Carolina MPA Digest 9/4/20
Carolina MPA Student Digest:
Carolina MPA Calendar

  • September 7: September term online courses start
  • September 23-26: ICMA Virtual Conference (details below)
  • September 28: Deadline to apply for December Graduation
  • October 22-24: MPA Immersion
Online format MPA Students connect during their Student Leadership Council Happy Hour on 9/3/20. Be on the lookout for the next event!
The Carolina MPA Diversity Committee is excited to announce a new initiative: the Diversity Committee Book Club, which will kick off with its inaugural book this semester. We will be reading "Between the World and Me" by Ta-Nehisi Coates. Over the course of the semester, the Committee will hold three informal discussion meetings over Zoom to correspond with the three parts by which the book is divided. We are aiming to create a safe space where students can work together to gain a deeper understanding of racial inequity and work to become better, more active advocates.

We are trying to gauge how many participants to expect so we can plan accordingly. Please fill out the survey if you are interested in and committed to participating.
The International City/County Management Conference has moved online for 2020. Student registration is FREE as UNC has a student chapter, so check it out! Topics for this year include:
  • Budget & Finance
  • Civic Health & Cohesion
  • Emergency Management
  • Equity & Inclusion
  • Futurism-Innovation-Technology
  • Resilience
  • Leadership


Interested in getting involved in UNC's student chapter of ICMA? Email Molly Gaskin, President.
Lori Armstrong to Present at ICMA!
Our very own MPA student, Lori Armstrong, will be part of a round table discussion at this year's virtual conference. If you're attending, please come out and support her!

Title: Overcoming Isolation During COVID19
Type of session: Roundtable
Date session will air: Wednesday September 23, 2020
Start Time (Eastern): 4:00 PM
End Time (Eastern): 4:45 PM

Are you also presenting? If so, please let us know!

University & Beyond Events
  • Virtual Opportunities to engage:
  • Starting Today: QGAPS Social
  • September 1: Reflections on Race & Medicine in the Year of COVID-19 & Nationwide Protests
  • September 9: Alondra Nelson: Society After Pandemic
  • September 10: Race, Racism, & Racial Equality Symposium
  • Starting September 10: The Diaspora Film Festival
  • September 10: Fostering Dialogue Across the Political Aisle
  • September 14: Diplomacy in a World of Transnational Crisis
  • October 7: How Pandemics Show Us Who We Are: Race and Risk in the United States
  • Climbing the Hill: Women in the History of UNC virtual exhibition
  • Votes for (Some) Women: UNC scholars reflect on the 10oth Anniversary of the 19th Amendment
  • Writing Center Blog: To Iraq & Back: A Veteran's Writing Journey
  • Community Music School Applications Now Open
  • Volunteer & Professional Development Opportunities
  • Apply for the Graduate School's Impact & Horizon Awards
  • Opportunities to Get Outside
  • Overcoming Zoom Fatigue

1st Fridays at 3:00 PM and 3rd Thursdays at 5:00 PM.
(Virtual) QGAPS Socials are every First Friday and Third Thursday, and they're a fantastic opportunity to connect with other LGBTQIA+ identifying members of the graduate student community at Carolina!
If you have any questions or accessibility needs, please contact Jay M, Graduate and Professional Student Program Coordinator, at meerajay@email.unc.edu.
Alondra Nelson, Harold F. Linder Chair in the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton
Wednesday, Sept. 9 | 4:30 p.m.
 
