontinued.

ideas and want to be announcers and host shows. They want media training.

MSU students are not mic shy and want to be trained by experts as they develop their brand. They have made the connection that this is what we do at WEAA. The real world of work is across the hall.”

Wickham says he had three goals for the programming changes: to bring more students into WEAA’s operations, to strengthen the station’s finances and to broaden its audience base. And he adds that WEAA is part of the overall strategy for education of students in the SGJC, which was established in 2013.

“The idea in creating this school was to have three departments where you go into the classrooms and you are taught by…some of the top professionals and academics in our discipline. And each department has associated with it what we call a performance center (on campus), where (students) leave the classroom and can actually apply their knowledge in a professional way,” Wickham explains. “So the radio station and our television studio are performance centers for our Department of Multi-Platform Production.

The digital newsroom is a performance center for our Department of Multimedia Journalism. And our strategy shop is a performance center for our Department of Strategic Communication.”

After some initial resistance to the lineup changes, the station is enjoying increased popularity, Wickham says: comments from listeners are mostly positive, and the station’s ratings are up. Today, he says, WEAA has largely achieved the goals of the programming shakeup, including the most important one.

“WEAA is a learning lab,” Wickham says. “…We’ve increased significantly the num10

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Dean DeWayne Wickham

ber of Morgan students who are working at the radio station. We have students who are working with the news operation.

We have students who are working in various aspects of production.”

Student Participation Baldwin Williams Jr. is a multiplatform production major at Morgan and an intern for WEAA’s Master Class with Robert Shahid. The junior from Silver Spring, Maryland, is an aspiring producer, writer and voice actor and is still excited about the opportunity he’s had to edit interviews and record voiceover promos for the station.

“We currently have 10 student interns and have helped more than 20 interns since October,” says Malarie Pinkard-Pierre, station manager for WEAA. “We are also producing a Morgan student radio show called The Morgan Mashup, which has about 10 contributors and two hosts. The show is a mixture of music and reports by the MSU contributors on politics, entertainment, relationships, sports and college life, from their perspective.”

“My experience at WEAA (has been) a very enriching one, because I’ve always wanted to know at least the ins and outs of radio,” says Williams, whose internship opportunity came via Jacqueline Jones, assistant dean for programs and chair of the Department of Multimedia Journalism at Morgan’s SGJC. “I said, ‘Yes! Yes, absolutely, 110 percent yes.’ ” Williams continues. “I’m glad that I was able to get my radio experience here rather than going somewhere else, because it’s a station right on campus.”

“We understand that we are an extension of the School of Global Journalism and Communication…. We have done a great job of making sure students understand that this station belongs to them,” says Pinkard-Pierre. “Lately, I have even been seeing kids who don’t have communications as a major. They just have great

“I tell the students to embrace every opportunity and learn every skill they can,” Jones says. “No experience is wasted and can always teach a lesson about the precise skill at hand and important soft skills, including time management, interacting with colleagues and superiors and being exposed to something they had MORGAN.EDU

WEAA Radio

not previously considered as a possible career.”

MSU senior Keiswana Williams, another multiplatform production major, hosted the weekly Morgan Mashup during the Spring 2018 semester. A transfer student from Clark Atlanta University and a native of Gaithersburg, Maryland, she switched her major at Morgan from strategic communications to fulfill her desire to work on-air and behind the scenes in media.

Proactive in finding work experience at WEAA, she applied for an internship with Today with Dr. Kaye and was hired.

The show’s producer then, who was a Morgan graduate, and the show host, Dr. Kaye, gave her the opportunity to learn to produce, write scripts, put together sound clips, edit sound and more, Williams said. They also served as her role models and mentors.

“My producer is…like an older sister to me,” Williams said. “She’s showing me what I need to know to be in this radio industry and what it’s like to be behind the scenes as well as in front.”

MSU multimedia journalism senior Rodney Mitchell Jr. was in business attire when we talked with him, fresh from an interview for an internship with WJZ-TV in Baltimore. He was hoping his time onair as cohost of a new WEAA pre-game sports show named MSU Game Day Experience would boost his chances. Stan Saunders, formerly a longtime sportscaster with WJZ, is host of the show. Mitchell hails from District Heights, Maryland, and is also an ROTC cadet at Morgan. He pre-

viously landed an internship with Turner Sports in Atlanta through a contact made by one of his Morgan professors. He can’t say enough about the opportunities he’s gained at WEAA. “I think WEAA has enhanced my skills 100 percent, from my diction to my professionalism,” Mitchell says. “I think the new program changes have allowed students to get so many more opportunities than before. And also vice versa: I think sometimes the students are helping the professionals with, for instance, social media, just keeping them up to date. I think it’s been a home run transition for WEAA.” Education First Wickham says that seeing students like Rodney Mitchell, Keiswana Williams and Baldwin Williams progress is what motivates him.

“I’m trying to help these students,” Wickham says. “I’ve had a great professional career. I have worked all over this world.

I’ve covered presidents and kings and prime ministers. And frankly, I’m on the downside of my career, not in a negative way: I’ve done it all. I’ve been on Air Force One. I’ve done all of those things.

And so my challenge is to share as much of what I know and what I’ve experienced with these students whose careers are ahead of them. “…That’s why they come to the University: for the preparation,” he adds. “And we ought to be able to give it to them in the fullest way possible.”

Mfume agrees.

“Students have to work with on-air professionals and see what they do and how they do it, understand deadlines, understand priorities and understand a news operation, which is so very vital,” he says.

“And if they’re doing that with professionals, they grow immensely.”

