2025 Student Leadership Symposium Work and Purpose: Navigating Change and Uncertainty

The Black Cultural Center's 2025 Student Leadership Symposium will take place on Wednesday, April 16th from 9:30 am - 4:00 pm at the Black Cultural Center Gallery, located on the 2nd floor of Addams Hall (AH 207).

Through informative panels, an interactive workshop, and a film screening the Symposium invites you to explore the intersections of leadership, community service, passion, and work. Panelists and presenters will consist of UIC students, faculty and staff, and community leaders.

If you are unable to be present the whole day, feel free to attend when you are able.

Registration Link: https://uic.ca1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_9ET8wvUJwjaOpRc

Schedule:

• 9:30 am- 10:00 am: Breakfast
• 10:00 am- 11:30 am: Labors of Love: The Intersection of Passion, Purpose, & Service
  • In this session, our panelists will discuss the ways they find purpose in their work- on and off campus. They will also address the challenges young people face following their passion in a climate of uncertainty
  • Panelists: Dr. Jeremiah Abiade (College of Engineering/DuSable Scholars), Dr. David Stovall, (Departments of Black Studies & Criminology, Law, and Justice), Nia-Blessing Armstrong (Undergraduate Student, BCC Intern), and Jimmy Rodgers (Undergraduate Student)
• 11:30 am- 12:00 pm: Discovering Purpose: Unlocking Passion in Your Work
  • A transformative workshop designed to help you (re)connect with what drives you.
  • Facilitated by Rev. Larry J. Morris III of the Inclusive Collective.
• 12:00 pm- 1:15 pm: Lunch
• 1:30 pm- 2:30 pm: Film Screening: One Million Experiments 
  • One Million Experiments is a documentary exploring and showcasing community-based projects that expand our ideas about what keeps us safe. The film was produced in Chicago by Respair Production and Media, a company devoted to the development, programming, and production of independent and transformative media
• 2:45 pm - 4:00 pm Afternoon Panel: Labor in Action Empowering Communities for Change
  • In this session, panelists will discuss the meaning of community empowerment and the ways we can work for social change from wherever we are.
  • Panelists: Drake Materre (Project Coordinator at UIC-Community Outreach Intervention Projects), John West (Doctoral Student), Teri McMurtry-Chubb, J.D. (Associate Dean for Research & Faculty Development in UIC Law School), Dr. Grenita Hall (Director, UIC Healthy Living Clinic)