The Daily Egyptian - February 23, 2022

THE

Daily Egyptian SERVING THE SOUTHERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY COMMUNITY SINCE 1916.

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WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 23, 2022

VOL. 105, ISSUE 7

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Wednesday, February 23, 2022

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Letter from the Editor Dear Readers, As the first Black female Editor-in-Chief of the Daily Egyptian I am happy to provide you with our annual Black History Month Edition. SIU is a university that has made great strides in diversity within the past few years. We have a Black Dean of Students Jeffrey McGoy, our first Black Chancellor Austin Lane, and in our new College of Arts and Media Interim Dean Olusegun Ojewuyi.

Black exists beyond the month of February. There has been a historical infringement on the free speech of Black people in America. Freed Black people were not granted

BLACK

the rights to read and write (legally) until 1860. In this edition, the staff at The Daily Egyptian newspaper wish to amplify voices that were once silenced and celebrate a culture and people that have been so integral in the advancement of this country.

We wish to not only put a magnifying glass on the struggles of Black people but to also showcase their accomplishments throughout history. For information on Black History Month events please visit: Black History Month | Student Multicultural Resource Center | SIU. We hope you enjoy, Oreoluwa Ojewuyi, Editor-in-Chief

2022 HISTORY

MONTH

FEBRUARY

Black Health and Wellness Strong EVENTS ARE OPEN TO EVERYONE For more information call 618-453-3740 For disability accommodations call 618-453-5738

BALANCE LOVE ALERT CHERISH KNOWLEDGE TUE 1

BLACK HISTORY MONTH KICKOFF Guest Speaker: Dr. Ngozi Ezike, Director of the Illinois Department of Public Health 5pm-6:30pm • Guyon Auditorium and Zoom (Hybrid) Register in advance for this webinar: zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_7KuK1q1XRA-4vjQ7IcNOnQ Refreshments will be served after event.

WED 2

Addressing Accessibility in Economics, Finance, Data Science, and Policy 5:30pm-6:30pm • Virtual Zoom: zoom.us/j/92088079763

Mission Statement The Daily Egyptian, the student-run news organization of Southern Illinois University Carbondale, is committed to being a trusted source of news, information, commentary and public discourse, while helping readers understand the issues affecting their lives.

SAT 12

Black Doctor discusses Health and Wellness 11:30am-12:30pm • University Mall Sneaking Out 9pm • Dentmon Center, 880 W. High St., Carbondale For tickets contact Aaron 618-203-1442.

WED 16

Copyright Information @2021 The Daily Egyptian. All rights reserved. All content is property of the Daily Egyptian and may not be reproduced or transmitted without consent. The Daily Egyptian is a member of the Illinois College Press Association, Associated Collegiate Press, College Media Advisers Inc. and the College Business and Advertising Managers Inc.

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Students must include their year and major. Faculty must include rank and department. Others include hometown.

Submissions should be sent to editor@dailyegyptian.com

Hair Story 6pm • Virtual Register: carbondalepubliclibrary.org

WED 23

Health Fair 1pm-4pm • University Mall

SAT 26

Black Doctor discusses Health and Wellness 11:30am-12:30pm • University Mall

Salukis SPEAK: A Discussion Series Positive Thinking for Positive Results 4pm-5pm • Student Services Building 150-160

SUN 27

Family Friday Movie Night 5:30pm • University Mall

Open Poetry Slam 5pm • Student Center Big Muddy Room Students only.

MON 28

SAT 5

Tunnel of Oppression Tours 6pm-9pm • Lower Level Grinnell

FRI 4

Black Doctor discusses Health and Wellness 11am-12:30pm • University Mall Community Pop-up 1pm-5pm • Boyton St. Community Center, Marion, IL

MON 7

THU 17

Tunnel of Oppression Tours 6pm-9pm • Lower Level Grinnell

Graduate Luncheon 11:30am-1pm • Student Center Cambria Room

King Richard 7pm • Student Center Auditorium Students only.

TUE 8

FRI 18

Sexual Health in COVID-19 Pandemic 12pm • Student Services Building 150-160 Lunch provided. Students only.

Hip Hop: Tools of the Trade Guest Speaker: Dr. Jason Rawls 5pm • Morris Library Guyon Auditorium

Black and Queer Roundtable 5pm-6pm • Student Services Building 150-160 Date Night (Adults only movie) 5:30pm • University Mall

SAT 19

Black Doctor discusses Health and Wellness 11:30am-12:30pm • University Mall

THU 10

Graduate Luncheon 11:30am-1pm • Student Center Cambria Room Presentation and Art Exhibit: Blacks in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) Guest Speaker: Dr. Wendell O’Neal 4pm-6pm • University Museum/Zoom Register in advance for this webinar: zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_ck5yWNGREqcuNhfdDVSkQ

MON 21

TRIO Kickoff 5pm • TBD Details: triostudentsupport.siu.edu/index.php

Afrocentric Fashion Show 3pm • Morris Library Guyon Auditorium

Saving Ourselves: Where Do We Go from Here?

11am • Student Services Building 150-160 Black History Scholar Bowl 6pm • Student Center

FEBRUARY 12-MARCH 16 Voices and Votes: A Smithsonian Exhibit 11am-5pm • University Mall

JANUARY 17

MLK Jr. Breakfast 8am • Student Center Ballrooms

SPONSORS

African American Museum of Southern Illinois Analytics Office of Diversity and Inclusion Black Affairs Council Black Chamber of Commerce of Southern Illinois Black History Month Planning Committee Black Resource Center Black Togetherness Organization Carbondale United College of Business Dentmon Center Kappa Alpha Psi NAACP New Student Programs Omega Delta Phi Sacral Space for Women Student Affairs Student Programming Council TRIO Support Services University Museum Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion SIU is committed to protecting the community. All those attending in person events must wear masks in shared indoor spaces and follow current campus and state pandemic safety guidelines/protocols (siu.edu/coronovirus). Check calendar.siu.edu/mastercalendar/ MasterCalendar.aspx or siu.edu/coronavirus for status of events and cancellations.

Publishing Information The Daily Egyptian is published by the students of Southern Illinois University Carbondale and functions as a laboratory for the School of Journalism in exchange for the room and utilities in the Communications Building. The Daily Egyptian is a non-profit organization that survives primarily off of its advertising revenue. Offices are in the Communications Building, room 1259, at Southern Illinois University Carbondale, Carbondale, Ill., 62901.

TUE 22

Business Shower and Mixer 4pm-7pm • Hannibal Black Sports Bar and Grill 1808 Washington St-Cairo, IL

SPC Movie Night: “RESPECT” 7pm • Student Center Auditorium Students only.

The Daily Egyptian is published by the students of Southern Illinois University Carbondale on a weekly basis. Fall and spring semester editions run every Wednesday. Free copies are distributed in the Carbondale, Carterville, and Springfield communities. The Daily Egyptian can be found at www. dailyegyptian.com or on the Daily Egyptian app!

Black Love 5pm-7pm • University Mall

A Black Male Initiative Series: Transforming Perception Guest Speaker: Dr. Joseph Smith 12pm-1pm • Student Services Building 150-160

THU 3

About Us

FRI 11

Interactive Theater: Allies in Action March 22, 2022 5:00-6:30PM Use this Zoom link to attend: https://siue.zoom.us/j/95383383499

Panelists: Dr. Daniel F. Mahony, President of the SIU System Dr. Austin Lane, Chancellor SIUC Dr. James Minor, Chancellor SIUE Dr. Wesley McNeese, Systems Director for Diversity Initiatives SIU School of Medicine Dr. Sandy Pensoneau-Conway, Director of Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies and of the School of Communication Studies Facilitated by Kathyrn Bentley, SIUE Associate Professor of Theater and Dance and Director of the IMPACT Academy, and the IMPACT Academy Players

Register for this event here!

In this session, we will view vignettes and discuss them with our panelists. Vignettes used during interactive theater are based on story circles with STEM women faculty members who shared instances of bias they have encountered.

For information on other upcoming events sponsored by ADVANCE, please visit our website.

winter.

Wednesday, February 23, 2022

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The Black college student experience: PWIs vs HBCUs

Janiyah Gaston Oreoluwa Ojewuyi jgaston@dailyegyptian.com oojewuyi@dailyegyptian.com

Predominantly White Institutions (PWIs) and Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) can affect the way Black students interact with their school and academic community.

The US Department of Education defines a PWI as a university that has 50% or more enrollment from White students but it is also used to refer to any University that is deemed “historically white”. The US Department of Education defines an HBCU as “[…] any historically Black college or university that was established prior to 1964, whose principal mission was, and is, the education of Black Americans, and that is accredited by a nationally recognized accrediting agency […].”

The choice between an HBCU or PWI is not an easy one. Some students must prioritize funding over experience when applying to college.

A brief by the American Council on Education found that HBCUs endowments are behind PWIs by 70%.

Ashley Hinton, a first year student in the psychology program at SIU, said although she came to SIU because it was in-state and affordable, the atmosphere of attending a PWI can make Black students feel uncomfortable.

“You have to pass certain cities that used to be sundown towns or certain things where you just feel like ‘Oh, am I going to be profiled?,” Hinton said.

Black students are not unwarranted in feeling uneasy about coming down to Carbondale, given its history of racial discrimination, Hinton said.

Hinton said the administration has a misconception that a majority of Black students are underprivileged.

“There are some Black people who are wealthy. There are some Black people who are not underprivileged, but [...]that is what we were labeled as when we are seen walking around campus.”

Hinton said the university labeling Black students as underprivileged falsely paints them as in need of help, and always asking for a handout.

Hinton said she has to prove herself day in and day out in class.

“I would say walking into classrooms where there are times I feel like I have to prove myself more, even though I’m an exceptional student.”

Hinton said.

Hinton said this constant pressure to prove herself in class has taken a toll on her mental health. It has caused her to be more conscious of her participation in class in order to prove herself as a good student, she said.

