Judith Strathearn, Ph.D., is a lecturer in the Gender and Women’s Studies Department and an affiliate professor in the Africana Studies Department at Metropolitan State University of Denver. Her areas of expertise include black feminism, experiential pedagogy, literature of the African Diaspora and Gullah Geechee studies.
Devon Wright, Ph.D., is an associate professor in the Department of Africana Studies and the Department of Sociology at Metropolitan State University of Denver. His areas of expertise include Black social movements, conservative right-wing social movements, white-supremacist ideology and racist rhetoric in conservative right-wing media organizations and the politics of hip-hop culture. Wright currently teaches Politics and Black People, Social Movements and the Black Experience, and Black Lives Matter and COVID-19.
Prior to joining MSU Denver, Wright taught as a social-sciences instructor at Fort Lauderdale High School. Wright has been asked to speak on various topics, including the history of black social-protest movements, the Black Lives Matter Movement, white-supremacist hate groups such as the Ku Klux Klan and the segregationist Citizen’s Councils of America and hip-hop culture.
He received his doctorate in Sociology and master’s and bachelor’s degrees in History, all from Florida International University.
JaLisa Williams is an adjunct professor in the Department of Social Work at Metropolitan State University of Denver. Her areas of expertise include mindfulness interventions for race-based trauma, black generational healing, yoga, social justice and radical pedagogies.
Williams joined MSU Denver in 2019, first as an affiliate professor and taught a variety of courses in the BSSW and MSW program. Her classes taught included creative approach to change, gender and social work as well as power, privilege and oppression. Williams also served as an affiliate professor for Regis University where she developed two innovative curriculums under the Integrative Core Department.
She is the owner for Soulflower Experiences, which is a community-based mindfulness business teaching workshops, yoga and meditation classes. She also worked as a yoga therapist and counselor for The Center for Trauma and Resilience. There she provided short term counseling for individuals who have experienced crime in Denver, provided crisis intervention and client advocacy as well as presented and co-facilitated classes for the Befriending the Body yoga program.
Williams was a violence prevention program coordinator where she led, created and facilitated programing around interpersonal violence, healthy relationships, and violence against women and gender fluid individuals. Williams received her bachelor’s in kinesiology and exercise science in 2013 and her master’s in social work in 2016 from the Metropolitan State University of Denver.
Alfred Tatum, Ph.D., is a professor in the School of Education at Metropolitan State University of Denver.
Robert Preuhs, Ph.D, is a professor and chair of the Political Science Department at Metropolitan State University of Denver.
Douglas Mpondi is a professor and chair of the Department of Africana Studies at Metropolitan State University of Denver.
Katia Campbell, Ph.D., is the associate dean of the College of Letters, Arts and Sciences and former chair of the Department of Communication Studies at Metropolitan State University of Denver.
Her scholarship and teaching focuses on rhetoric, free speech, cultural representation, popular media and critical pedagogy. Campbell is also the Faculty Senate President. Outside of MSU Denver, she consults and facilitates workshops on communication and diversity, media literacy, free speech, public speaking, and dialogic ethics. After completing her doctorate, Campbell worked as a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Communication at University of Colorado Denver.
Her research areas of interest include, but are not limited to, citizenship and civic engagement, cultural diversity and communication within a U.S. cultural context and cultural studies with an emphasis on media studies. Campbell has co-authored three publications in the areas of civic engagement and social justice. Her book, “Neo-Pragmatism, Communication, and the Culture of Creative Democracy,” focuses specifically on the malleable conceptions of citizenship and civic responsibility and explicates the possible social ramifications of our modern practice of citizenship.
Campbell earned her doctorate in human communication studies from University of Denver in 2004.
Rosemarie Allen, Ed.D., is a professor of Early Childhood Education. She began teaching at MSU Denver in 2004.
Her research interests are related to addressing the disproportionate number of children of color expelled and suspended from early childhood programs and how culturally responsive teaching can more effectively address the problem. She was appointed as a Global Leader for Early Childhood in 2009 and represents the United States biannually at World Forums across the globe.
Allen has also served as director of the Colorado Department of Human Services, Division of Child Care, for five years. During her tenure, she worked with state and national leaders to create programs that became nationwide models. The Center for Social Emotional Competence (Pyramid Plus) was created, quality measures were added to early childhood rules and regulations, a statewide quality rating system for all licensed programs was initiated, early childhood guidelines aligned with Colorado Department of Education standards were developed, and the Professional Development blueprint was formed, building the foundation for Colorado to receive a 45 million dollar Race to the Top Early Childhood Challenge grant in 2011.
Allen consults with early childhood leaders on culturally responsive practices, micro-aggressions and facing personal bias and privilege. She currently serves on the National Pyramid Model Consortium team, has served on the Board of the National Association for Regulatory Agencies, the Mayor’s Commission on Early Childhood, the Early Childhood Professional Development Task Force and many governor and mayoral commissions.
