AFAS Engaged
Beyond the Classroom
A fundamental component of the AFAS degree program is experiential, immersive learning, which emphasizes "learning by doing" in local to global community contexts, and analytical reflection on these experiences. Our department offers various pathways for students to engage in experiential learning, including internships, study abroad, and community-based research. AFAS Engaged initiatives support a number of the Arts & Sciences Literacies for Life and Career, providing skills, experiences, and perspective that make the value of an education in AFAS more tangible, and help prepare our students for more fulfilling and impactful lives and careers. Check back soon for more information about AFAS Engaged opportunities! Learn more about some of our campus and community partners, below.
Greenwood Cemetery
Greenwood Cemetery was organized in 1874 to serve the needs of the growing black population of post-civil war St. Louis and St. Louis County. It was the first commercial non-sectarian cemetery for African Americans in the St Louis metropolitan area. More than 50,000 Africans Americans are buried within Greenwood’s 31.85 acres.
In 2004, Greenwood Cemetery was listed on the National Register of Historic Places and a monument was erected in honor of Harriet Robinson Scott, Freedom Suit Plaintiff and wife of Dred Scott. The Friends of Greenwood was dissolved in 2016 and the Greenwood Cemetery Preservation Association (GCPA) was formed. The cemetery now has a 501C(3) tax status and is GCPA, a non-profit organization. Also in 2016, Greenwood was listed on St. Louis County's Historic Landmarks. Our goal is to bring the Cemetery to its former glory.
The cemetery has proved to be a valuable teaching tool for students in the St. Louis County public schools as well as college and university students from University of Missouri-St. Louis and William Woods University, which have used the site to teach anthropology, history, mathematics, and other disciplines. Greenwood offers enormous promise as an educational and tourist resource. The compelling oral record regarding Greenwood leaves no doubt of its historic, cultural and social importance to St. Louis, and particularly St. Louis African Americans as a source of great pride.
Williams & Associates
Erise Williams & Associates Inc., is a community based public health agency addressing minority health disparities and health equity. The mission of the agency is to provide public health education, prevention, wellness, and treatment interventions that address health disparities while promoting health equity for Black and other marginalized people.
The agency strives to deliver an array of quality programs and services including, but not limited to:
- Health education workshops and community sessions
- HIV/STI prevention information and services, including STI treatment
- Population specific monthly social and confidential support groups
- LGBTQ culturally appropriate services and programs
- Substance Abuse Prevention, recovery, and treatment referral services
- Mental Health Services
- HIV Medical Case Management and Early Intervention Services (EIS)
- Wellness Screenings
- Public Health Approaches to Violence Prevention
- Men’s Women’s and Youth health related education and services
Regioanl Arts Commission
As the leading public catalyst for arts and culture in St. Louis, the Regional Arts Commission leverages the power of creativity to strengthen and enrich our community.
In this more equitable world, every culture is valued, supported and enabled to grow and thrive. A person’s well-being and success in life are not determined by race, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, national origin, religion, ability, class, or status.
This work requires that we confront inequities of the past, reveal inequities of the present and develop effective strategies to move all of us toward a more equitable future.
The Regional Arts Commission envisions a region where every resident has the freedom, resources, and opportunities to enjoy a creative life – to share and celebrate their stories, art, and culture and feel a sense of belonging wherever they live, work, or play.
Power4STL
Power4STL is a 501c3 nonprofit organization located in the East Loop of Delmar Blvd in St. Louis, MO. Founded in 2018 by trauma surgeon Dr. LJ Punch, we are committed to reducing the impact of trauma in the St. Louis region. We are home to two programs which work synchronously to provide holistic care to people and their families experiencing trauma. This includes The T, a holistic harm reduction program for people who are at risk for overdose due to trauma-related drug use, and the Bullet Related Injury Clinic (The BRIC) which provides a patient-centered medical home for individuals and families who have been injured or threatened by a bullet.
The T
The T, which stands for trauma, is a holistic harm reduction program. We recognize that drug use is often a response to trauma, and that Black bodies in the US carry a collective, historic, and present burden of trauma within the body. Responding to this burden requires a commitment to physical, social, and spiritual wholeness that conventional treatments do not prioritize. The T meets people who use drugs where they are, and supports each individual's goals for their health and wellbeing. We do this through an accessible, open-door policy to the clinical and self-care services at the brick-and-mortar building. This center focuses on safe use, overdose prevention and reversal, wound care, infection management and prevention, and holistic self-directed methods for gaining control of chaotic illicit drug use. We also provide navigation to both treatment and recovery services. The T also collaborates with numerous community partners to engage the communities of need and service. In addition to the services provided at The T, there is a mobile component to the work known as The T on Wheels or "TWheels". This fleet of repurposed used ambulances and shuttles engages in over 10 regular outreach stops each week, bringing the healing care of The T to a large population of people experiencing housing insecurity. The T is located at 5874 Delmar Blvd, St. Louis, MO 63112.(314-474-5707).
The BRIC
The Bullet Related Injury Clinic (BRIC) is dedicated to supporting patients and families after the experience of Bullet Related Injury (BRI) through trauma informed, culturally congruent and whole person-centered care. The BRIC focuses on bridging care between emergency services and long-term trauma recovery for those suffering from BRI, including loved ones and family who were not directly impacted by the trajectory of the bullet. We BRIC Boxes which contain wound and self-care supplies as an invitation to the clinic. The BRIC engages patients in self-led healing from a holistic perspective, integrating spiritual and mental health care with bandage changes and other medical care. BRIKids is a specialized program within the clinic for children who have direct bullet injuries or children of adults who have been injured. This includes play therapy, child care, and age appropriate wellness resources. The clinic employs staff with lived experience in trauma, BRI and recovery, adding to the accessibility and impact of the care. The BRIC is located within the Delmar Divine, the prior home of Regional Hospital, which was the last public hospital focused on the care for Black people in St. Louis, located at 5501 Delmar Blvd, St. Louis, MO 63112 (314-624-0398).