Feyi Arowolo, is a second year student in the communications program at Southern Illinois University (SIU), she said came to SIU because of the opportunities SIU

Oreoluwa Ojewuyi | @oojewuyi@dailyegyptian.com

offers to students.

Arowolo said she considered going to an HBCU at one point because of the sense of community they have.

“I see the different events that some HBCUs do, [...] for example, with Black History Month, they have [events] such as a Black talent show, a cookout, [and they have] Black [activities] all around campus and many more. Because this is a PWI we really can’t do it as we want to,” Arowolo said.

Arowolo said while SIU does promote itself as being diverse when it comes to the Black students they don’t feel they can celebrate their culture to its fullest extent like they would be able to at an HBCU. Cheyenne Willard is a third year student at SIU. Willard said she came to SIU because they offered her the most money when she graduated from her community college. Willard is spearheading a Black majorette RSO with her friend to celebrate a black dance and culture. Willard said her new Black majorette team will have a good starting point thanks to other Black RSOs who paved the way like Dynasty Dance who have built a good reputation within the Black population at SIU. “We are the enchanting Diamond Majorette team and pretty soon we will be having tryouts,” Willard said.

Willard said the RSO is particularly for Black girls and whoever else can dance but wants to dance specifically majorette style.

It is important to have RSOs on

campus that celebrate Blackness because of the various racialized experiences Black students face at a PWI. Willard said she heard several non- Black students at SIU using the N word and experienced people touching her hair without permission and asking if her hair was real.

“People were saying it, and it was not people that I necessarily know or anything like that, but they were saying it at parties, things like that.

As if it was a casual word to say or something that was okay to say,” Willard said.

Willard said those racial instances were not the only ones she experienced. She said in 2020 her sister and friends had notes slid under their dorm room door at Schneider Hall saying, “The apes are coming,” and students made ape noises outside of the dorm rooms.

After the incident, the administration sent out an email saying they could not do anything because they did not catch them on camera. “[SIU said] they didn’t see it on camera, and I’m just like, ‘wow, y’all can catch everything else, [...] but you just happen to not see this on the camera?’” Willard said.

Charah McKinzie is the program coordinator for the Black Resource Center. McKinzie said not having the proper resources for Black students can lead them to feeling isolated in their own university.

“There are just certain things that

a Black student needs and one of those things include community.

What it means to see a professor that looks like me, or that looks like you,” Mckinzie said.

According to McKinzie Black students who attend a PWI need to be able to feel that they have that sense of community around them.

Alvin Boss is a fourth year student at Morehouse college, a HBCU in Atlanta, Ga. He said he decided to go to an HBCU because of the sense of unity they offered.

“I saw the brotherhood and the closeness that the school has to offer to students, how upperclassmen will actively help younger classmates,” Boss said. “[They] make sure they got their classes set, make sure they’re involved on campus, make sure they are there and they have the tools needed to get the best out of Morehouse.”

Boss said having upperclassmen actively helping you make sure you get to class and get involved is what makes HBCUs like Morehouse welcoming. He said for students who attend a PWI it can feel as though you have to find your group of Black people to hangout with.

“I feel like Black people have to always be like the one Black person.

They always have to make Black groups for something like ‘Black people that like sports’ or ‘Black people that like comic books’ [at] PWIs you have to find your Black group.”

Boss said with HBCUs you do

not have to limit yourself to just being a Black person you can just be yourself.

Jamecia Laws, a third year law student who attended the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff, said HBCUs offer a wide range of scholarships.

“There are specific programs, such as scholarship programs and internship programs, that are marketed and available only for HBCU students. So, if you were to be within a PWI you would possibly not qualify for those opportunities,” Laws said.

Laws said because there are more Black students at HBCUs, Black fraternities and sororities are more prevalent there.

“We had all of the Divine Nine organizations whereas at some PWI there might not be enough students on campus to fulfill that organization. Those Divine Nine organizations definitely play a large part in HBCU culture,” Laws said.

The Divine Nine are historically black Greek organizations made up of five fraternities and four sororities.

The Divine Nine were formed as a way to give African Americans a chance to be a part of Greek life because of their exclusion from the White fraternities and sororities.

SIU has a few of the Divine Nine including Alpha Phi Alpha, Kappa Alpha Psi, Phi Beta Sigma, Iota Phi Theta, Alpha Kappa Alpha and Sigma Gamma Rho. Lauren Evans, a second year, and Cameryn Baptiste, a third year student, who both attend Xavier University of Louisiana, said HBCUs allow you to connect with more people who share similar experiences with you.

Evans said having that sense of community takes more of an edge off while going to college. Baptiste said having Black teachers makes Black students want to do better in class. “[You] can tell that they want you to strive and they want you to be successful regardless of the circumstance, and they’re always willing to be understanding of whatever you’re going through,” Baptiste said.

Baptiste said professors at HBCUs have a better understanding of what you might be going through and will work with you more.

Baptiste said at PWIs it feels as though Black students have to talk to each other. Whereas at HBCUs it is more natural.

“Sometimes at PWIs it’s just like a random girl going up to you saying, ‘Yes, Queen. Oh my gosh, you look amazing,’” Baptiste said.

“And, I mean, it’s okay, but it’s kind of awkward to an extent and here it’s just like, ‘Hey, girl, I like your hair.

It looks really good.’ [...] It just feels better. It’s genuine.”

Please see EXPERIENCE | 5

Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Page 4

Amina Naliaka from Kenya, SIU Doctoral student in Environmental Resources and Policy, shares her experience about her research and future plans Wednesday, Feb. 16, 2022, at SIU in Carbondale, Ill. “My concentration is in water resources, specifically groundwater. The consumption of water is increasing at an alarming rate compared to its management. My research is basically based on social and ecological factors. I am taking different climatic data and seeing how it impacts climate change,” Naliaka said. Subash Kharel | @pics.leaks

Student Amina Naliaka awarded for her environmental research

Jamilah Lewis | @jamilahlewis

Amina Naliaka, a Southern Illinois University Carbondale (SIU) doctoral student in the Environment and Policy program, recently won a grant and received an internship for her research in groundwater sustainability and geography studies.

Naliaka is an international student from Kenya who’s been in the doctoral program at SIU since 2018.

She was recently awarded a grant from the North Central Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (NC-SARE) to fund her project focused on groundwater sustainability.

Naliaka received a summer internship for graduate students from the American Association of Geographers (AAG). The internship will consist of various virtual workshops and seminars to network with fellow geography students.

Naliaka said she found out about the NC-SARE grant by keeping track of news with newsletter subscriptions and other students’ studies.

“I came across a student’s research, and I saw that she was funded by that organization, so I got interested [and] I explored it further,” Naliaka said. “It looked like it was right up

“I look forward to expand[ing] my experience further, and working at a greater scale, and also interacting with diverse people that are seeing what everybody’s doing, and see how I can contribute, and learn from the opportunity.”

- Amina Naliaka Environment and Policy doctoral student

my alley, [and] I decided to just send in an email to inquire for more information. And after that, everything else fell into place.”

Naliaka’s project focuses on supporting groundwater sustainability in many areas hurting from the overuse of groundwater reservoirs, known as aquifers, and will be done in Nebraska, she said.

“With this heavy reliance on groundwater, obviously, that problem is set to get worse, especially with [the] increasing population that needs more agricultural products,” Naliaka said. “Through this project, I hope to provide an understanding of the groundwater system and how it interacts with groundwater users while at the same time accounting for climate change because climate change, of course, impacts water availability.”

Aquifers provide the largest portion

of fresh water in the U.S., so taking out more than people put in causes serious danger to the environment, Naliaka said.

“We have to keep track of how it’s being used, so my project is aimed at doing that,” Naliaka said. “[We’re] giving visuals using models of how different decisions made by farmers impact backwater availability.”

She’ll also use climate data to model environmental scenarios and illustrations of how groundwater is impacted, Naliaka said.

Naliaka’s groundwater sustainability study isn’t the only thing she’s passionate about with the AAG internship helping get further into the geography field.

The AAG summer internship is the first of its kind, and Naliaka will be acting in a supporting role in instructive technology and outreach, she said.

With this internship being virtual, it gives Naliaka and the people involved a more holistic expansion on their education within the internship, she said.

“I’ve taught online since we had this pandemic, but participating in the AAG internship will now expose me… to this online learning and how to facilitate it better,” Naliaka said.

“I look forward to expand[ing] my experience further, and working at a greater scale, and also interacting with diverse people that are seeing what everybody’s doing, and see how I can contribute, and learn from the opportunity.”

Naliaka said she found her passion for geography in high school.

“I got into geographic information systems during my undergrad [education], then I did a postgraduate diploma in the same,” Naliaka said.

“After that, I came to the U.S. for my

master’s and that’s when I ventured into environmental science.”

Naliaka said she found SIU while looking for programs that connected to her interest in environmental safety.

SIU’s Environmental Resources and Policy program is interdisciplinary, giving her a lot of experience from different schools like sociology and psychology.

“I owe a lot to SIU. Since I got here, I’ve grown so much, I can’t believe it.

I’m not the same person [I was when I] got here in 2018,” Naliaka said.

“I’ve expanded my experience. I’ve expanded my education. And I owe it all to the faculty and the students.”

Naliaka said she’s unsure when her time at SIU will end and it depends on her progress in her research. She said she plans to stay in the education field.

“I would like to stick to academia…

After my undergrad I taught high school for a while and then college for a short while and then that’s when I opted to advance my education,” Naliaka said. “But I love teaching [and] I thought for sure I’d love to continue.”

Staff reporter Jamilah Lewis can be reached at jlewis@dailyegyptian.com or on Twitter @jamilahlewis.

Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Page 5

Black women working to make change in Carbondale

Carolyn Dickte Janiyah Gaston carolynd@dailyegyptian.com jgaston@dailyegyptian.com

Black women in Carbondale are coming up with ideas to make Carbondale a better community by being a part of groups like Women for Change and running for the city council.