Mfume names broadcast journalist April Ryan, Baltimore City Mayor Catherine Pugh and MSU sportscaster Lamont Germany as a few of a long list of former Morgan students he worked with as program director at WEAA and who still thank him for the opportunities they received to hone their skills at the station.

“So I believe that the station has to remain a lab for students,” Mfume says.

“That’s the way we began it. That was our original intent. And it also has to be true to the community and allow community access. That was the second most important thing…that we open the door and open the microphones. And it has to find a way to continue to appeal for funding from the private sector and not rely solely on the State of Maryland.”

To achieve these goals, he adds, WEAA must continue to evolve.

“Change is about as natural to the universe as anything. The question is, ‘Is it good change, is it change for the sake of change, or is it bad change?’ ” Mfume says. “And as long as it’s good change, it’s good for the station, it’s good for this community, and it’s good for Morgan.” n

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December Commencement Spotlighted Student Achievement and Activism

By Eric Addison

“Under the rules of commencement speakers, I am required to say, ‘Work hard.’ Which you should. But I’m here with a bolder message: ‘It’s time to change the rules.’ ” — Sen. Elizabeth Warren

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Clara I. Adams, Ph.D.

Eugene M. DeLoatch, Ph.D.

Laco Johnson III

A buoyant crowd shrugged off dreary weather this past fall to celebrate the sixth December Commencement Exercises of Morgan State University, in MSU’s Talmadge L. Hill Field House. The 400plus bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degree candidates heard a direct appeal for civic activism from Elizabeth Warren, senior U.S. senator from Massachusetts, who delivered the Commencement address. Sen. Warren; Morgan graduate and recently retired Morgan senior administrator Clara I. Adams, Ph.D.; and Eugene M. DeLoatch, Ph.D., recently retired founding dean of Morgan’s Clarence M. Mitchell Jr. School of Engineering, received honorary Doctor of Laws degrees during the ceremony.

at Harvard University. Her research made her an expert on bankruptcy and the financial pressures facing middle-class families and bolstered her winning run for the U.S. Senate in 2012.

Vice President for Academic Affairs Anna McPhatter recognized the honors graduates in the audience, including the highest-ranking student, biology major Mopeninujesu Oluyinka, who graduated summa cum laude with a perfect 4.0 GPA. President Wilson presented Bachelor of Science in biology graduate Akunna Mezu with the President’s Second Mile Award for outstanding leadership and participation in student affairs and honored Emmanuel Balraj, Bachelor of Science in architecture and environmental design graduate, with the President’s Award for Exceptional Creative Achievement.

As soon-to-be graduates assembled on the second floor of the MSU Student Center and waited to file into the field house to receive their baccalaureates, most were focused on their future careers. Some, like political science major Laco Johnson III, from Washington, D.C., also turned their thoughts to the Commencement speaker.

“I think it’s great to have a senator speaking….but I think I lean a little bit to the left of most of her policies,” said Johnson, a nontraditional student who returned to Morgan to complete his degree program after 10 years in the workforce. “I think the senators, and the House (of Representatives) along with them, need to go with a green plan (for environmental sustainability). I want to be an environmental lawyer. The country needs them.”

‘Rules Matter, Too’ In his introduction of Sen. Warren, Morgan President David Wilson outlined Warren’s long career in the law, which began with her J.D. from Rutgers University in 1976 and continued with her work as a law professor and faculty administrator at six universities, including her last tenure,

Sen. Warren told her Morgan audience a personal story of her family’s financial struggles when she was a child, a story, she said, that motivates her current advocacy for consumers and middle-class families. Her father worked as a janitor, and when he had a heart attack, her mother had to take her first job outside of the home, at age 50. The minimum-wage job saved the family’s home from foreclosure.

“For a long time, I thought that story was about my mother. I thought that story was about her courage and her grit….

But eventually I came to understand that that story was also a story about the government,” Sen. Warren said. “…When I was a little girl, minimum wage was enough to cover expenses for a family of three. Today, full-time minimum wage is not enough to pay for rent on a median two-bedroom apartment in any state in America…. What happened? Washington changed the rules…. Hard work matters, but rules matter, too.”

Government rules have also systematically discriminated against people of color in the U.S., leading to today’s record low homeownership rate for black citizens and the record high wealth gap between blacks and whites in the country, Sen. Warren charged.

“Under the rules of commencement speakers, I am required to say, ‘Work hard.’ Which you should,” she said. “But I’m here with a bolder message: ‘It’s time to change the rules.’ ” ‘Morgan State University Is You’ Student achievement was also spotlighted. MSU Interim Provost and Senior

Senior Class President Emani Majors, a construction management major from Baltimore, gave a stirring salute to the graduates, tracing an arc of accomplishment from Morgan students’ pioneering role in the civil rights movement to the recent 100 percent pass rate of Morgan nursing graduates on the national licensure exam.

“Morgan State University is you,” Majors said. “So now as you’ve walked across this stage and into your prospective career paths, I challenge you to show the world who Morgan State University is through your work ethic. Show them who Morganites are through a compassionate heart and relentless determination….