The Griot
The Griot is the first cultural institution in St. Louis that is solely dedicated to revealing the broad scope of Black History and culture. Through compelling core exhibits, dynamic touring shows, educational and entertaining public programs, our mission is: “to create a community of lifelong learners who explore, experience and embrace the region's rich and enduring African-American heritage.”
Only the second of its kind in the country, The Griot Museum of Black History opened as The Black World History Wax Museum in February 1997. In 2009, we hit upon what seems to be the perfect name “The Griot (pronounced “GREE-OH”) Museum of Black History ("The Griot”). Our new name more accurately reflects what we do -- collect, preserve, interpret, and share the stories, culture, and history of Black people - particularly highlighting their regional connection to American history.
The core galleries of The Griot include life-size wax figures, other art, artifacts, and memorabilia to help interpret the stories of Black people who have contributed to our country’s development. Visitors can “meet” and learn about Carter G. Woodson, Josephine Baker, Dred and Harriet Scott, Elizabeth Keckley, William Wells Brown, James Milton Turner, Clark Terry, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the Rev. Earl. E. Nance Sr., Miles Davis, Madame C.J. Walker, York, Percy Green, Macler Shepard, Chief Sherman George, and others.
The Griot’s interpretative program includes an authentic slave cabin, originally built on the Wright-Smith plantation in Jonesburg, Missouri. Visitors can solve puzzles view documentary videos, and “board” a scale model section of a ship that replicates those used to transport Africans to America during the Transatlantic Slave Trade.
The Museum hosts national and local touring arts and humanities exhibits. Community education programs, artists gallery talks, and cultural celebrations enhance The Griot’s community outreach efforts.
WashU & Slavery
The WashU & Slavery Project began in Fall 2020 when the Center for the Study of Race, Ethnicity & Equity (CRE2) convened a working group to explore participation in Universities Studying Slavery (USS). This group began exploring relationships between slavery, its legacies, and our institutional history, and several courses that year engaged students in related research, including a review of USS projects at other universities.
Arch City Defenders
Mission
ArchCity Defenders (ACD) is a holistic legal advocacy organization that combats the criminalization of poverty and state violence, especially in communities of color. ACD’s foundation of civil and criminal legal representation, social services, impact litigation, policy and media advocacy, and community collaboration achieves and inspires justice and equitable outcomes for people throughout the St. Louis region and beyond.
Vision
ArchCity Defenders envisions a society liberated from systems of oppression where the promise of justice and racial equity is realized; communities where our approach to public safety prioritizes investment in well-being, health, and transformation without relying on criminalization and incarceration; and people living freely in their communities, thriving regardless of their race or income.
Values
ArchCity Defenders is committed to revolutionary justice. We believe that the law is not the final arbiter of justice; rather, we advance a view of justice rooted in love, support, accountability, and equity for all people.
We are an antiracist organization that combats racist power, policy, and ideas. Because we understand antiracism to be intersectional, we stand with all people subject to abusive systems of power and privilege. We believe that true antiracism is also feminist, queer, anti-nativist, and anti-poverty, which means that we oppose the exploitative system of capitalism that mass produces poverty.
We believe in advocacy that is people- and community-centered. We are committed to the self-determination of our clients and their communities, and thus are committed to supporting them in building power to exert control over their own lives and destiny.
In our work with clients, partners, and each other, we strive toward abolition of the prison-industrial complex. We believe that our challenges are best addressed by people in intentional and supportive community with each other–with universal access to healthcare, housing, educational and employment opportunities, and shared public spaces–and not by prisons and jails, policing, or prosecution.
https://www.archcitydefenders.org/about-us/mission-vision-values/
LEAD STL
LEAD STL is a trailblazing non-profit organization dedicated to igniting transformative social change in the greater Saint Louis area. With a special focus on the Black and Jewish experiences, we commit to dismantling systemic injustices through immersive learning and empathy building. Our curricula fosters social and emotional learning while training participants to lean into challenging conversations surrounding racism, antisemitism, Islamophobia and many other forms of inequity and injustice. We provide tools necessary to create systemic change, promising a brighter future for our region.
Our commitment to social justice and equity extends far beyond the walls of our organization; it is deeply rooted in an active, ongoing collaboration with the community we serve. We recognize that the most impactful change arises from ground-level activism, facilitated by direct engagement with local schools, organizations, and individuals. Through partnerships, workshops, and immersive learning experiences, we aim to bring about a collective shift in understanding and action. This community-centric approach ensures that our programs are not just tailored to the needs of the community, but are also powered by the very people striving for change. It is this symbiotic relationship that amplifies our impact, allowing us to foster leadership, build cultural understanding, and enact meaningful, long-lasting social change.
Vitendo4Africa
Vitendo 4 Africa is a non profit organization registered in Missouri as 501 c (3) whose activities are directed towards empowering communities through educational and outreach programs in Missouri and in Africa. The vision of the organization is to welcome, connect and empower healthier immigrant individuals and families through the provision of supports and services, and by coordinating resources. OUR VISON Empowered, Stronger, Healthier immigrant individuals and families.
Vitendo4Africa provides a forum for discussion of common issues, aspirations and solutions for the advancement of individuals and groups from African Immigrant community in Missouri. we are committed to promote and preserve the diverse African History, Music, arts, and cultures. Vitendo4africa sponsors events organized by Immigrant Communities in St louis and other neighboring cities.