According to the United States Census Bureau Carbondale’s population in 2021 was 24,408. About 61.55% of the population is White and 26.93% of the population is Black.

While Carbondale prides itself on being diverse, only two of Carbondale’s six council members are Black.

Councilwoman Ginger Rye-Sanders is one of the two Black women council members on city council. Rye-Sanders said after a shooting

near her house, she decided she needed to do something to better her community.

She said she saw two Black men lose their lives to gun violence and her grandson being near that situation made her decide to form Women for Change. Women for Change is an organization dedicated to helping the Carbondale community and its citizens through various programs.

Rye-Sanders said while Women for Change does host a lot of programs for the community, such as gardening, entrepreneurship, and sewing to help give back, she decided she could help even more by being on the city council.

“I’m here now on city council and to represent all, because after all, people [need to know] what’s going on in their lives, and I’m here to listen to them and to do what I

can for all the people in Carbondale,” RyeSanders said.

Councilwoman Carolin Harvey said she has lived in Carbondale since 1971 and ran for city council in 2010. In order to get on the city council, there have to be enough people who are willing to sign a petition for someone to run, she said.

“We do what’s best for all of the citizens of Carbondale, but […]one thing that I think that my presence has done is make people more aware of the need for more minority representation and that looking at things through a different lens,” Harvey said.

Harvey said Black History Month is a time to look back on all the accomplishments Black men and women have made throughout time.

“I like to do some focus on Black history during the month of February. But it’s every

day. Black people are doing extraordinary things every day of the year, and those who have come before us should be remembered every day of the year, not just from one particular month out of the year.” Harvey said.

Harvey said Black History Month should not just be limited to one month. Black history should be celebrated all year round.

“We cry at things that happen, and you wonder why it happens, but it’s a lifestyle and so, once we can get the understanding that we are making changes to black history, by the life that we live, and the love that we give to one another,” Rye-Sanders said.

various expressions of Blackness. That’s important. It’s important for students to know that they can talk about whatever is going on in their classes. They can just be. There’s no false pretenses, there’s no one judging them. There’s no one seeking anything but let’s just celebrate them for who they are,” McKinzie said.

McKinzie said giving students a space to be themselves will allow them to thrive and feel like they do not have to hide who they are.

McKinzie said the center offers workshops

on self advocacy for Black students. Self advocacy is important because as students come to campus it takes some time to figure out exactly what their wants and needs are and how to use the correct language to ask for them to be met she said.

McKinzie encourages Black students to be vocal and advocate for what they need on their campus.

“We always are looking for volunteers to help out with some of the events that we

promote. I also like to get feedback from students,” McKinzie said. “Is there some programming or certain things that students want to see? I let them know hey, just let me know and let’s find out what we need to do to get it going.”

Staff reporter Carolyn Dickte and assistant to the editor Janiyah Gaston can be reached at carolynd@dailyegyptian.com and jgaston@ dailyegyptian.com.

Experience3 continued from

Evans said having this easy access to people who know what to do with your hair or any other needs you might have is comforting.

McKinzie said the Black Resource Center wants to meet the needs of Black students on the SIU campus. The resource center offers Black students help with renting textbooks, finding scholarships and encouraging them to embrace themselves and their culture.

“We provide that space right at the Black Resource Center [where] we celebrate the

Assistant to the Editor Janiyah Gaston and Editor in Chief Oreoluwa Ojewuyi can be reached at jgaston@dailyegyptian.com and oojewuyi@dailyegyptian.com.

2022 HIRAM H. LESAR DISTINGUISHED LECTURE

Jerry Hawkins

Executive Director of Dallas Truth, Racial Healing & Transformation (DTRHT) Truth and Transformation in Southern Illinois, South Africa, Chicago and Dallas: Narrative Change Work as a Foundation for the Future Jerry Hawkins is the Executive Director of DTRHT, part of a national 14-place initiative by The W.K. Kellogg Foundation. Jerry is also a co-founder of The Imagining Freedom Institute, a national research-based leadership group that helps organizations and institutions understand the historical context to contemporary issues of place, race and racism. Jerry is a current 2020-21 Presidential Leadership Scholar. Jerry is a current 2020-21 Presidential Leadership Scholar and SIU alumnus.

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 16

Reception: 4:30 p.m. • Formal Lounge Lecture: 5 p.m. • School of Law Auditorium Masks are required to attend this lecture.

Page 6

Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Black skepticism and medicine throughout history Dominique Martinez-Powell dmartinez-powell@dailyegyptian.com

This shield of skepticism has proven to be an effective method of protection against exploitative systems. The long history of medical exploitation of Black bodies has created a type of cynicism that unintentionally can be harmful to the health of the Black community.

Black skepticism is a tool older generation of Black Americans employed to protect themselves and their progeny long before the harsh realities of the Jim Crow era and continues into the modern era.

Throughout the early 1900s and last 1960s, there was a policy of forced sterilizations among POC women due to the significant implementation of eugenic legislation in the US. Many people in the Black Community can also recall the history of the Tuskegee Experiments, originally called the “Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male” that occurred during the years of 1932 and 1972. The Tuskegee experiments were conducted by the United States Public Health Service (USPHS) and the goal was to observe the progression of syphilis in Black men. The individuals involved believed they were receiving treatment when they were receiving none at all. When penicillin was discovered to be a safe treatment for syphilis they neglected to give it to the Black men in order to continue the experiment.

Even now the Black community holds the memory of similar events against their chest as a reminder of what possible dangers hide within the practices of medicine, both young and old.

Dr. Marie-Ange Sainvilus is a Black Obstetrics & Gynecology (OB-GYN) specialist in Marion, Illinois. Sainvilus is an SIU School of Medicine alumnus that started her residency in 1997 and she has been working in OB-GYN ever since.

Much of the current practice of gynecology is built upon experimentation on enslaved Black women. This history and the continued medical racism and malpractice Black people continually face has built a mistrust between the Black community and medical healthcare.

Black women seeking treatment in gynecology are constantly faced with the issue of not having their care taken seriously. Sainvilus said many of these women lose their lives before or in childbirth due to a lack of proper care.

“The most common thing right now that is happening is the maternal mortality rate due to [preeclampsia, or] pregnancy-induced hypertension,” Sainvilus said. “There are a lot of women who have preeclampsia and it is not either recognized or treated properly.”

Sainvilus said she has some personal experience of a doctor ignoring signs of preeclampsia with her niece who was going through her first pregnancy with twins at age of 39. Everything was going fine with her pregnancy.

Seth Martin | @seth.mart

“I’ve spent a great deal of my life as an administrator in medicine, especially medical education, trying to increase the numbers of physicians from groups that are underrepresented in medicine.”

- Dr. Wesley Robinson-McNeese SIU System Executive Director for Diversity Initiatives at the School of Medicine

At around 36 weeks of pregnancy, her blood pressure shot up and she had to go into the hospital to be monitored.

“If [Sainvilus’ niece] did not have an advocate and if the perinatologist did not supersede and intervene […] her blood pressure would have kept going up and either her or the babies or both might have been dead,” said Sainvilus.

Sainvilus told her niece she was sure she wouldn’t be going home that night. However, when her niece’s gynecologist came in they said that her niece would be sent home that day and induced for labor four to five days later.

Luckily a perinatologist, someone who specializes in high-risk pregnancies, caught the issue and advocated for

Sainvilus’ niece to be induced that day.

Sainvilus does what she can to correct any misinformation both with her patients and within her personal life. When she heard some of the beliefs some of her daughter’s friends had regarding birth control and other women’s reproductive topics, she created a zoom call in order for her to be able to converse with all of them and talk through some of the misinformation.

“I get calls a lot from different people. My children will say ‘My friend has a problem. Can she call you?’ and before I say anything, the phone is ringing and I am amazed at the misinformation that is out

there, especially when it comes to contraception,” said Sainvilus.

Another modern version of Black skepticism can be seen when the COVID-19 vaccine came out. Many news outlets insinuated that minority populations would be prioritized and the reactions were mixed but there were a few reactions that stood out from the Black community.

One of the reasons that people from the Black community were hesitant about receiving the vaccine was they were afraid to be experimented on.

Many people think the research is too underdeveloped and that the vaccine was created too soon despite past research on other similar coronaviruses

like Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS).

Dr. Wesley Robinson-McNeese, an SIU School of Medicine alumni and SIU System Executive Director for Diversity Initiatives at the School of Medicine said he would not be surprised to see a lot of Black individuals and people of color who felt skeptical of the vaccine during the first rollout out due to the perception of it being experimental by many.

“I think [the history between black people and medicine] effects patients or potential patients negatively even today because when you have this memory [it] gives you a little bit of hesitation about entering a system where you know the system has harmed people in the process of delivering or not delivering medical care until that makes you hold back a little bit,” Robinson-McNeese said.

Some like Robinson-McNeese and Sainvilus believe that having more Black doctors in the medical field may help the situations many Black individuals may face when receiving healthcare.

“I’ve spent a great deal of my life as an administrator in medicine, especially medical education, trying to increase the numbers of physicians from groups that are underrepresented in medicine [...] because when we have physicians, who look more like their patients or are coming from backgrounds that their patients have, then patients are more likely to go to see physicians and respond positively to what they are told,” RobinsonMcNeese said.

Other Black community leaders including Linda Flowers, a retired educator and current president of the Carbondale NAACP chapter, think it might be helpful but having more Black doctors won’t eliminate the skepticism or continued mistreatment facing the Black community today.

“I think part of it probably has to do with the position that Black people find themselves in from hundreds of years of being shut out of the economic, social and all of that. Some people have life struggles, putting food on the table, paying the rent, sometimes they are neglecting their health, so there is some skepticism justly so, but then there are some other factors that probably play into it as well,” Flowers said.

A healthy sense of skepticism is good to maintain when discussing medical questions and concerns, Robinson-McNeese said.