Show others, through example, why we say, ‘Growing the Future, Leading the World.’ ” Before giving his closing remarks to the graduates, President Wilson officially recognized five prominent Morgan leaders who retired from the University this academic year: Dr. Adams; Dr. DeLoatch; Cheryl Y. Hitchcock, MSU vice president for Institutional Advancement; Burney J. Hollis, Ph.D., dean emeritus of the MSU College of Liberal Arts; and Patricia L. Welch, Ph.D., dean of the School of Education and Urban Studies. n

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Donor Profile

A Rich Life and Abundant Giving Mary Elaine Proctor Blackwell’s Story Reflects Hard Work, Determination and Trust in God

By Ferdinand Mehlinger

Mary Elaine Proctor Blackwell

Mary Elaine Proctor Blackwell of Morgan’s Class of ’49 has been the guiding force behind the establishment of three endowment funds at Morgan State University: the Harold Blackwell Sr. Endowment Fund, the Dr. Effietee M. Payne Endowed Scholarship Fund and the Class of ’49 Alumni House Maintenance Endowment Fund, totaling more than $100,000.

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Her 90-year story is one of perseverance, determination and faith, the three qualities she says young people today must embrace to stay competitive and relevant in a changing world.

“Without hard work,” she says, “you risk becoming illiterate.”

Mary Blackwell was born Mary Elaine Proctor in 1928, in a log cabin in Cedar-

ville, Maryland, a small community in southern Prince George’s County, just before the Great Depression. Her mother was a housekeeper, and her father was a laborer, truck driver, switch board operator and Capitol Hill elevator operator.

“All the jobs he had he was in and out of depending on pay or the lack of it,” Blackwell says. “As a child, I thought

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everyone moved every Christmas, and I realized later in life that it was because of our hardships.”

Her high school principal, who was a Morgan graduate, encouraged her to realize her dream of becoming a teacher, and she saw Morgan’s campus for the first time in the summer of 1944. It was known then as Morgan State College, and she was 16 years old. She entered Morgan as a freshman the next year, as World War II came to an end and the struggle for civil rights for African Americans was just gearing up. As an undergraduate, she majored in health and physical education and minored in history and English. She also held a part-time job in the art department on Morgan’s campus and was a member of the Newman Club, an organization for Catholic students.

(we) could not sit at the (soda) fountain in Northwood shopping center. When I first came here, we had to get off the bus at Cold Spring Lane and Loch Raven and walk down the alley to get to Morgan’s campus. We could not walk in front of the houses on the streets, and the dogs were always barking at us….The city bus didn’t even come to campus.”

After graduating from Morgan, Blackwell applied to graduate school at the University of Maryland to continue her education. She was rejected because of her race.

The Christian Center (now known as the University Memorial Chapel) was the center of socialization….” Blackwell says, “We couldn’t go into town, because we didn’t have the money. So we gathered there.”

Although younger, she served in leadership roles along with many of her male peers who had just returned from the war. Blackwell was the 1948–49 president of the campus chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. and was captain of the women’s basketball team from 1947 to 1949, under the legendary Effietee M. Payne, P.E.D., who was Morgan’s first female head coach, an activist for women’s rights and a role model for generations of female students.

Blackwell joined an early wave of Morgan students engaged in civil rights activism.

“I was on the planning committee for the March on Annapolis in March of 1948... that was (near) the beginning of what we call the civil rights movement. We were fortunate to have the guidance of two young lawyers in the planning of the Annapolis march: Elmer Henderson and Patricia Harris. At the same time, (we) were trying to integrate the theaters and what we now call performing arts centers here in Baltimore....” Blackwell recalls. “Downtown Baltimore was very segregated at that time. (We) could only go to black restaurants, and all of our activities were on Pennsylvania Avenue.

We could not go to Druid Hill Park, and

“I was on the planning committee for the March on Annapolis in March of 1948...that was (near) the beginning of what we call the civil rights movement….”

“The celebrated civil rights lawyer Thurgood Marshall together with Lillie May Carroll Jackson, president of the Baltimore Branch of the NAACP, fought for us and won reimbursements for our rejection from the University of Maryland for whatever school we wanted to attend,” Blackwell says, “and I chose New York University in 1950.”

who would become her husband. But their romance did not materialize until the summer of 1952. Elaine was exiting a bus in Washington, D.C., when her heel was caught in the floor mat. Harold was waiting to board the bus, and when the door opened, she fell into his arms.

Friends later teased that her “fall” was no accident, but she insists laughingly that it was. Harold earned his Bachelor of Science from Morgan in 1952, and the couple married in 1954, the same year Elaine earned her master’s degree in education from NYU. They had five children: four girls and a boy.

Blackwell began her teaching career in 1949 at Westwood Jr. High School in southern Prince George’s County and was transferred with Westwood’s students to her alma mater, Frederick Douglass Junior/Senior High School, in 1950. After her tenure at Douglass, she taught at Fairmount Heights High School then joined the newly integrated D.C. Public Schools, teaching at McKinley Technical High School from 1959 until 1967. In Fall 1967, she joined the faculty at D.C. Teachers College, which later merged with the University of the District of Columbia (UDC). She retired from UDC at age 55, having served as an educator for nearly 32 years. Blackwell now has four grandchildren and one great-granddaughter. Harold passed away in 2013 at age 90, and her beloved eldest grandson, Marques, passed away in 2007 at age 26.

“God has been good. He has given me so many blessings,” Blackwell says. “I almost lost my husband in 1972, but he lived to celebrate his 90th birthday.”

Blackwell remains the activist. She is now focused on commemorating the work of Dr. Effietee Payne. She believes such recognition is perfect for Morgan’s campus, which she calls her “third home,” after Prince George’s County, where she was born, and Washington, D.C., where she now resides.

