Community Engagement Initiative

Moderator: Rita Landgraf, Director, Partnership for Healthy Communities

Speakers: Erin Knight, Associate Director, Partnership for Healthy Communities and Cassandra Codes-Johnson, Assoc. Deputy Director, Division of Public Health, Delaware Health and Social Services.

Our overall health is strongly influenced by where we live, learn, work, play and pray. It is also heavily influenced by your income level, education, and health care services. Our culture, language, political and religious beliefs, social norms and attitudes, and the rates of poverty, crime, and violence also affect our health.  Society can achieve greater health equity as its environmental, social, and economic conditions improve.

Health inequities are historically entrenched and pervasive, but they are not insurmountable. We can be most effective by transforming our collective thinking from a perspective focused on treatment of the individual, to one that focuses on prevention, health, and wellness of the broader population.  The focus of this session is to raise awareness that structural and systemic racism is the fundamental cause of health inequities, instilled in policy/resource allocations, and perpetuates health inequities.  We will highlight a call to action for all of us to make fundamental shifts in our approaches.

Moderator: Suzanne Burton, CAS Associate Dean for the Arts

"You can't help it. An artist's duty, as far as I'm concerned, is to reflect the times." ― Nina Simone

Speakers:  Theatre, Hassan Al Amin –  Music- Colin Miller,    Dance, Lynnette Overby, Visual Arts, Colette Gaiter

            A panel of University of Delaware arts and social change leaders will describe their work in a variety of art forms (theatre, dance, visual arts and music) created to promote self and societal understanding and move people to action. During their presentation they will share excerpts of their work and describe motivations and impact on audiences and participants.