“I think that there should be an inquiry and patients should be prepared to inquire of their doctor.

‘What is this, why is this? When is this? How will it help me?’ Just all kinds of questions, the same kind of questions that you might ask if you were buying something in the store or getting your car,” Robinson-McNeese said.

Staff Photographer Dominique Martinez-Powell can be reached at dmartinez-powell@dailyegyptian.com.

Page 7

Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Black Affairs Council’s first Ebony Ball to highlight black students

Jamilah Lewis | @jamilahlewis

Southern Illinois University’s (SIU) Black Affairs Council (BAC) will be hosting its first annual Ebony Ball on March 19 in the Garden Grove Event Center at 7:30 pm.

According to the flyer provided by the BAC on Twitter, the event will have a Black Tie dress code and will include dinner, a DJ, a 360 photo booth, a red carpet, a best-dressed

competition and a Mr. and Miss BAC competition.

BAC’s public relations chair Mackenzie Gaines said the RSO has been planning this ball since October to have something for Black students during Black History Month.

“It’s been a vision for BAC for a while, and we just wanted to give [the] opportunity for it to end off Black History Month on a really good

note,” Gaines said. “That was the main reason why we [planned]it, just to have something else for students to do and to look forward to each and every year.”

Mr. and Miss BAC is something the RSO has been advertising for a while now, the winners of which will become representatives for BAC, Gaines said.

“So, when people would like to [or]

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want to know more about BAC they have that person to look towards,” Mackenzie said. “That’s what [it] will be, just leaders on campus... that people can turn to if they have any questions regarding BAC.” Mackenzie said Mr. and Miss BAC will give Black students the chance to showcase their leadership around campus.

Safety precautions including metal

detectors and negative COVID-19 tests from the last 72 hours will be in place at the event.

More information can be found on the BAC’s Instagram, Twitter, or by contacting them at BlackAffairsCounil@siu.edu.

Staff reporter Jamilah Lewis can be reached at jlewis@dailyegyptian.com or on Twitter @jamilahlewis.

Page 8

Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Black cooks bring a taste of family flare to the SIU community

Kamaria Harmon | @QuoteKamariaa

Southern Illinois University (SIU) students, encouraged by their friends ,have made their own businesses by showing off their skills in the kitchen.

From Chicago-style food to Caribbean, students cooking for their peers and members of the community have brought a sense of home to Carbondale.

Kevon Williams, a fourth year student majoring in Marketing, is the owner and chef of Ke’s Kitchen.

Williams said he has been cooking since he arrived at SIU when his friends and the Carbondale community encouraged him to start selling plates.

“People always [told] me, ‘you should start getting more people to taste your food.’ I was inspired to go ahead and start doing it,” Williams said. “The first few days I opened up I served 70 plus people, now it’s just getting all over the community.”

Williams said Ke’s Kitchen specializes in the experience, not just the food, which leaves customers coming back.

“It’s the whole experience from the taste, the customer service, to your food being prepared,” Williams said.

“Everything is made fresh. We bring the gourmet experience to the locals.”

Williams said he started cooking at six years old. He and his father had planned to open a restaurant together in the future.

“We originally had a plan of opening up a restaurant,” he said. “[My father] was supposed to be the cook, and I was supposed to handle the business analytics and all that stuff. I started cooking and falling back in love with it.”

His passion for cooking drove him to start his own restaurant. The feedback he gets from the community and people close to him motivate him to keep going.

“My girlfriend ended up investing in me [and] buying all the equipment.

Since I have everything now, I do what’s best,” he said. “The people love it and they crave it everyday, so I can’t stop.”

Williams said the best way to reach him is through his phone number or snapchat.

“I try to cook Friday through Sunday, the food is usually ready around 4 p.m. and I cook until 4 a.m.,” he said. “I promote through snapchat… I was handing out flyers and everything.”

Williams said he does deliver and has clientele in Marion, Herrin and Murphysboro.

Williams said he plans to bring a restaurant to Carbondale in the future featuring Chicago-style food.

“The Chicago style food I [was] used to growing up, I’m going to bring it out here,” he said. “[It’s] another connection I have with my customers, the ones from Chicago.”

Williams said he is appreciative of his customers and is confident in his work in the kitchen. He said he offers full refunds to customers who don’t enjoy their food.

“I thank everybody for supporting [me], I really am blessed to just have this business. The support from everybody is really overwhelming,” he said.

Williams said his business has been positive from the start and looks forward

Caribbean Hut Food Truck waits for customers for lunch on Friday, Feb. 18, 2022, at the Staples parking in Carbondale, Ill. Monica Sharma | @mscli_cks

to continuing cooking for the Southern Illinois community.

Jailon Welch, a second year student majoring in Business and Marketing and SIU football player, owns a small food business in Carbondale called Food Correct. He and his business partner, sophomore Lia Khan, started the business together. She does all the analytics and outreach while Welch does the cooking.

“She does a lot of things [like] making the fliers, advertising, and going to the store, and getting everything we need,” Welch said. “She helps me prep in the kitchen; she does a lot behind the scenes.”

Welch said he started cooking when he was a preteen. He said his parents taught him when he went to his family owned Lo Lo’s, a soul-food restaurant in Grand Rapids, Michigan. They now own a popular restaurant in Chicago called The Licking.

“I’ve been cooking since about twelve, just cooking because my parents taught me,” Welch said.

Welch said he started selling plates last year in his dorm, because his friend encouraged him to.

“My friend Jeff one day was sitting and was eating. He was like ‘bro this [is] good, you should start selling food,’” Welch said. “Once a couple of people tried my food, that’s when I started selling plates.”

Food Correct specializes in their wings, and they’re a fan favorite. Wings come with fries or chips, a dessert and a drink of choice. Welch does deliver, but there is a small fee, he said.

Welch said he prefers to be reached through his snapchat or instagram, where he also promotes new menu options. He said he has future plans for Food Correct which involves owning his own restaurant.

“I plan on opening up my own restaurant one day. Right now I’m

working hard and staying diligent in my schoolwork and staying diligent on the football field,” Welch said.

Calvin Francis, a teammate of Welch’s, has a bachelor’s degree in Business Management and Marketing and is currently working toward his master’s in Finance. He owns Big Cal’s Caribbean Kitchen.

Francis said he learned to cook early from his parents cooking back at home.

“I used to always cook when I was back home; I learned early growing up watching my dad and my mom,” he said. “It was just second nature.”

Francis is from the Turks and Caicos Islands, and it’s why he specializes in Caribbean food. He said his teammates encouraged him to start selling plates after cooking for them.

“I’m from the Caribbean, and I

came out here to play football,” he said. “There was no Caribbean food out here, nothing that reminded me of home. I made curry chicken, rice and peas with sweet plantain. All my teammates used to eat all my food and told me ‘you need to start selling plates.’”

Francis started advertising his food on social media while his peers spread his business by word of mouth.

Eventually he began to receive a large clientele.

Francis said, if time permits, in the future he wants to own a food truck, but his dream is to go to the National Football League (NFL).

“Probably one of these [days I’ll] get a food truck, I don’t know,” he said. “I [have] bigger dreams, I want to go to the NFL, if not I want to work with investments. I don’t see it as a dream

to have a big restaurant. This is just something I do.”

Francis said he only accepts pick-ups and primarily cooks on the weekends.

He said the best way to reach him is through snapchat.

“I’m serving good quality food and certainly not anything [of] bad quality.

When it warms up I’m going to be getting on the grill more doing jerk chicken, maybe some ‘Rasta Pasta.’ I’ll keep y’all posted,” Francis said.

For more details about upcoming menu items and meals, these Black cooks are best reached through snapchat. Ke’s Kitchen- @kevon_ doe.

Food Correct- @welchjay20023. Big Cal’s Caribbean Kitchen- @calvin_57.

Staff reporter Kamaria Harmon can be reached at kharmon@dailyegyptian.com or on Twitter at @QuoteKamariaa.

Freeman Johnson sells food at Caribbean Hut on Friday, Feb. 18, 2022, out of the Staples parking in Carbondale, Ill. Freeman has been running his food truck business since 2017. “I am originally from the Bahamas and moved to Carbondale. Caribbean food is new to this area, and it’s something that has taken off.

We have different seafood and Caribbean spices. Jerk chicken, jerk pork are very popular in Jamaica. Most of the people come around 11a.m. to 2p.m. People usually from 25 to 40 middle-aged people come to eat our dish. We feel really good, and I am very satisfied with my job,” Johnson said. Monica Sharma | @mscli_cks

Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Page 9

Black Law Student Association and Project Human X celebrate

Janiyah Gaston | @DEJaniyah

On Saturday Feb 19 from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m., Project Human X hosted a paint night at the Southern Illinois (SIU) University Law school Library in honor of Henrietta Lacks. She was an African American woman who died from cervical cancer, and doctors took her cells and used them to help further medical advances in the 50s. Attendees painted a tree shaped into a DNA strand to represent Lacks’ DNA and how it how it made many advancements in the medical field.

Before the painting started, Tiara McKeithan, a first year law student at SIU, announced that the proceeds from the night’s event would go to the Boys and Girls Club of Southern Illinois and help form a scholarship fund for BLSA. The painting was a tree in the shape of a DNA strand to represent how Henrietta Lacks’ cells changed the medical field.

Gloria Lewis, a first year law student and a member of the BLSA (Black Law Students Association), said they are hosting this event to bring light to the Henrietta Lacks case.

“The polio vaccine was invented because of her cells. The Human Genome Project was actually started because of Henrietta Lacks’ cells, so doctors were actually taking her genetic makeup and publishing that for the general public,” Lewis said.

Lewis said doctors made millions of dollars off of using Lacks cells to help further advance areas of the medical field. Doctors did not ask permission from the family of Lacks to use her cells or compensate them for the medical advancements Lacks’ cells created.

