| Taking Responsibility for Race Judy Goldsmith |
9 AM |
| The campus community is invited to a free workshop “Taking Responsibility for Race” Wednesday, March 31, beginning at 9 a.m. in the Multicultural center. This workshop is being presented by human rights activist and educator Judy Goldsmith, former president of the National Organization for Women. |
| “Taking Responsibility for Race” acknowledges that the white majority in our culture needs to take a fair share of responsibility for racial issues that continue to diminish the quality of life for many, Goldsmith said. The workshop employs exploratory, rather than confrontational strategies, to examine current realities and strategies for finding common ground for our communities, homes and work places. |
| A civil rights activist before becoming involved in feminism, Goldsmith carried those ideals into her work with NOW, making them a focus of the organization's activities during her presidency (1982-1985). Those activities included co-chairing the 1983 March on Washington with Coretta Scott King and other civil rights leaders, her arrest in 1984 at the South African Embassy in protest of that nation's apartheid policies, and her longstanding and vocal advocacy for affirmative action. |
| Returning to Wisconsin after 12 years in Washington, D.C., Goldsmith served two years as special consultant to the chancellor for gender equity and affirmative action at UW-Stevens Point. There she assisted the university community in the incorporation of an increasingly diverse college population. She left Stevens Point in 1993 to take a position as campus dean at the UW Center in Fond du Lac -- a position from which she retired in July of 2002. |
| Goldsmith is a native of Wisconsin, where she knew poverty as a child in a working class home. A scholarship allowed her to attend college. She earned a bachelor's degree in English at the Wisconsin State College at Stevens Point (now UW-SP), and a master's degree at the State University of New York at Buffalo. She taught college English in New York and Wisconsin (including at the UW Center in Manitowoc) for 15 years before becoming a national officer of NOW in 1978. |
| Goldsmith now lives in Fond du Lac, and is a member of the Fond du Lac County Board of Supervisors. |
| Attend and write a two-page reaction paper and receive 5 extra credit points. |