Scholars have long known that socioeconomic opportunity, employment sector, incarceration and detention status, housing insecurity, and educational access have everything to do with health and wellbeing. The disproportionate, life-threatening impact of the novel coronavirus on Black communities across the United States is therefore a symptom of the wider, deeper social pandemic of structural inequality. At the same time, Covid-19 has become a kind of social kaleidoscope refracting social phenomena, reassembling them in new and familiar formations—and with unfamiliar vividness. How do the social conditions exposed, exacerbated, and created by the novel coronavirus demand that we revisit and substantively rethink our ideas of society, social institutions, technology, and politics?
About Dr. Nelson:
Alondra Nelson is one of the country’s foremost thinkers in the fields of science, technology, social inequality, and race. Her groundbreaking books include The Social Life of DNA: Race, Reparations, and Reconciliation after the Genome and Body and Soul: The Black Panther Party and the Fight Against Medical Discrimination. Nelson was previously Professor of Sociology at Columbia. She was the University’s first Dean of Social Science and continues to serve as President of Social Science Research Council. Nelson joined the sociology department at Princeton as a regular Visiting Lecturer with the rank of Professor at the same time that she assumes the Harold F. Linder Chair in the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton.
This online lecture is free and open to the public, but registration is required. How to join via Zoom: Please RSVP via Eventbrite and a link will be emailed to you. Please note that registration will close 24 hours before the start of the talk.

 
More information can also be found on our website. We hope to see you there!
The inaugural Race, Racism and Racial Equity (R3) Symposium, hosted by the University Office for Diversity and Inclusion, is a series of virtual events that will bring together scholars and researchers from across campus to share their work with Carolina and the broader community. We will provide context on the state of race at UNC and in the U.S., advancing the work of the Chancellor’s Commission on History, Race and a Way Forward. R3 will also highlight the stellar and innovative work of our graduate researchers through virtual “lightning” sessions and poster presentations.
The first of the R3 series, “The Historical Exploitation of Black and Brown Bodies at UNC: Learning from the Past to Change the Present,” will be held on Thursday, Sept. 10, 1:30–3 p.m.


 
Chapel Hill, NC – The Diaspora Festival of Black and Independent Film is the Stone Center’s annual series spotlighting film from all corners of the African Diaspora. Many of our screenings over the year have been North Carolina premieres and most feature commentary and appearances by the directors and local scholars as well was post-film discussions. In light of the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and its particularly devastating impact on traditional film festival programing, the fall 2020 edition of the festival seeks to take a retrospective look at a select number of our most popular and resonant shorts films from recent editions. In adherence to offering context, perspective and expert breakdown of the films and the issues they raise, we have invited each of the directors to join us virtually for a post-screening discussion of the film and their broader filmmaking endeavors. 
 
A link to each of the selected films will be provided for advanced viewing prior to the virtual discussion via Zoom. 
 
Screening Schedule 
 
September 10, 3:30PM 
Dir. Merawi Gerima | USA 2019 | Narrative Feature | 90 Mins  
When Jay arrives home, he finds his neighborhood gentrified beyond recognition. Demetrius, his childhood best friend, is missing, but none of the remaining black folks trust Jay enough to provide any answers. Jay’s frustration compounds as he also finds himself alienated in the city at large, attacked from all sides. Jay visits his last friend Dion in prison, but leaves feeling powerless and infuriated. One final, chance confrontation results in Jay succumbing to the same forces as did his friends. 
 
September 17, 3:30PM 
Dir. Michael Cooke & Kimberly Y. James | 2015 | 15 Mins | Short, Drama  
Two African American sisters grow up in racially charged 1960s Georgia, but one is born with fair skin. And when schools integrate in their small town, she decides to change her destiny – by passing for white. 
 
October 1, 3:30PM 
Dir. Ashley Brim | 2017 | 15 Mins | Short, Drama  
Based on a true story, AN ACT OF TERROR explores the ongoing oppression of the African American community at the hands of the criminal justice system. In the Jim Crow South, Virginia Christian, a 16-year-old African American maid, dreams of a better life for herself. Those dreams are shattered when she is attacked by her white employer setting off a series of tragic events that end in Virginia being tried for murder. 
 
October 8, 3:30PM  
Dir. Talibah Newman | 2013 | 19 mins | Short, Drama 
A young boy, Honey, explores identity and grief with his mystical neighbor, while in the midst of the struggle to help his mother lay his grandfather to rest. 
 