Lewis said cases like Lacks’ are becoming more prevalent in the medical field when it comes to physicians treating Black people.

The mortality rates for Black women giving childbirth are ridiculous we’re almost three or four times more likely to die in childbirth than women of other races,” Lewis said.

Lewis said Black women specifically have been mistreated and used throughout history when it comes to medical procedures. She said the Black community specifically Black women are often given the short end of the stick when it comes to medical health.

Marquez Scoggin, the co-founder of Project Human X, said they partnered with BLSA because they wanted to show what Henrietta Lacks’ legacy means through art.

“The tree in relation to her family.

That’s the symbolism that I have with this canvas, and then the background is black, and this is lack symbolic of the fact that this is a Black woman, that we’re talking about her DNA and there’s a galaxy background, which it just adds an element of beauty to it and really,”

Mariah Hendrickson paints a picture of a tree in the form of a DNA strand at the Project Human X paint night Feb. 19, 2022 in Carbondale, Ill. Janiyah Gaston | @janiyah_reports

Scoggin said.

Scoggin said he hopes the painting embodies how Henrietta Lacks helped create many of the medical strides we see in today’s society.

Scoggin said the doctors who took Lacks’ cells should have asked for consent first instead of taking her DNA. “I think that we have to respect each other’s bodies. I think that it’s fundamental when it comes to human rights, when it comes to human decency, when it comes to humanity, so I think that we should not do anything with someone else’s body without their

consent,” Scoggin said.

Scoggin said respecting one another’s bodies should always come first no matter what the case may be.

Shaniyah Williams, a member of Project Human X, said this event will help shed light on how it was not okay for Lack’s or her family to be taken advantage of in that way.

Williams said staying aware about situations like Lacks will keep the Black community remain aware if doctors try to take advantage of them.

Williams said practices where certain parts of people are being stolen without

their permission will result in people not wanting to go to hospitals. This practice causes Black people to have distrust in hospitals.

“I think that art is one of the greatest ways to shine light on the challenges that humanity is facing. So I’m very thankful to be using art in this manner, and I’m excited to see what else Project Human X can do with art in the future to empower humanity,” Scoggin said.

Assistant to the Editor Janiyah Gaston can be reached at jgaston@dailyegyptian. com or on Twitter @DEJaniyah.

CENTRALIA

POLICE DEPARTMENT

The Board of Fire and Police Commissioners of the City of Centralia, Illinois announces testing to establish an eligibility register for the Centralia Police Department.

Applications may be picked up at the Centralia Police Dept, 222 South Poplar, between the hours of 7:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. Monday thru Friday beginning Monday, January 10, 2022. All applications must be returned to the same location no later than Thursday, February 24, 2022 at 4:30pm.

Application packets may be downloaded online at www.cityofcentralia. org. All forms must be printed and returned by the Thursday, February 24, 2022 at 4:30pm deadline. No online submissions will be accepted.

A mandatory orientation meeting, physical ability test, and written test will be held starting at 1:00pm at the Centralia High School football field on Saturday, February 26, 2022. You will be advised of the time and location of the written test at that time.

Applicants must be 20-34 years of age at the time of testing, unless • • •

You provide proof of employment as a constituted police officer in Illinois or any other state Proof of employment as an auxiliary police officer for a minmum of 5 years and are under 40 years of age.

Age requirements may be extended for candidates with prior military service.

Applicant must be a high school graduate, or have a GED equivalent, and be a U.S. Citizen. Additional restrictions will be discussed at the orientation meeting.

APPLY TODAY AT

WWW.CITYOFCENTRALIA.ORG

Page 10

Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Black pioneer athletes remembered for legacies beyond their sport Brandyn Wilcoxen @Brandyn_2020

Centralia native Harvey Welch came to Carbondale in 1951 to attend Southern Illinois University on a basketball scholarship. Though SIU was integrated, the surrounding town’s policy of excluding Black people from most aspects of public life was both familiar and isolating.

“The only place Black folks could eat was a little cafe in the old train station,” Welch said in a 1997 interview with The Daily Egyptian. “Everything else was closed or not open to Black people. That was kind of lonesome because I didn’t have anybody to relate to.”

Welch grew up in Centralia, which was also mostly segregated. It had several White grade schools and one Black grade school; all of which fed into one integrated high school. He said in a 2018 interview with The Southern Illinoisan that he learned early on that the prejudices of others would serve as a roadblock throughout his life.

“You will be in classes where you will not get what you earned,” Welch said, recalling what he had been told.

After high school, Welch attended Centralia Township Junior College (now Kaskaskia College), where his basketball talents impressed then-SIU head coach Lynn Holder enough to earn him a scholarship. Four years after Jackie Robinson broke baseball’s color barrier, Welch became the first Black man to earn a varsity letter in basketball at SIU. Welch said he remembered the men’s basketball team being a welcoming environment.

“I felt like the teammates, they were all White, accepted me as what I was… they accepted my contributions and participation,” Welch said in 2018.

It was not the same story when it came to dealing with fans. One day, during warmups before a game against Southeast Missouri State, a ball got away from him and into the hands of a boy in the crowd.

When he went to retrieve it, the boy threw the ball as hard as he could at his face.

Welch was an All-Conference selection in 1954, leading the Salukis in scoring that year, and remains in the top 20 in Saluki history in career rebounds per game. Welch was inducted into the Saluki Hall of Fame in 1986.

For all of his success on the basketball court, Welch said he credited his time at SIU more for the opportunities it gave him later in life.

After his time in Carbondale, Welch had a distinguished career in the U.S. Air Force, where he was one of the first three Blacks to rise to the rank of colonel. He retired from the Air Force in 1975, and became the Dean of Student Life at SIU. “This little Black boy from Centralia was in charge of the vast majority of what went on at this school,” Welch said in 2018. “That’s a hell of an achievement.”

In 2019, Welch died at the age of 86. A day later, SIU lost another trailblazer, Seymour Bryson, 81.

Bryson was not far behind Welch, joining the Saluki men’s basketball team in 1955. By the time his career was done, he had shattered the all-time scoring record with 1,529 and still remains 10th in school history. His 1,244 career rebounds remains the SIU record.

However, Bryson, a Saluki Hall of Famer Class of 1979, said he had always hoped that his career would be remembered beyond what he did on the court.

“I’ve helped bring at least $50 million in external grants to this University. I’m one of three AfricanAmericans to progress from assistant professor to full professor here, the first African-American to serve as associate dean of a college and the second of three African-American deans on this campus,” Bryson said in 2008 when announcing his retirement.

What began as a scholarship opportunity to play basketball for the Salukis became an administrative career as the Quincy native eventually worked his way to a Ph.D, and ascended to Vice Chancellor.

He also served as the university’s affirmative action officer, among several other positions.

On the weekend of their deaths, former SIU President and U.S. Congressman Glenn Poshard spoke of Bryson and Welch’s unparalleled contributions to Southern Illinois.

“When you look at the broad history of our university, these are two of the giants, reaching all the way to Dr. (Delyte) Morris and throughout our modern day history. They were two people in the middle of helping build this university,” Poshard said in a 2019 interview with The Southern Illinoisan.

“They were part of that group effort that helped take SIU from a small teachers college to a large research university.”

Harold Bardo, a former teammate of Bryson’s on the 1959 men’s basketball team, recognizes the importance of sharing SIU’s history of Black athletes.

He has always gone out of his way to recognize Welch and Bryson, who paved the way for his own opportunity to play basketball in Carbondale.

“Both [Bryson and Welch] lived and worked at a time of opportunity for African-Americans, and both took advantage of it,” Bardo said in a 2019 interview with The Southern Illinoisan. “Both were always trailblazers for African-Americans on this campus and in this community. So students would look to them as someone who looked like them and wanted them to succeed.”

Bardo’s path to Carbondale was somewhat unique from the other Black Salukis of his day.

He came from an integrated high school in Sparta, and in 1957 was used to sharing classes with White students. There was still the typical prejudice that most Black Americans experienced, but the lives of those in Sparta weren’t that different from their White neighbors.

“Everybody was one class in that community,” Bardo said in 2003. “If your parents worked, they all worked at the same place basically.”

He remembered his time at SIU being positive but still recognized there were problems both on campus and in the community.

“While things were good when I was here, things have never been perfect,” Bardo said in a 2018 interview with The Southern Illinoisan. “It’s an ongoing process. It hasn’t gotten there and it probably won’t get there in my lifetime.”

While he was considered a solid athlete on both the basketball and track teams, most of Bardo’s success came after his playing career was over.

As multi-time interim athletic director, most recently in 2018, Bardo was the faculty representative to the university’s athletic program for 15 years. He directed the School of Medicine’s MEDPREP program from 1984 to 1999 and from 2001 until his retirement in 2015. In 2016, Bardo was inducted into the Saluki Hall of Fame.

In a 2016 address to the Saluki football team, Bardo spoke of how athletics allows players to be leaders on their team and in their community regardless of their background. He said his entire life has revolved around the university.

Salukis weren’t just breaking barriers in basketball.

While Bryson was in the midst of his all-time great career on the court, another Black man was trailblazing on the football field.

In 1956, Bill Norwood became the first Black quarterback in Saluki history. Coming from segregated Centralia, Norwood grew up without indoor plumbing. He said his ascension to a pioneer in multiple fields is not credited to any special talent, but simply working hard at his craft.

“The first thing my parents told me was you had to be twice as good to get half as far, and that kind of

stuck with me,” Norwood said in a 2019 interview with ABC 7 Chicago.

The quarterback was long held as a premium position, almost exclusively given to White players.

At the time Norwood joined the team, there had only been five Black quarterbacks in NFL history, three of whom debuted in the previous five years.

After a college stint that earned him AllConference honors in 1958, Norwood, like Welch before him, joined the Air Force. He was one of the first Black Americans to fly the B-52 bomber. Six years later, he left the military to become the first Black pilot for United Airlines.