“I want to thank Morgan alums, friends and supporters who have helped with our goals,” Blackwell says. “I encourage Morganites everywhere to support and give back to our beloved alma mater.” n

Elaine Proctor was still a student at Morgan when she met Harold Blackwell, the man from Columbia, South Carolina, MORGAN MAGAZINE VOLUME I 2019

15

Historic Fundraising Morgan Completes Its $250-Million Anniversary Campaign “Before you do a campaign, you do your homework. You have analyses done…. It looked doable.”

— Cheryl Y. Hitchcock, Retired MSU Vice President for Institutional Advancement

The Sesquicentennial Celebration ended in December 2017, but history-making events have continued apace at Morgan State University. This past October, MSU President David Wilson announced the successful completion of the Sesquicentennial Anniversary Campaign, the University’s second-ever comprehensive campaign and the largest funding effort of its kind in Morgan’s history. The campaign raised more than $250 million ($254,307,730) in gifts and grants from more than 13,000 supporters, securing funds to advance teaching and research, grow the University’s endowment, develop academic programs, provide student scholarships and further community engagement. MSU alumnus, former music executive and current entrepreneur Kevin Liles served as the campaign’s honorary chairman.

Morgan’s vice president for Institutional Advancement, Cheryl Y. Hitchcock, directed the campaign. In an interview just before her retirement from that position in December 2018, she reported that the Anniversary Campaign was not only MSU’s largest, it was also one of the largest ever by an Historically Black College or University. And she added that the University’s campaign team never doubted that the goal would be met.

Morgan, in July 2010, and was intended to include funding from public and private sources, Hitchcock explained.

“We went through the numbers and decided up front that $200 million of the campaign funds would be in the form of research grants from public entities such as the National Science Foundation, NASA and other government agencies, and we chose $50 million as the goal for funding from the private donors: big corporations, foundations and alumni,” Hitchcock said. “The goal for the private side was actually double the goal of our previous (2002–2007) campaign, which succeeded in raising $25 million from private donations only.”

“It went the way we wanted, and we’re pleased,” Hitchcock said.

Effective Oversight Donna J. Howard led the private sector fundraising as director of Morgan’s Office of Development. She has now replaced Hitchcock as MSU’s interim vice president for Institutional Advancement.

“…Before you do a campaign, you do your homework. You have analyses done.

We had a financial fundraising consultant who surveyed the landscape before we even started,” Hitchcock said. “It looked doable.”

“It’s exciting to have been part of such a remarkable achievement that accomplished so many of the university’s strategic priorities,” Howard says. “I’m particularly proud of the 607 new scholarship opportunities that were created during the campaign years through the collective support of Morgan’s alumni and friends, as well as and corporations and foundations who put their resources behind the transformational power of higher education.”

The campaign was launched at the beginning of President Wilson’s tenure at

Hitchcock praised Morgan’s vice president for Research and Economic Devel-

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opment, Willie E. May, Ph.D., for his oversight of public sector fundraising since his arrival at Morgan in May 2018. Dr. May joined the University after a 45 ½-year career that included service as director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), among other high-level appointments in government and academia. Dr. May, in turn, credits Morgan’s faculty for its research prowess.

Thirty new research and academic programs were established as a result of the campaign, among them: • Formation of the Center for Reverse Engineering and Microelectronics (CREAM) for “Protection of Microelectronic Devices from Agents with Malicious Intent” (School of Engineering) • “Automation of Data Processing for Prediction, Analysis, and Control of Complex Events and Environments” (School of Engineering) • “Supporting Maryland Oyster Farmers Through Production of Oyster Larvae at the Morgan Patuxent Environmental and Aquatic Research Laboratory” (MSU PEARL) (Division of Research and Economic Development) • “Development and Implementation of Novel Training Models for Enhancing the Diversity Within the Biomedical Research Community” (School of Computer, Mathematical and Natural Sciences) • NASA Goddard Earth Sciences Technology and Research Studies and Investigations (GESTAR) (Division of Research and Economic Development)

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Morgan publicly announced the launch of the Anniversary Campaign during the 2016 Founder’s Day Convocation. MSU alumnus Kevin Liles (center, below) was named as the campaign’s honorary chairman.

Ongoing Benefits Benefits from the Anniversary Campaign funds have been ongoing since 2010, Hitchcock explained, before naming a few: grants from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation established Morgan’s Benjamin A. Quarles Humanities and Social Science Institute; funding from the Travelers Companies, Inc. bolstered Morgan’s Actuarial Science Program; funding from the foundation affiliated with one of her favorite authors, James Patterson, launched Morgan’s Patterson Scholars Teacher Education Scholarship Program; and the expansion of Morgan’s Study Abroad Program was accomplished with funding from President Wilson’s Five-Dollar Scholarship Fund.

“None of the funds are used for our capital projects” such as construction of buildings, Hitchcock added.

What made the Anniversary Campaign so successful?

“I think there were several things,” Hitchcock said. “We established a Development team. When Dr. Wilson came here, we didn’t have development officers. He made funds available for us to hire four fundraisers.

“Another thing, I believe, is that Dr. Wilson is such a good fundraiser,” she continued. “He’s an advocate and a real cheerleader for the University, and he speaks at a lot of events around the country. That helps establish our credibility as an institution that’s worth investing in.

“Also, you can’t fundraise without the faculty’s development of projects they need money for,” Hitchcock said. “They’ve gotten more and more involved in the process, helping write grant proposals, for example, and it’s getting almost competitive, which is great.

“Finally, our alumni have gotten very

competitive in raising funds,” she said.

