Sharing Experiences
As with all organizations, events and activities are an integral part of our mission, vision, values and goals. The Department of Antiracism, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion seeks to develop events and activities that are informative and educational in every aspect. Among the events sponsored by the Department of ADEI are Conversations of Understanding and the Illinois Higher Education Equity Symposium.
Juneteenth
The Pew Research Center reports that at least 28 states as well as the District of Columbia legally recognized Juneteenth as a public holiday. Acknowledged as the newest federal holiday, Juneteenth National Independence Day celebrates the end of slavery in the United States. At the state level, however, it varies whether they even commemorate it as an official holiday, a day of observance, or something else. In Illinois, Governor Pritzker signed legislation on June 16, 2021, making Juneteenth a state recognized holiday known as National Freedom Day. The name “Juneteenth” is essentially a combination of the words June and nineteenth for June 19, 1865, when General Gordon Granger led Union soldiers into Galveston, Texas to announce the end of the war and FREEDOM for all enslaved people, two years after President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, ending slavery.
Sources: Illinois.gov, Pew Research Center
LGBTQ Pride Month
On June 11, 1999, President Bill Clinton became the first U.S. president to declare June as “Gay and Lesbian Pride Month”. One reported 2024 theme for LGBTQ Pride Month is “Power in Pride”. The purpose of commemorating the month is to recognize the impact that the LGBTQ community has had on history. Although the organization of LGBTQ rights in the United States dates back to at least 1924, Britannica illustrates the reason why the month of June is celebrated for the LGBTQ community is in remembrance of a 1969 event in New York’s Greenwich Village at the Stonewall Inn. Following a police raid of the bar for selling liquor without a license, approximately 400 people rioted in protest of the police harassment. The Stonewall riots, also known as the Stonewall Uprising, became the spark igniting the LGBTQ rights movement.
Sources:Britannica.com, USDA.gov