 
ABOUT THE STONE CENTER: The Sonja Haynes Stone Center, founded in 1988 on the campus of UNC-Chapel Hill, encourages and provides opportunities for the critical examination of all dimensions of African-American, African and African diaspora cultures through sustained and open discussion, dialogue and debate.
UNC Global
Monday, Sept. 14, 6 p.m.

The Joseph J. Sisco Memorial Forum, "Diplomacy in a World of Transnational Crisis," will examine large-scale policy and diplomacy implications of transnational issues, such as COVID-19.
A keynote address will be delivered by Ambassador Thomas Pickering, who served as ambassador under six U.S. presidents in a distinguished diplomatic career spanning five decades.
The American Academy of Diplomacy, in collaboration with the Office of the Vice Provost for Global Affairs, is hosting the event.
Students in UNC professor Katherine Turk's spring history class curated Wilson Library's new exhibit, Climbing the Hill: Women in the History of UNC, the DTH's Emma Lindsey reports. And although the exhibit was set to be unveiled in the spring, Wilson Library has made access to it online-only for the time being. 
  • The exhibit houses 48 historical pieces, featuring artifacts such as the diploma of Sallie Walker Stockard, the first woman to graduate from UNC, and photos depicting the Food Workers' Strike, which was led by women of color. 
  • Turk said the team defined the scope of the project, women at UNC, very broadly to include workers, students and community members. She said this reflects diverse experiences and shows that, from the beginning, women have been drivers of change at UNC. 
  • Kate Karstens, a UNC graduate and former Daily Tar Heel staffer who was part of Turk's class, said the problems that some women detailed in their diary entries, which are now chronicled in Wilson, resonated with her own experience on campus. 
“I get exiled from male peers in study sessions and I get told that I have a resting bitch face and I get told by a professor that I am too eager when I sit in the front row," she said. "These things are still happening today.”
UNC Professor Katherine Turk looks back at the 19th Amendment. “We want to celebrate, but we have to be clear that this was one step in a very long story. Today’s efforts to limit suffrage are part of the story, too.” Read full coverage here.
Many veterans face unique challenges and rewards while writing in college. “As I began to practice college writing more and more, I found more commonalities between my old Army experience and my new college experience.” Read more about writing coach Don’s experience writing as a veteran in this blog post.
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Department of Music is proud to offer year-round music instruction to residents of the triangle through the UNC Community Music School (UNC-CMS). Our goal is to enrich our community and contribute to the cultural fabric of the region by offering music education of the highest possible quality.
UNC-CMS will receive ongoing contributions from our distinguished Department of Music faculty, both in terms of instruction and guidance. Housed in the beautiful Kenan Music Building and using state-of-the-art classrooms, we provide an exceptional atmosphere for students of all ages to explore, develop, and refine musical expression. We trust you will find our faculty and curriculum to be an outstanding resource for artistry and fellowship for years to come.
“We released this guidance to try to help students navigate the absentee voting process because we heard that many students may be confused about how it works given the circumstances with COVID and the fact that a lot of students have been displaced from their campus housing,” said Patrick Gannon, the Board's public information officer. Check out more details on voting options at the Daily Tar Heel.
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The Graduate School is currently accepting applications for the 2021 Impact and Horizon Awards recognizing graduate student research that contributes to the educational, economic, physical, social or cultural well-being of North Carolinians. Eligible nominees include current graduate students and alumni who graduated May 2019 and later. A gallery highlighting the research of the 2020 recipients can be found here.

Nominees whose research has demonstrated direct impact will be considered for the Impact Award; Nominees whose research has high potential for direct impact will be considered for the Horizon Award.

Students should submit their applications online; Programs may nominate up to three students.

Nominations are due October 9, 2020.
Isolation and working from home are taking a toll on daily movement. Getting 30 minutes of exercise a day makes a positive difference. UNC Exercise & Sports Science Professor Abbie Smith-Ryan examines how you can prevent Zoom fatigue.
Carolina MPA | UNC School of Government | carolinampa.sog.unc.edu | Website | Intranet
The Carolina MPA Intranet houses information and resources for students during the program.