“We’ve put some programs in place to create competition among alumni classes and chapters, recognizing them for being number one, number two, number three, etc. And every class, especially our 50year anniversary class, wants to outdo the class before them, and the gifts are getting larger and larger, which, in turn, is helping us increase our alumni giving rate. All of this helped us to reach our goal.”

“This is a significant achievement in the history of our University, made possible by the generosity of those committed to the success of Morgan and our students,” said President Wilson. “These resources will go a long way in enabling us to advance Morgan’s mission while fostering an innovative environment that keeps our students on track to receive their degrees and prepares them for life beyond graduation.” n MORGAN MAGAZINE VOLUME I 2019

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A Banner Year for Study Abroad

Approximately 115 students from the University participated in programs in 23 countries from Fall 2017 through Summer 2018, a new record for the institution.

By Donna M. Owens

Akhir (“Rufus”) Settles remembers hearing Morgan State University’s president, David Wilson, Ed.D., encourage students to travel abroad because the experience would be life-changing.

Initially hesitant, Settles felt ready by junior year and was determined to take the global leap. Using money raised via GoFundMe to help meet his expenses, he traveled with the University’s Psychology Department to Trinidad and Tobago in the summer of 2018. Just as had been predicted, the journey changed his life. “…I grew as a person. The life evaluation one goes through while being abroad is very intense,” says Settles, 20, a strategic communication major from Washington, D.C., now in his senior year. “A sense of independence surges through each student.”

The two-week trip was packed with activity: students networked with officials at various government ministries and cultural organizations such as the National Carnival Commission of Trinidad and Tobago. They also visited sites that included the Wild Fowl Trust Wild Life Preservation and the University of the West Indies at St. Augustine, where they toured the campus and a private exhibition. There was time to unplug with a movie outing, meal events sampling ‘Trini’ cuisine, and more.

(left to right) MSU students Teirra Slater, Rufus Settles and Kyra Harris

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Settles explains that he “became a part of the culture,” walking down Frederick Street in the city of Port of Spain, for instance, and “everyone looking at me like I belong, made me feel as if I was at home,” he recalls. “It felt so good to be in another country and feel accepted and included. The people I met, the relationships built and the family I gained while abroad, is priceless.”

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Pathways to Understanding Last year was stellar for study abroad at Morgan.

According to a new report from the Office of Study Abroad and Scholar Exchange in Morgan’s Division of International Affairs, approximately 115 students from the University participated in programs in 23 countries from Fall 2017 through Summer 2018, a new record for the institution. More than 300 Morgan students have studied, interned, volunteered and/or participated in teaching outside of the U.S. since the Study Abroad Office was established, during the 2010–11 academic year.

Marisa Gray

The goal of the study abroad program is to encourage students to broaden the scope of their knowledge about other cultures, learn languages and gain positive experiences — all part of a holistic college education. Morgan students are free to travel to any country not under a U.S. State Department Travel Advisory at Level 3 (“Reconsider Travel”) or Level 4 (“Do Not Travel”), but the most popular destinations have been China, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, the Caribbean region as well as African nations, among them, Ghana, Tanzania and Botswana.

“We’re seeing lots of interest from students,” says Marisa A. Gray, a 2009 and 2011 Morgan graduate and current MSU doctoral candidate who serves as program manager in the International Division.

She notes that Johnson Niba, who recently passed away, launched the University’s study abroad initiatives. Since that time, a small, dedicated team has built on that legacy. “Every year we continue to grow.”

The report notes that the University “remains committed to creating pathways for its students to have a better understanding of the world beyond their immediate location and arming them with the tools they will need to cope with an increasingly complex global environment.”

That means creating enthusiasm and an enabling environment on campus for students to begin thinking about international experiential learning.

Toward that end, Gray says, her office engages and recruits students in a variety of ways.

“We do classroom presentations for freshmen and run study abroad sessions. We attend events on campus including Explore Morgan Day, and we also have a Study Abroad Fair every spring and fall,” Gray says. “There’s a student lounge and resource center, and students can do research and pick up materials.”

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Amazing Experiences Gray, who hails from the Caribbean, also stresses to students that their options are not limited geographically.

“Many think about Europe,” she reports, “but there are also countries in the Western hemisphere and beyond which they can explore.”

Kyra Harris, a sociology major from California who is slated to graduate in May 2019, is a study abroad enthusiast. In fact, she’s had two stays overseas through Morgan. Harris, 25, was on the same trip that Settles took to Trinidad and Tobago in June 2018. Before that, she visited Berlin, Germany, during the Spring 2018 semester, working an internship with a technology start-up company and taking a German language course and another course in intercultural communications and leadership. She described both countries and the experiences therein as “amazing.”

“My perspective was absolutely broadened. Academically, going abroad made me want to push harder to achieve goals so I can travel more,” Harris says. “Since coming back to Morgan, I feel a larger sense of pride being able to say that I even had an internship in another country to add to my resume. Potential employers look at me with more willingness to accept me.”

There was personal growth as well for Harris, who blogged about her trip to Germany and shared photos online.

“I learned not to continue closing myself off (in) my old comfort zones,” she says, “with relationships, school, family and life in general. Once you do that, that is when you allow yourself to be held back.”

Wide Recognition Morgan continues to gain recognition for its commitment to providing study abroad opportunities to its students.

Nyjel Turner

The institution received a “Seal of Excellence” in October 2017 from the Institute of International Education (IIE), for surpassing its Generation Study Abroad “commitment goal” before the end of the five-year campaign mark in 2019. Morgan became a commitment partner in 2014 with a pledge to double the number of students from the institution who study abroad, in five years.

