HKS Hosts Black Policy Conference
by Lena Benson on April 29, 2010 in HKS News, News
April 16th and 17th marked the 6th Annual Black Policy Conference at HKS. This year’s theme was “A Call to Action: Empowering the Individual and Mobilizing the Collective,” and keynote speakers included Angela Glover Blackwell, CEO and founder of PolicyLink and Anthony Williams, former Mayor of Washington, D.C. and HKS Lecturer in Public Management. This year’s conference co-chairs, Rasheba Johnson and Naima Green, both MPP ‘10s, aimed to inspire participants to not only discuss how policies are currently effecting black communities but also to use opportunities provided by this conference to take steps towards developing a strategic plan of action. Such opportunities included a community organizing workshop, a networking reception, and numerous panels to choose from on topics not traditionally featured at HKS or Harvard conferences.
Such panels included “Prisoner Re-entry: Building Bridges Between Ex-Offenders and Their Communities” and “Investing in Human Capital in the South: Strategies to Cultivate Young Black Leaders”. Aly Spencer, MPP ‘11 and co-founder of the HKS Southern Caucus, attended the panel on the South and remarked, “The panel was a good reminder that when we think about the South we aren’t just talking about Atlanta and Charlotte and New Orleans. The panelists emphasized the breadth and depth of the lingering problems in the region and the dramatic surge in leadership that will be needed to address them. I left feeling really challenged to ask what I am doing and what I can do.”
This year, the conference organizers also pushed the entire HKS community to recognize that topics highlighted at the Black Policy Conference are policies that affect us all, not just black students or people working in black communities. E-mails, flyers, and one-on-one conversations leading up to the event encouraged students to consider that leaders should understand the needs of diverse constituent groups, since many polices in the US disproportionately impact communities of color.
“We are extremely pleased with how the conference turned out. It is still a young tradition, but each year the aspirations for it grow and we are very fortunate to have so much support from the administration, our classmates, and alums in putting it together”, said Johnson. Many members of the African and Africa-American Diaspora Collaborative (AADC), Harvard Journal of African-American Public Policy, and The Community Development Project spent months assisting with the conference by sponsoring panels, publicizing the event, and organizing logistics.
The conference was founded in 2004 by Nicole Campbell, MPP ’05, and now serves not only as an opportunity to highlight the impact of numerous policy issues on black communities, but also as a much anticipated annual event that brings together diverse students from graduate and undergraduate institutions all over Boston. Many alumni like Campbell also return to HKS each year specifically for the conference, seeing it as an opportunity to reconnect and give back.
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