UMass Lecture Series on Police-Community Relations Coming to STCC

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. – The University of Massachusetts Amherst will bring its Feinberg Family Distinguished Lecture Series, which examines historic trends involving law enforcement in the United States, to Springfield Technical Community College on Wednesday, Oct. 26.

The UMass event, titled “Resisting Police Violence in Springfield and Beyond: Mothers, Scholars, and Queer People of Color Speak Out,” is scheduled for 7 p.m. in the Theater in Scibelli Hall (Building 2) at STCC.

The Feinberg Series, which is free and open to the public, is offered by the History Department at UMass Amherst in collaboration with more than two dozen community and university partners. According to UMass History Department chair Professor Brian Ogilvie: “Mass incarceration is one of the defining characteristics of the United States in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. This year’s Feinberg Series examines the historical processes that have led to our present state, in the hope that an understanding of the past will serve as prelude to change in the future.”

Speakers at the STCC event include:

  • Kissa Owens, the mother of Delano Walker, a Springfield teen struck and killed in traffic during a confrontation with police in 2009.
  • ShaeShae Quest, a member of BLM413 and a community organizer with Out Now.
  • Andrea Ritchie, black lesbian police misconduct attorney and organizer who has engaged in extensive research, writing, litigation, organizing and advocacy around policing of women and LGBT people of color over the past two decades. Ritchie is a Soros Justice Fellow and co-author of Say Her Name, Roadmap for Change and Queer (In)Justice.
  • Rhonda Y. Williams, a Cleveland, Ohio-based scholar-activist. She is the author of Concrete Demands: The Search for Black Power in the 20th Century and the award-winning The Politics of Public Housing: Black Women’s Struggles against Urban Inequity. She is founder and director of the Social Justice Institute at Case Western Reserve University. As one of the “Cleveland 8,” she is a voice for justice in the case of Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy who was killed by police gunfire in 2014.
  • Maria Ververis, a resident of Middletown, Conn., and mother of Michael Ververis, who reached a settlement with the Springfield Police Department regarding allegations that he was beaten and choked by police in 2011 and then falsely arrested in an attempt to cover up the police violence.

This event is part of the UMass Amherst History Department’s 2016-2017 Feinberg Family Distinguished Lecture Series, The U.S. in the Age of Mass Incarceration, and is co-hosted by Out Now, Arise for Social Justice, Project Operation Change, and the Springfield Technical Community College School of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences.

About the UMass Feinberg Family Distinguished Lecture Series

The 2016-2017 Feinberg Family Distinguished Lecture Series, The U.S. in the Age of Mass Incarceration, explores how state violence, mass incarceration and mass criminalization have transformed the U.S. economy, culture and society. More than a dozen free panels, performances, gallery exhibitions and lectures by the nation’s leading scholars, artists and activists will explore a wide range of topics, from police brutality and immigration detention, to the consequences of incarceration for women, people of color and LGBTQ individuals.  The series is presented by the UMass Amherst History Department and community partners and made possible thanks to the generosity of Kenneth R. Feinberg ’67 and associates.

About Springfield Technical Community College

Founded in 1967 and located on 35 acres of the Springfield Armory National Historic Site, STCC is a major resource for the economic vitality of Western Massachusetts. As the only technical community college in Massachusetts, STCC, an Achieving the Dream Leader College, offers a variety of career programs unequalled in the state. STCC’s highly regarded transfer programs in business, engineering, liberal arts, science and technology continue to provide the most economical options for students pursuing a four-year degree. With an annual enrollment of more than 8,700 day, evening, weekend and online students, STCC is a vibrant campus rich in diversity.

For more information about STCC, visit www.stcc.edu. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter (@S_T_C_C).

Media contact: Jim Danko, coordinator of media relations, (413) 755-4812, jdanko@stcc.edu