Morgan received another award in May from the Council of International Educational Exchange (CIEE), during the organization’s annual breakfast at the NAFSA: Association of International Educators conference in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The CIEE Commitment to Access Award is given to an

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outstanding institution that is actively committed to sending its students abroad.

Morgan and CIEE have also hosted a one-day passport event, offering 100 free passports to students. To facilitate the passport processing, agents of the Baltimore District U.S. Postal Service participated.

Personal Growth Having a passport has opened up new worlds to Teirra Slater, a junior marketing major from Philadelphia. Slater, like Harris, studied abroad in Berlin, Germany, during the Spring 2018 semester.

Calling Berlin “special and full of history, unique art and kind people,” she explains that her study abroad trip led to a new academic major.

“I realized while taking classes in Germany that marketing and events were more interesting to me than accounting. International marketing piqued my interest, because my professors there gave me hands-on experience by sending us outside the classroom to understand different concepts,” Slater says.

The trip also changed her personally.

“It pushed me to get out of my comfort zone,” she says. “I now see the world differently than before I left.”

Nyjel Turner, 19, hails from Prince George’s County, Maryland. This past summer, he traveled thousands of miles from home to visit Granada, Spain.

“The city was very quiet and felt very dense but open at the same time. The food was healthy, and there was more of an importance placed on meals,” says the sophomore computer science major.

Turner says studying abroad has changed his personal perspective drastically and expanded his views of the world.

“The experience helped me to see that traveling is not a luxury that is only reserved for those with an abundance of wealth, and given the commitment, how easy it is to travel. It showed that I could be comfortable in a foreign environment and quickly adapt to new surroundings.”

Moreover, the experience made him rethink his career goals.

“I previously wanted to use my degree and work as a software engineer in the tech industry,” Turner says. “Now I would like to use my degree to freelance open source projects while also traveling the world.”n

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21

Morgan Students Join Google for Study-Away Program

While much of the world goes to Google to find useful information in the virtual space, five students from Morgan’s School of Computer, Mathematical and Natural Sciences are enjoying a unique opportunity to do so in reality.

The Google Tech Exchange Program is a study-away initiative established to offer students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs) the opportunity to take computer science and interpersonal (“soft”) skills classes at the Googleplex — the “Big Four” tech company’s headquarters campus, in Mountain View, California — for one year or one semester during their junior year.

Beginning last fall, 65 undergraduates and five faculty members from 11 HBCUs and HSIs have been involved in the experience. In addition to Morgan, the other 22

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universities participating in the Tech Exchange program are Howard University, Florida A&M University, California State University Dominguez Hills, New Mexico State University, Prairie View A&M University, North Carolina A&T State University, Dillard University, University of Texas–El Paso, University of Puerto Rico–Mayaguez and Spelman College.

The five Morgan students participating in the program this year are computer science majors Sarah Cooper, Michael McDonald, Demetrius Robinson, Joshua Smith and Morgan Whittaker. With the exception of Robinson, all will study at Google for two semesters during the 2018–19 academic year.

“I’m excited to be a part of this program, because Tech Exchange has given us an opportunity to leave the college com-

munity and gain experience in the work community,” says McDonald. “I’m looking forward to increasing my network, creating an opportunity to secure a full-time job and gaining more knowledge about my career.”

“Tech Exchange is a space we are creating, in partnership with HBCUs and HSIs, to ensure we are building with everyone and being inclusive of who is sitting at the digital table of innovation,” says April Alvarez, Educational Equity Programs manager for Google. “This program is focused on increasing the number of black and Latinx students in the tech industry and Silicon Valley, exposing scholars to careers in the tech industry and empowering black and Latinx higher education through knowledge-sharing of industry best practices. We hope, through these MORGAN.EDU

partnerships, we’ll strengthen our relationships with black and Latinx communities.”

set-up, student selection and send-off, and programmatic considerations at both Morgan and Google.

Talent Recognition The primary benefits to students participating in the program include the chance to:

“The Tech Exchange Program will greatly broaden career prospects in the hightech sector for the participating students, by having them leave the comfort of their home institution and surroundings to be immersed in Silicon Valley’s culture of innovation,” says Dr. Yu. “This unique opportunity to learn the skills that are currently most needed in the tech industry, hands-on, from one of the world’s foremost technology providers, was one that neither Morgan nor our students could pass up.”

• Access state-of-the-art course content that is highly sought after in technology industries but may not be available at Morgan State University; • Acquire soft skills needed to work in tech industries; • Learn from a domestic exchange experience with peers from many other campuses; and • Acquire a better understanding of Google and high-tech industries.

Morgan’s Hongtao Yu, Ph.D., dean of MSU’s School of Computer, Mathematical and Natural Sciences, has been involved with Morgan’s participation in the Tech Exchange Program from its inception, taking a prominent role in providing curriculum design and approval, program

Most if not all of the classes being taken at Google will count toward the students’ curriculum requirements for graduation at their home institutions. As the program progresses, all of the participating HBCUs will contribute by sending faculty members to the Google campus to teach classes, in collaboration with Google scientists/engineers. Students will take a selection of applied computer science courses — including machine learning,

product management, computational theory and database systems — throughout the year, from HBCU/HSI faculty and Google engineers.

“We are pleased that Google has recognized the great talent that our university is producing and has produced over the years,” says Morgan State University President David Wilson. “Morgan has a very strong computer science program. Providing this opportunity for our students to participate in a yearlong study-away program that allows them to integrate the theory of what they are learning in the classroom with its application in an innovative work environment like that on the Google campus is sure to be a phenomenal experience.

