ARAOMC Task Force encourages you to sign up for a study circle on race relations beginning in April.  You'll meet for five 2-hour sessions with a small diverse group of Gainesville citizens, becoming acquainted and sharing experiences with race, considering race relations in Gainesville, and thinking about what actions might be taken to help.

Contact: Alice Primack, This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Saturday morning, March 6
Thursday evenings, March 11 and 25

In March, all UUFGers are encouraged to participate in the Dismantling Racism film series in the downtown public Library.  We will meet 1/2 hour before start of each film to prepare using our UUFG Experiential Guide.  There is also a facilitated discussion after each film.

Saturday, March 6, at 10 AM, the film is Tuskegee Airmen followed by a discussion led by Roxane Bleiweis; Thursday, March 11, at 6 PM, the film is Eyes on the Prize; and Thursday, March 25, at 6 PM, the film is The Great Debaters.

At the films, you will be invited to participate in Study Circles on Race Relations which will start in April.

Contact: Alice Primack

This January, our ARAOMC Task Force brought together a unit for the annual MLK March, and marched under the UUFG banner from the downtown Plaza to the MLK Center.  We used the Experiential Guide prepared by Rev. LoraKim Joyner in preparation and again in reflection at the end of the March.

The ARAOMC Task Force encourages UUFGers to participate in the film festival sponsored by the Dismantling Racism Team associated with Gainesville’s Office of Equal Opportunity.  Films are free and will be shown at the downtown public Library beginning on February 13 at 10 AM with “Remember the Titans.”  Set in 1971, this is a heartwarming story of football coaches and teams courageously bringing a town together as the schools were integrated.  In April, we hope you will join in a series of Study Circles on racism and race relations to examine these issues in diverse groups and look for solutions.

Contact: Mickie Edwardson

The Jubilee World Anti-racism Workshop

Our Workshop took place the weekend of November 13-15. This District-wide workshop was hosted by UUFG, and drew participants from Clearwater, Palatka, Leesburg, and Ocala as well as UUFG.

Our presenters, Myrtle Hepler and Pat Callair from North Carolina, volunteer their time putting on these workshops for the UUA all over the United States. On Sunday, Rev. LoraKim Joyner brought it all to the UUFG level as she challenged the congregation to do the deep work needed for us to become truly open to the "other" and to be an Anti-Racist Anti-Oppressive Multicultural Congregation.

Our  ARAOMC Task Force of Social Justice Council is looking forward to seeing you at the upcoming anti-racism Jubilee Workshop on the weekend of November 13.  Please use the registration form in this issue.  We have two trainers coming from North Carolina and New Orleans to work with us and other state congregations are invited to join us.

Questions? Contact Task Force members: Roxane Bleiweis, LoraKim Joyner, Harriet Ludwig,  Alice Primack,  Rosaleen Salvo, Rodney Samuels.

Dr. Larry McDaniel’s invitation on July 12th during services to join the black community’s challenge for change in local schools, with a goal of  improving the low black graduation rate, has inspired a new UUF Anti-Racism Project.

The project’s goal is to gather information on schools that have overcome the black-white student academic gap. Member Ralph Bowden gave a first example from Decatur, GA, where he lived prior to moving here in 1999.  That city’s schools have graduated a record number of poor, black students.

“Decatur has become a bedroom community for professionals from Atlanta,” he said. “They are drawn by the city’s excellent schools. So there are lots of high-achieving white kids from those homes.  But there is also a low-income housing project there and the schools also have lots of black kids on free and reduced lunch incomes. But the curriculum is such that the black students also achieve above the state average and the black high school graduation rate is also higher than average. The drop-out rate is very low.”

If it can be done there, why not here, instead of blaming the gap totally on poverty, as we do?   McDaniel ran down the list of the well-known problems that can be traced back to early education of black youngsters in a whites-only academic curriculum. The big need is teachers who are trained to deal with multi-cultural students.

The project ties in to the national UUA’s anti-racist, anti-oppression, multicultural (ARAOMC) mission that includes a five-year plan to build closer relationships with the black community and other minorities.  Rev. LoraKim Joyner, through the ACTION Network,  already works with black churches.