The DEI Champion Spotlight features Rowan community members who are leading the way in DEI initiatives across campus. Champions featured in the spotlight serve as a great example of how DEI can be reflected throughout the campus. Meet Candice Peters, a Ph.D. candidate in Education and recent recipient of the American College Personnel Association (ACPA) Pan African Network Outstanding Student Award.

Candice Peters 

Tell us about yourself:

I am an international student from Kingston, Jamaica, and a Doctoral Candidate in the Ph.D. in Education program at Rowan University. I also work on campus, serving as the Graduate Coordinator of the Dr. Harley E. Flack Student Mentoring Program in the Office of Social Justice, Inclusion, and Conflict Resolution (SJICR). My research and scholarship, grounded in criticality, foreground the voices, wisdoms, and social realities of Black women and girls, Afro-Caribbean peoples, and other racially and ethnically marginalized populations in education. 

Recently, at the 2022 American College Personnel Association (ACPA) Annual Convention in St. Louis, Missouri, I received one of the Pan African Network Achievement Awards—the Outstanding Graduate Student Award. This award was presented to an up-and-coming student affairs professional who has demonstrated citizenship, innovation, leadership, and distinguished service to others, and whose early accomplishments have significantly contributed to the profession. Bearing this in mind, it is an honor to be the recipient of such an award; to have my efforts acknowledged by other scholar-practitioners in the field. It feels good. Also, going to Missouri to collect an award with my name on it was a big deal and a big win for me, my family, my mentors, and my friends. The work does not stop here, though. This is just the beginning. As I chart my own path in the academy, I will continue to be a disruptor of whiteness, inequities, and injustices. I will honor my roots and the communities I represent, and remain true to myself throughout the process.

Why is DEI work important?

DEI work is necessary for the survival of those of us who show up, but are often punished for how we show up. I say “survival” because DEI work helps to cultivate environments that enable historically oppressed peoples to be their whole selves without penalty. It urges us to show off the pieces of ourselves that we would usually be encouraged to shed or kill in order to maintain white standards of professionalism and being. It intentionally makes room for the bodies, voices, and cultures of those of us who have traditionally been excluded, demonized, silenced, and dismissed. Thus, DEI work is life-giving, spirit-replenishing work—nothing less. Without it, we run the risk of reinstating oppressive molds and praxes. That is not a risk any kind soul should be willing to take.

DEI Resource you would like to share: 

• https://citeasista.com/
• @FirstGenDocs