“I applaud the leadership at Google in recognizing the value that Morgan and other HBCUs and HSIs are bringing to the innovation and technology space,” Wilson adds, “and we look forward to sending scores of additional students to the Google campus in the years to come.” n

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Morgan Professor Honored for ‘Bold Thinking’ on Race

By Kevin M. Briscoe

Lawrence Brown, Ph.D.

Lawrence Brown, Ph.D., associate professor in Morgan State University’s School of Community Health and Policy, is one of two recipients of the 2018 Bold Thinker Award, presented by the Open Society Institute (OSI) of Baltimore at its 20th anniversary celebration this past summer. He was recognized for his ongoing social justice advocacy work and service, particularly his research and efforts to highlight and end racial segregation in Baltimore City. OSI Baltimore is a public charity targeting drug addiction, over-reliance on incarceration, and academic and other obstacles between young people and their success, in Baltimore City and Maryland.

“I was really excited when I heard I’d won the OSI Bold Thinker 24

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Award,” Dr. Brown wrote in an email. “For me, it was great to be acknowledged as a scholar, given the work I put in at the mighty Morgan State University, an HBCU that has seen so many tremendous scholars here, such as Dr. Homer Favor, Dr. Benjamin Quarles, Dr. Lorece Edwards and many more.”

The premise of Dr. Brown’s work is that Baltimore is a “hypersegregated” town split into two parts: an “L” shape of white neighborhoods bisecting the northern part of the city from north to south then stretching east to the waterfront, and a butterfly-shaped cluster of black neighborhoods in east and west Baltimore. The former, he posits, has structural advantages, such as a high concentration of traditional banks, MORGAN.EDU

Community Involvement “…It is the responsibility of our city government and our courts to compel racial equity in the allocations of public tax dollars and private bank lending for home loans and businesses.”

— Lawrence Brown, Ph.D., Associate Professor, MSU School of Community Health and Policy

quality policing and better access to grocery stores, whereas the latter is home to pawn shops, check-cashing and payday loan establishments, stop-and-frisk police tactics and “food deserts” interrupted by fast-food restaurants and corner markets.

This, he says, is not a new reality.

“Even though we’ve had Black mayors and a majority Black city council, they have not dismantled the apartheid that has bedeviled the city since 1910, when Baltimore passed the first anti-Black racial zoning ordinance in the history of the United States,” Dr. Brown wrote. “By making it plain that we have a white L and Black Butterfly, I think it helps people see how racial segregation is still weaponized economically to harm and damage Black lives.”

What is the solution?

“People in the white L are not motivated to spread their wealth,” Dr. Brown wrote. “I would argue that it is the responsibility of our city government and our courts to compel racial

equity in the allocations of public tax dollars and private bank lending for home loans and businesses. We’ve got to put an end to our apartheid budget as a city where we spend over $500 million on policing, which is more than health, housing, arts, parks, workforce development and civil rights combined.”

For his part of the fight, Dr. Brown, 39, is continuing his research on the impact of ongoing historical trauma and how that affects black neighborhoods.

“I’m completing a book right now (titled), “The Black Butterfly: How We Must Make Black Neighborhoods Matter,” he wrote. “It will be published in 2019 by Johns Hopkins University Press. I’m also working with my students on an initiative called #BmoreLEADfree, where we work to tackle the ongoing mass lead poisoning in Baltimore City. My quest is to make sure we see that we can’t make Black Lives Matter if we don’t make Black neighborhoods matter. We can only do that if we get serious about dismantling this new Jim Crow system of Baltimore Apartheid and defeat the rising tide of racism via Trumpism.” n MORGAN MAGAZINE VOLUME I 2019

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Thought Leadership in HIV Prevention MSU Professor’s Theory Explains High-Risk Behavior Among African Americans

By Frieda Wiley

Lorece Edwards, Dr.P.H. 26

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Research Spotlight In the United States, more new HIV infections occur in adolescents and young adults than in any other group, and the scales are disproportionately tipped toward the African-American community. African Americans, who make up only 13.4 percent of the U.S. population, account for 44 percent of all new cases of HIV and 57 percent of all HIV cases among youth. The numbers are even more alarming for black, same gender-loving (SGL) men, who are 11 times more likely to contract HIV than their white male SGL counterparts. Equally disturbing is that more than one-third (34 percent) of the estimated 21,000 HIV infections that occur in African Americans each year affect people 13 to 24 years of age, a demographic called “emerging adults.”

Research Reaps Answers So why has HIV become a growing epidemic among African-American emerging adults and the culprit behind what Morgan State University researcher Lorece Edwards, Dr.P.H., calls “urban sexual suicide”? The University has explored some interesting answers, thanks to funding from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMSHA). Dr. Edwards is an associate professor in Morgan’s Department of Health Behavior Sciences and director of the University’s Center for Sexual Health Advancement and Prevention Education (SHAPE). She has been responsible for four grants totaling $4 million from SAMSHA since 2013, to study communicable diseases such as HIV/AIDS, other sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and hepatitis C virus.

Dr. Edwards says several underlying factors have pushed the uptrend in HIV infections among African-American emerging adults in urban settings. These include the youths’ beliefs about STI and HIV acquisition and other risk factors as well the priority they place on those risks.

Dr. Edwards uncovered some unsettling information through numerous surveys and interviews of emerging adults on campus and in surrounding communities, beginning with the respondents’ nonchalant attitudes and beliefs of invincibility toward HIV/AIDS and other communicable diseases, which she attributes to the ubiquity of disease.