“Not everyone in the industry wanted to see African Americans as pilots,” Norwood said in a 2019 appearance for the Tuskegee Next program.

“So I made sure that I was very good.”

Norwood’s career at United lasted for 31 years.

During that time, he also became its first Black captain. After his retirement, his name was painted on the side of a United Airlines Boeing 727 aircraft, the plane he flew, which now hangs in the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry.

“Whenever you’re the first, first of your gender or first of your race, it puts a little bit more pressure on the professional job you perform,” Norwood said in a 2015 interview with The Daily Egyptian.

Norwood was inducted into the Saluki Hall of Fame in 1993, shortly before his retirement from United. He now lives in Mesa, Ariz. and, at age 86, is a member of the Archer-Ragsdale Chapter

of the Tuskegee Airmen.

“Bill’s imprint has been left here in a number of ways,” Bardo said in a 2015 interview with The Daily Egyptian. “He was an original in terms of being a Black quarterback.”

Much of the narrative of race relations in America in the mid-twentieth century focuses on the Southern United States. Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and the Carolinas are all the center of attention when discussing the social climate of the time. Meanwhile, in southern Illinois, things weren’t much different.

The region shares many similarities culturally with the South, including, at the time, segregated neighborhoods and schools. Many Black athletes would have to attend Historically Black Colleges and Universities in order to play college sports, and Black students would frequently face discrimination if they were allowed into the building at all.

These trailblazers came in during a transformative time in American history. While Jackie Robinson is hailed for his breaking of baseball’s color barrier, Welch had a similar impact in southern Illinois.

“In each community there was a Jackie Robinson,” Bryson said, referring to Welch, in a 1997 interview for The Daily Egyptian. “Not all were able to reach the level he reached, but what Jackie Robinson did was open doors.”

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Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Page 11

Our Voices Poetry Slam

Kamaria Harmon | @QuoteKamariaa

Black voices and Black culture were highlighted as Southern Illinois University (SIU) fraternity Omega Delta Phi Beta Upsilon Chapter hosted the Our Voices Poetry Slam on Feb. 16 at 5 p.m. in the Student Center auditorium.

The fraternity’s academic chair, Daniel Killins, a senior majoring in Music Business said the purpose of the event was to get people out and hear some poetry.

“We didn’t want to have anything too complicated, we also [knew] we could get people to sign up and come out,” he said. “Songwriting is basically poetry. When you sing something, you sing about how you feel, because that can take you wherever.”

Killins said he wanted people to express their art through words.

Killins said he hoped the takeaway for this event was informing people about culture and being open to other cultures.

“I wanted the audience to learn about Blackness [and stay] informed. Learn about other people’s culture.” Killins said.

“Don’t assume that people who don’t look like you and me don’t know about our culture.”

Killins said there are people who don’t live by stereotypes and actually involve themselves with the history of black culture.

“People know. Some people do actually take the time to study us, for us. Not just the stereotypes of us.” he said.

Killins said he hopes to go back to school and study more history of Black culture.

“I’ll probably go back to school and study our history,” he said.

“Maybe it’ll be African Studies or sociology, I want to learn because it’s not just about us, it is about other people too.”

Cristina Castillo is the Coordinator for the Hispanic and Latinos Resource Center. Castillo recited a poem, Langston Hughes Let America Be America Again.

Thomas Boyd, the president of Omega Delta Phi shared a recitation of Gwendolyn Brooks “Primer for Blacks.” He said he chose the poem because it is essential for young Black people to accept being Black.

“It’s a poem about accepting one’s Blackness and loving his Blackness,” Boyd said. “I think it’s important for us, especially young people in a world that doesn’t like the fact that you are Black.”

“Primer for Blacks” reads, in part:

The huge, the pungent object of our prime out-ride is to Comprehend, to salute and to Love the fact that we are Black, which is our “ultimate Reality,” which is the lone ground from which our meaningful metamorphosis, from which our prosperous staccato, group or individual, can rise.

Boyd said, while growing up he was in a poetry slam which got him interested in writing poetry.

“Back in middle school, I was a part of a poetry slam and something clicked there. So I just started writing poems,” he said.

Boyd said since then he hasn’t had much time to do poetry, as it was a nice way for him to vent. He said he lost the spirit that he once had for it.

“I didn’t have enough time or creative genius to write poems,” he said. “It was a very nice outlet. I really enjoyed writing poems.”

Boyd said he enjoyed himself at the poetry slam and, although his fraternity wasn’t too keen on poems, he thought it would be a nice way to educate people during Black History Month.

KJ Fitz, a junior majoring in psychology, read a poem she

constructed about surviving in Chicago while being Black.

‘The blood of my ancestors has been diluted, Without their consent.

Their culture beaten out of them.

Mother tongues ripped from their mouths, Forcing them into quiet assimilation.

The oppressions beating down on them, Like the hot sun they were made to work under.

“My mom was really big on keeping us out of the city. She had four children, three of them being Black men. She was more worried about my third brother because he was tall and very obviously Black,” Fitz said. “She convinced him to join the military and that was hard for me because we were very close, but I understood why she didn’t want him to stay in Chicago.

That’s what inspired the poem. It was around the time when a lot of the police shootings started to happen.”

Fitz said her mom also encouraged her to start poetry because she used to do it. Fitz said her mother used to take her to performances when she was younger.

“I was like ‘okay, that’s kind of something I wanted to do,’” she said.

“I didn’t take it super seriously until about eighth grade when my teacher told me about Louder than a Bomb.”

Louder than a Bomb is the world’s biggest poetry festival for young authors. Referred to as the Olympics for poetry.

Since eighth grade Fitz has excelled in poetry. She said in high school she invested more of her time in slam poetry and ended up participating in the festival.

“I actually did make it on a Louder than a Bomb team at some point,” she said. “I’ve done open mics, I’ve done actual competitions. Poetry has kind of always been a really big thing for me. I’ve actually taken first place in three different poetry slams.”

Fitz said she suggests everyone does poetry, even if it isn’t your initial outlet.

She said it’s important for everyone to be able to get their message across.

“I highly encourage people to do poetry, like everybody starts from somewhere. The goal of poetry is not necessarily about being good, but getting a message across,” she said.

“I have used poetry to help me get through a lot of things that I’ve had going on in my life.”

Staff reporter Kamaria Harmon can be reached at kharmon@ dailyegyptian.com or on Twitter at @QuoteKamariaa.

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Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Disco drag show dominates Saluki ballroom William Box | @William17455137

The excitement that filled the ballroom of Southern Illinois University’s (SIU) Student Center was electrified with one purpose.

The crowd wanted to be dazzled.

The Saluki Rainbow Network (SRN) and the Office of Student Engagement organized the Spicy Seventies Disco Drag Show on Saturday, February 19.

“Tonight is the first drag show that we’ve had since the pandemic began,” Mika Anderson, treasurer of the SRN, said. “It’s been a storied part of our history for as long as I’ve been here. It’s sad to see such a long history stopped because of COVID.” The event was open to the public with students admitted at a discount. More than 150 members of the local community of all ages attended the show with socially distanced seating and masking policies in place.

The event consisted of 19 choreographed performances with eight performers. Lip synching, dancing and regular tips from the crowd were mainstays of each act throughout the night, beginning at 8 p.m. and ending at 10:30 p.m.

The show was emceed by Faim Lee Jewls, the drag king who performed the first act. Additional acts included elaborate and themed costumes and performances by queens Ceduxion Carrington, Idina Rimes, Blanche DuBois, Jodie Santana and Sierra Skye D’leight as well as king Will Kummings.

“It has been way too long since we’ve been here,” Jewls said. “SIU shows… it’s amazing to be able

Faim Lee Jewls performs at the Spicy Seventies Disco Drag Show Feb. 19, 2022 at the SIU Student Center in Carbondale, Ill. Dominique Martinez-Powell | @dmartinez_powell.photography

to connect with a completely different crowd than you would see normally if you’re at a bar.”

Jewls said he performed for university town audiences from as far away as Gettysburg, Pa. but loves to return to Carbondale and considers it his hometown.

“It is absolutely invigorating to come up on that stage for the very first time and look out on the crowd,” Jewls said. “The crowd is my favorite part. I don’t have to always be myself and it’s nice to get out of that mode and not be a workaholic, get on stage and enjoy myself.”

The performers have entertained together across southern Illinois and the greater tri-state area, said Rimes. She said this has allowed them to develop a bond

outside of their performances.

“We’re a family. Honestly, with me, Faim, Jodie, Blanche, […] Sierra and I went to school together,” Rimes said. “We’re not just stage family, we’re friends outside of all of this.”

She said their friendship and diverse talents make for a more interesting show.

“There’s a lot more to choose from, and I think their value is more varied,” Rimes said. “I think you have to have the dancers, you have to have the pretty faces, you have to have the singers [...] there’s always something for everybody.”

The performers are always open and accepting of the questions regarding their work and getting involved in the local drag scene, Rimes said.

“We’re here whether you see us or not,” she said. “[Do] you want to get into drag? [Do] You just want to know how it works behind the scenes? Reach out to your local drag queen and/or king or male or female performer,

whatever you’re interested in doing, and ask them in a polite and positive manner.”

It can sometimes be difficult to begin performing when they fear shame from their family, but exposing unsupportive members of the community to the scene is the best way to change their mind, Carrington said.

“I know we push for people to accept this, but you also have to be tolerant because everybody moves at a different pace,” they said. “Don’t cut somebody out because they’re not accepting of you right away. Life experiences [are] what changes people.”

Carrington said they didn’t tell their family when they began to perform five years ago, but they found out on their own and became supportive over time.

They said the first time their father saw them in drag was while responding to their home being broken into.

“I was at a show and my father was the first one to respond

because I had a home alarm,” Carrington said. “I showed up [in drag] and my dad looks me up and down and he’s like, ‘that’s my son! He does drag shows!’ at four in the morning in the hood. That was his turning point, actually seeing me in it.”

