As the Rowan University Wellness Center, the health and wellness of our whole community is at the center of our mission. We are deeply saddened and angered by the recent deaths that have exposed yet again, the profound inequities lived every day by Black Americans. Understanding the historical contexts that have brought us here ranging from slavery, Jim Crow Laws, the Civil Rights Movement, and the countless experiences of segregation, we are with you. We are frustrated that your voices are often not heard, and your stories are often not told. The names of Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, George Floyd, and the lives of so many other Black people across the globe who have fallen victim to police brutality and other forms of violence must never be forgotten, and this conversation about equity must not end. We stand with you to keep this conversation alive. We stand in solidarity with you and we are ready to support you. Black Lives do matter!

We pledge to uphold our mission and promise to celebrate and support diversity. We are greatly concerned for the well-being of our community members experiencing race-based trauma, be it current, historical, and/or cross-generational. We realize the need for our community to process all feelings arising from the social injustices that have been exposed. We are aware that those of us who hold white privilege need to explore and understand our own unconscious biases and educate ourselves about health disparities arising from systemic barriers to health care and access to resources in our Black communities. As a Wellness Center, we work for health equity. The only way for us to rise is together.

The trauma of the killings of our Black community members, as well as the disproportionate suffering from COVID-19 pandemic, has had a profound impact on the well-being of this community. We are committed to engaging in dialogue about racial inequities, health disparities, and generational trauma. As a society, as a Wellness Center, and as a University, we cannot fail in this. We stand against racism in all its visible and hidden forms, and pledge to expose and call out discrimination, unconscious biases, and microaggressions in our daily interactions. We will hold others accountable just as we will hold ourselves accountable. As the Wellness Center continues to strive for racial justice not only in our day to day work to support the community, but in our health care and in our mental health care, We know these issues and so many more require nothing less than our sustained attention and care.

We SEE you Rowan Black community. We stand as a Wellness Center to work toward healing through these racial traumas exploding at the surface. We recognize these experiences are not isolated and impact well-being and the ability to thrive. If you are suffering, do not suffer alone, please reach out to our Wellness Center for support.