“These days, HIV infections are just as common as the flu, and people have become desensitized,” explains Dr. Edwards, who grew up during a time in which HIV did not exist and STIs were generally curable and non-life-threatening. “For emerging adults today, HIV is far too familiar. People have casual conversations about their clinical measures of HIV, while others retreat to silence and secrecy.”

The approval of the first prescription medication for HIV prevention, Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP), in 2012, has also contributed to casual attitudes about HIV risk in African-American communities, Dr. Edwards says, and she adds that many emerging adults think taking the preventative pill, commonly known as “prep,” will keep them from acquiring the virus.

However, PrEP only reduces HIV infection by as much as 94 to 96 percent when taken every day. Furthermore, it does not prevent other STIs and, like other prescription medications, it has side-effects that should be given full consideration.

In addition, social stigma and the fear of ostracism contribute to many young African Americans’ unwillingness to use condoms during sexual activity, Dr. Edwards has found. And many of those she surveyed reported being fearful of HIV test results. “I am satisfied not knowing (my HIV) status and life is easier that way.

What you don’t know won’t hurt you,” one survey respondent wrote. Others fear facing social persecution after the discovery of their HIV status.

Hidden Factor: Perceived Risk But these factors, although daunting, are not the biggest hurdles to HIV prevention in many cases, Dr. Edwards says. For many African-American youth who live in high-risk, high-crime areas, every day is a struggle to survive community violence and toxic community stress such as hearing gunshots; witnessing robberies; eviction and homelessness; food insecurity and a host of other structural and social determinants of health. For these individuals, she says, the risk of contracting HIV takes a back seat to daily challenges such as getting home safely from school and work and making it through the neighborhood alive and unscathed.

“The perceived risk for HIV is much lower

than the perceived risk for other threats to survival and existence,” Dr. Edwards says. “People are not thinking about longevity. They’re thinking about the here and now.”

Taking note of these attitudes, Dr. Edwards developed the “Perceived Risk Hierarchy Theory (PRHT).” The PRHT posits that emerging adults’ and younger individuals’ perceptions of health risk or severity are attenuated by what they perceive as more imminent and immediate risks: matters of personal threats, endangerments and perceived survival expectations. This perceived hierarchy provides a highly plausible explanation of the behaviors and attitudes toward health promotion and disease prevention. The Perceived Risk and Hierarchy Inventory, based on the theory, is a type of analytical tool she and her colleagues used to collect data that provided insight into emerging adults’ rationale behind the professor’s statistical findings — data that conventional research methods might not have uncovered.

“This theory emerged out of a desire to learn why people weren’t getting tested for HIV,” Dr. Edwards summarized.

To dig deeper into the data, Dr. Edwards partnered with Morgan’s Center for Predictive Analytics, which helped the researcher test the theory by collecting and analyzing four iterations of surveys to validate the model. The Center is affiliated with Morgan’s nationally recognized psychometrics master’s degree and doctoral programs, which were ranked seventh in the U.S. this year by Universities. com. MSU is the only Historically Black Institution to offer graduate degrees in this discipline.

Morgan’s Office of Technology Transfer has been a champion and supporter of this work. The PRHT now has a U.S. patent pending, and renowned social scientist David R. Williams, Ph.D., professor of public health at Harvard University, recently cited the theory during his welcome address at the Annual Meeting of the American Public Health Association. Dr. Edwards is seeking to make the Perceived Risk and Hierarchy Inventory available to mass markets, including community health centers, schools, hospitals and the military.

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Research Spotlight

Ongoing Battle Dr. Edwards has used creative ways to encourage students to get tested for HIV and other STIs. Her GET SMART enterprise has made testing more accessible by offering screenings in the community and on campus, in locations such as the MSU library, the MSU Student Center and mobile vans, in addition to the health center. Despite increased accessibility and incentives such as $25 gift cards, T-shirts and movie passes, Dr. Edwards says the turnout for testing remains low.

“People are skeptical of being seen in 28

MORGAN MAGAZINE VOLUME I 2019

specific designated places for STI/HIV testing,” she explains.

HIV/AIDS in 1999 as a doctoral student in Morgan’s Public Health Program.

HIV education is a critical element of HIV prevention and management, but helping emerging adults recognize the longterm impact of the disease remains an ongoing battle. Dr. Edwards says recent national concern about opioid addiction and overdose has overshadowed the seriousness of HIV.

“My interest in HIV grew out of my passion for public health and the value and benefits of prevention, especially among women of color…ensuring conditions in which people can be safe,” says the tireless educator.

“People gravitate towards what is sexy or popular, and right now, that’s opioid abuse,” she observes. “There is a complacency about HIV now, because it is no longer an acute disease. It’s a chronic disease.”

Grooming Leaders in Public Health Advocacy Morgan State University was the first Historically Black College or University (HBCU) to offer doctoral degrees in public health. A member of the program’s inaugural class, Dr. Edwards says hearing former U.S. Surgeon General David Satcher’s keynote address at a Morgan convocation nearly 20 years ago inspired her to pursue a role of scholar/activist.

The Baltimore native first began studying

She feels the value and contributions of HBCUs in uplifting the African-American community remain largely unrecognized.

“In general, people need to value the education that HBCUs provide,” Dr. Edwards says. “HBCUs were created to meet the educational needs of black students who previously had negligible opportunities to attend college. HBCUs were the only means for higher education for blacks after the Civil War. However, HBCUs’ commitment to students (has) not changed. We provide a culture of caring.”

Dr. Edwards’ work in HIV education and prevention is one example that illustrates that commitment. n

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