A total of 19 acts were done by the eight performers. Each act evoked applause, cheers and tips from the audience. When the end of the show came, the audience took the opportunity to get pictures and speak with some of the performers.

Priscilla Vega, a 22 year old master’s student and graduate assistant with Student Health Services, said she enjoys attending shows put on by the local drag community.

“It’s always amazing. You never know what’s going to happen,” she said. “It’s always something new and it’s fantastic; I always love coming to these.”

Vega said the atmosphere of the shows are different depending on the local venue, providing another layer of unpredictability.

“When you’re in Hangar 9, you get to see some crazy stuff,” she said. “The Varsity shows are more family [oriented], so you don’t see a lot of what you would at Hangar. Then here, at the Student Center, you see a variety because it’s still school and community combined.”

Jewls said he loves to see the support of the queer community at their shows.

“I cannot express how good it feels to see the support from the LGBTQIA+ community,” Jewls said. “All of our people coming together and bringing people that have never been to the shows [...], It’s great to see.”

News Editor William Box can be reached at wbox@dailyegyptian.com or on Twitter at @William17455137.

Jodie Santana holds cash in her hand during her performance at the Spicy Seventies Disco Drag Show Feb. 19, 2022 at the SIU Student Center in Carbondale, Ill. Dominique Martinez-Powell | @dmartinez_powell. photography

Blanche DuBois passes out glow sticks at the Spicy Seventies Disco Drag Show Feb. 19, 2022 at the SIU Student Center in Carbondale, Ill. Dominique Martinez-Powell | @dmartinez_powell.photography

Wednesday, February 23, 2022

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SIU Carbondale hosts Black and Queer Roundtable Discussion Kiersten Owens kowens@dailyegyptian.com.

A Black and Queer roundtable was held at Southern Illinois University Carbondale (SIU) on Friday evening. People from many walks of life in and around the Carbondale community came together to discuss topics regarding the Black and LGBT+ communities.

Topics included the “gay agenda”, representation and ways to support the queer community. The roundtable was conducted in light of Black History Month,;however the conversation was mostly focused on the future and how these two historically marginalized communities can rewrite the narrative and move forward.

Daniel Killins, a studentworker at the Multicultural Resource Center, came up with the idea to hold and facilitate the discussion amongst students and faculty members. Killins is Black, a member of LGBT+ community,and loves the work he does at the Resource Center.

Killins said he is glad he got the job and feels fortunate to have met various students that have attended

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the different events hosted by the Resource Center.

“What made me want to work at the Resource Center was the community aspect. I wanted to go to all the events no matter which coordinator was hosting it,” Killins said. “It has really changed me.”

Killins has worked at the Resource Center since the fall 2021 semester and organized the first LGBT+ roundtable of the school year.

Friday night’s roundtable was the second, and people who attended the first were eager to continue the conversation.

Makaila Ballah, a Zoology student at SIU, said they felt both roundtables hosted beneficial discussions that helped bring people together.

Ballah said they were 17 when they first began discovering themself and the way they wanted to identify as a person. They said they hadn’t had much exposure to the queer community until they were around that age, but it helped lead them on a journey of self-discovery.

“I feel like everyone, whether they were queer or otherwise, got something out of the conversation,”

Ballah said, “Whether it was to get something off their chest or gain a better understanding of what it’s like for those people within the community.”

One topic of discussion at Fridays roundtable was the importance of Queer representation in the media and other forms of regular social consumption.

Many speakers discussed how important it is for the youth to see themselves represented in the media they consume and the people they are around.

Representation was also discussed as being a great way to offer exposure and normality to media-consumers of a historically marginalized group such as the LGBT+ community.

However, the conversation dove deeper into the specific ways representation is displayed. Speakers shared their thoughts on how Black and LGBT+ representation done poorly can potentially leave a bad taste with those who consume it.

Representation that focuses on the trauma the communities have experienced was agreed upon by those who spoke to be a total drag.

The speakers said it is time to move on with the conversation, and not

focus entirely on the traumatic history.

The conversation concluded with speakers sharing ideas on how they could move the conversation forward and provide support for the LGBT+ community. Other ideas were discussed in regards to helping the youth who may seek representation or need someone to talk with.

Cherie Watson, the Outreach and Instruction Librarian at SIU, shared her thoughts at the discussion on the importance of access to information at libraries and how crucial it is to help underrepresented groups. Watson said issues are arising throughout the United States to ban certain books that depict same-sex relations and this is damaging to the LGBT+ community.

“We have a long tradition in libraries of believing in people’s right to information and access to materials without censorship,” Watson said. “We want our collections to represent the world as it is and provide a safe space.”

Janine Armstrong is a Graduate Assistant at SIU under the

department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality studies. She said she teaches classes where barriers are taken down, and everyone can talk comfortably about uncomfortable topics.

Armstrong said she has a specific academic focus on how identities intersect and overlap, such as being a Queer Christian of Color. She said she loved the discussion held at the Black and Queer roundtable, but did have one request.

“I wish we had more time,” said Armstrong, “The more time we have, the deeper we can go. I wanted to hear everyone talk and share something.”

Armstrong was not alone in her wish. Others shared their hopes to have longer discussion time, have more discussions in general and get more people involved regardless of their identity.

Ballah said, “I feel like it is definitely important for people that aren’t identifying with whatever conversation we’re having to still come, because they’ll learn about something new.”

to win SIU’s Outstanding Athlete award in 1953. He was inducted into the Saluki Hall of Fame in 2000.

But for all of his athletic success, Gregory is best remembered for what came after. He went on to be a comedian and a human rights activist. He was deeply involved in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960’s with close relationships to figures such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. He protested against the Vietnam War. He was arrested multiple times and frequently went on hunger strikes.

“In all that he did, his wish was to always make people around him loveable and happy and to make America live up to her promise for all of us,” author and radio talk show host E. Faye Williams wrote in her book “Dick Gregory: Wake Up and Stay Woke: Running for Life.”

Gregory died in 2017 at the age of 84.

Julius Johnson, also a St. Louis native, was the first Black gymnast at SIU. A member of the 1956 and 1957 gymnastics teams, Johnson earned his bachelor’s at SIU in political science.

After going on to earn his law degree from Howard University in 1963, Johnson worked as a public defender, law school lecturer and assistant U.S. attorney before being appointed as administrative judge for the Department of Labor in 1976. His wife, Norma, was the first Black woman appointed U.S. District Court Chief Judge. Julius died in 2010, and Norma in 2011.

SIU also featured Black athletes who went on to become professionals in their sport. One of whom was Mississippi native Carver Shannon, who was the star running back at the time Norwood joined the team. He was an All-American in 1958 and was drafted by the Los Angeles Rams in 1959. He was on the Grey Cup-winning team in 1959 and 1961 on the Winnipeg Blue Bombers of the Canadian Football League, before joining the Rams and Chicago Bears in the NFL. Shannon’s career was ended by a knee injury sustained during his time with the Bears. Afterwards, he spent some time as a line judge. He was inducted into

the Saluki Hall of Fame in 1978 and currently lives in Los Angeles at the age of 83.

Houston Antwine, also a Mississippi native, was a two-sport phenom. He earned Associated Press Little All-America honors as a football player and was runner-up in the heavyweight division of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) as a wrestler.

Antwine went on to be drafted by both the NFL’s Detroit Lions and the AFL’s Houston Oilers (now Tennessee Titans) in 1961. He signed with the American Football League, and was traded to the Boston Patriots (now New England Patriots). He was considered one of the league’s best pass rushers, becoming a six-time All-Star and AllAFL player.

Antwine was inducted into the Saluki Hall of Fame in 1979, and the Patriots Hall of Fame posthumously in 2015. He died in 2011 at the age of 72.

Southern Illinois University has a rich history of Black athletes. Beginning at

Harvey Welch’s breaking of basketball’s color barrier, continuing with Seymour Bryson shattering records and paving the way, Bill Norwood pioneering on the field and in the skies, Harold Bardo carrying on nearly a half-century of administrative work and many others who have shaped not only SIU athletics history but that of their communities and country.

Of these trailblazers, only a few are still alive: Norwood, Bardo and Shannon.

The surviving athletes have continued to spread their stories and the stories of others to anyone who will listen.

These men each took perhaps the biggest steps towards progress: the first. It is important to know and celebrate that history, and what marginalized people did to build the world that we live in today. Now, the only way left to go is forward remembering what came before us and celebrating what is to come.

Staff reporter Kiersten Owens can be reached at kowens@dailyegyptian.com.

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The landmark 1954 U.S. Supreme Court decision to desegregate schools came in the midst of the early Black Salukis’ college careers. The next decade would go down in the history books for the advancement of civil rights in America. As Black athletes brought change to Southern Illinois, America was undergoing its own march towards progress.

Sandwiched between Jackie Robinson breaking baseball’s color barrier in 1947 and the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960’s was Welch, Bryson, Bardo and Norwood. Each of them came from towns in Illinois impacted by systemic racism to varying degrees, and each of them went on to break barriers and bring change to their fields. In a pivotal point in history, these men, among several other Black student-athletes, brought Southern Illinois towards a better future.

One of those athletes was Dick Gregory, a St. Louis native who became a Saluki in 1951 on a track scholarship. He set school records in the mile and halfmile runs, and was the first Black athlete

Staff reporter Brandyn Wilcoxen can be reached at bwilcoxen@dailyegyptian.com or on Twitter at @Brandyn_2020.

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Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Question and answer with Saluki basketball great Chris Carr

Joseph Bernard | @Jojobernard2001

Black History Month is a time when people reflect on all the accomplishments Black Americans have made throughout history.

One part of this history is recognizing the accomplishments of Black athletes in sports.

There are a lot of names to go around for great athletes out of SIU and a number of them are Black.

Saluki hall-of-famer Chris Carr is one of the many great Black athletes to come out of Southern Illinois and was talented enough to continue his career in the NBA as well as Greece and Serbia in their basketball leagues.

Carr was drafted 56th overall in the second round of the 1995 NBA draft by the Phoenix Suns and was able to play with five other NBA teams across all six seasons of his career. He even managed to earn a spot in the 1997 NBA Slam Dunk Contest, where he lost to Kobe Bryant.

Currently, Carr is an assistant coach for division II Drury University, passing on his knowledge of the game.

The Daily Egyptian was able to have a chat with Chris Carr in regard to Black History Month and what it means to him as one of the most recognized Black athletes to come out of Southern. He shared his experience being able to pass on what he’s learned to the next generation of players.

Q: What does being not only one of the

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greatest Black athletes to come out of SIU but one of the greatest athletes, in general, to come out of SIU mean to you?

Carr: “It’s humbling that people recognize me as that, but I love the fact that people recognize me more for my character and how I treated people. That means equally if not more than being a great athlete. I take a lot of pride in treating people the right way.”

Q: When you were a player here back in the day, was there any type of acknowledgment about Black History Month in the locker room when you were here?

Carr: “You’re always mindful of that as an athlete and with that, you’re always conscious of being respectful of all of it. It was really cool as athletes to be able to have something to unify us as a culture but unify us as athletes as well. It was something that was talked about, but more importantly, it was more about knowing the people that paved the way for you to be where you’re at. That was a bigger thing.”

Q: What does it mean to you to pass on your perspective as a Black man to the locker room over at Drury?

Carr: “It’s amazing because we have a really diverse locker room. I’m able to relate to the players of color and give them a different perspective, but also the perspective that’s coming from the players to the staff. Being able to have the ability to communicate going in the other direction as well. It’s important

that the men and women of color in athletics not only have a voice but they also have a presence that they can communicate with someone.

Q: Is Black History Month being talked about with you guys over there at Drury?

Carr: “It’s definitely talked about over here.

We have two young men of Nigerian descent that have a little broader perspective of Black History Month because of their African heritage. We have what we know in America, but they have what they know as native Africans. That’s not only something that we hold near and dear to, but they do as well as in Africa.”

Q: What are some improvements you’d like to see in your lifetime to advance the equality of Black people in America?

Carr: “I just think the biggest thing is to continue to strive for the respect of human life. It’s the broader picture. We’re aware of issues that have arisen the last few years in terms of race relations, but I think the bigger picture is to respect people as human beings.

We’re all one race. We’re all part of something bigger in the human race and we just have to keep that in mind and be respectful of that.

Q: What have been some improvements you’ve seen in your lifetime in terms of being respected for your race?

Carr: “Coming from where I grew up, we were the only family of color. Obviously, there’s going to be some challenges. I was

blessed to have a mother to raise me to be respectful of people that are respectful of you and stay away from those that aren’t. It allowed me to have a different perspective on life collectively. I have a perspective as an athlete as well. I’ve had so many more great days than I have [had] challenging days and I hope we can continue to strive as a nation towards treating each human being in a respectful manner.”

Q: Was there a specific Black mentor you had growing up or even in your NBA career that has really stuck to you?

Carr: “I’ve had a ton of those throughout my life. Probably my mother was the one I looked to and guided me through every facet of life and made me into the man I am today. I also look towards my brothers.

They had all been down a path I was going to go through as a young man of color in the United States. A lot of people looked up to athletes and other people of that nature, but I had the best people for me to be the person I am today in front of me. Coach Herrin furthered that when I got to college and was amazing in making me a great young man. He told me that people will remember me as the person far more than they’ll remember how many points you score. I’m so thankful for all of the people that have been influential in my life.”

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Wednesday, February 23, 2022

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Athletes reflect on Black History at SIU and around the country Cole Daily | @cdaily_de

Black athletes are the face of American sports.

Take a look at NBA player LeBron James, women’s tennis player Serena Williams or NFL quarterback Patrick Mahomes.

Black athletes have meant so much to every sport, throughout history. Per league stats, Black people make up 57.5% of the National Football League along with 74.2% of the National Basketball Association. There are many prominent Black athletes in other leagues like Major League Baseball and Major League Soccer.

However, it wasn’t always this way. For players like Walt “Clyde” Frazier, an Southern Illinois university (SIU) alumnus, his team in Carbondale was considered revolutionary for featuring so many black athletes.

Sophomore guard Chris Cross said Frazier’s teams in the late 60’s and the 2007 NCAA tournament team paved the way for athletes like himself to find success at Southern Illinois University-Carbondale.

It’s not just players from the past. Black athletes are becoming 21st century superstars in U.S. media. Many are using their platform to help push community development through programs and fundraisers.

Cross said it’s crucial for all black athletes to be role models and use their platform to make social change.

“It’s very important for black athletes to have a voice because they need to use their platform to address other issues in the world,” Cross said.

Junior running back JaVon Williams said athletes like James, Serena Williams and former NBA superstar Shaquille O’Neal inspire him.

“They show the character of Black athletes through history and in our world today. They built a foundation for young Black athletes and were an inspiration to them,” Williams said.

Recently, SIU alumna Gwen Berry made headlines when she turned away from the flag during the Olympic trials, which took place in the summer of 2021. The anthem was played as she was receiving her bronze medal.

Williams said he applauds her standing up for what she believed in.

“In situations where people want to express their feelings and beliefs. I’m always for that,” Williams said.

The event sparked national controversy. Some said it was shameful, others thought it was an impressive display of courage from the former Saluki.

“From what I have come across, when people kneel or look away during the anthem they aren’t shunning the U.S. or disrespecting the military,” Freshman guard Tyranny Brown said. “It’s completely separate from that so I

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hope that people look back on that with an open mind.”

Williams said he also looks up to former Black athlete Ricky Garrett from Southern Illinois University.

“Ricky came to Carbondale and gave us a perspective on how to carry yourself, how to perform to your greatest and how to be an African-American in an impactful way,” Williams said.

Many Black athletes have succeeded at SIU. Football alumni like Jeremy Chinn (current cornerback for the Carolina Panthers) and MyCole Pruitt (current tight end for the Tennessee Titans) have also paved the way for Black athletes at Southern Illinois. Both have made millions playing in the NFL. Brown said she heard stories about former alltime points leader Caerteasha Macklin coming back and scrimmaging against the team before COVID. She said Macklin gives her hope that she can reach those heights.

“I think it’s great that some of our Black athletes are allowed to come back and give back to the community that served them,” Brown said.

“It’s definitely big for me being a freshman who is a Black athlete. I look up to Macklin who was, previously, the leading scorer.”

However, all players said there is more work to be done in communities across the U.S. to help ensure future generations of Black athletes.

“Everyday we’re growing in many aspects as a country, but I’m almost certain in saying that we have a long way to go,” Brown said.

Williams said, “As an African-American, I would love to see more opportunities given to our culture. But you can see that work being done now, and it’s not gonna happen overnight.

It’s not just about African-American’s, but about everybody being provided the same opportunities.”

“It also comes down to Black people helping each other in athletics. We need to have Black people vouching for other Black people, helping them get to where they need to be,” Cross said.

Despite the Salukis’ long line of successful Black athletes over the years, the school holds a very small number of Black head coaches across all sports.

Williams said it could be advantageous for

Southern Illinois to hire more Black coaches in the future.

“I feel that the number of African-American coaches is growing and have been given more opportunities to go out there and prove how good of a coach they really are,” Williams said.

Cross said it could even help Southern Illinois in terms of recruiting.

“I think some athletes would appreciate seeing a face similar to their own. I personally don’t see it as an issue, but I could see it swaying some college athletes,” Cross said.

Brown said, although the diversity of the coaches across sports could be questioned, the leaders Southern Illinois has put in place for the athletic department have done wonders for Black athletes.

“The coaches that we have have always been very supportive of their Black athletes and always put them in a position to succeed. I don’t see that going away anytime soon,” Brown said.

shape your understanding of the world and how it works in terms of equality and inclusion?

Carr: “Man, being in college basketball is such an accomplishment in itself and being able to progress on to play professionally in the NBA and Europe, those experiences are hard to put into words. I know that part of the reason I was able to have success at all levels was equally about the person I was as it was about the player I was. Those are things that opened up doors for me to be a coach and give back to the game and young people of the game. In my heart it was all about being the person I am and the character I carried myself with on a daily basis.”

Q: How important is it for Black children today to be able to have somebody in athletics to look up to that looks like them?

Carr: “It was good being a teammate with people like Charles Barkley and Kevin Garnett who actually didn’t feel like they were role models, even though they were highly influential. They do have an impact anyways, but people can tell the true man that you are by the way you carry yourself every day. That shows the true measure of the person you are way beyond just being a great basketball player.

Q: How can we continue Dr. King’s message of inclusion and equality today?

Carr: “Continue to repeat it all the time.

Have a voice for reason and understanding, respect, and character. All that laid the foundation for the United States to be the land of the free that it is today. All these are extremely important and we shouldn’t lose sight of the ultimate goal of living a great life without fear of another human being at the cost of skin color, how you talk, dress out of fear or lack of understanding. Addressing those things are important to continue Dr. King and all those legacies that came before us.”

Sports Reporter Cole Daily can be reached at cdaily@dailyegyptian.com or on Twitter at cdaily_de.

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Q: How did some of the previous generations of Black athletes help shape the way for you and your other Black teammates in your time?

Carr: “I don’t know if I would get an opportunity to be in the NBA if it wasn’t for guys like Bill Russell that paved the way for all minorities to have an opportunity. Similar to that, I’m not sure if I’d be at SIU if it wasn’t for Walt Frazier. There are so many that came before me that allowed guys like me to be who we became. You can’t take those things for granted and have to be mindful of that.

They allowed us to have the life we have and the brand that we are.”

Q: How did your career in basketball

Sports reporter Joseph Bernard can be reached at joseph.l.bernard@siu.edu or on twitter @ Jojobernard2001.

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