Washburn University to Celebrate Black History Month with a Banquet Feb. 13

      Topeka, Kan. – Washburn University invites the public to join the Washburn community as it celebrates the achievements, contributions and history of African Americans in the United States this February. The Washburn University Office of Student Involvement and Development will host a banquet 6 – 8 p.m. Feb. 13 in the Washburn Room in the Memorial Union on the Washburn Campus. This event is free for Washburn students, faculty and staff, and is $10 for community members. Everyone who plans to attend needs to register here https://WUBlackHistoryMonthBanquet2025.eventbrite.com. Registration includes dinner.

       Guests will enjoy the poetry of Ebony Stewart and a keynote address by Ray Dempsey, founder and principal of Dempsey Inclusion Group, LLC. This is a WUmester 2025 event.

     “The story of Black History Month is filled with the voices of those yearning to be heard, those citizens who helped build our country but were often discounted because of the color of their skin,” said Isaiah Bryant-Collier, director of student involvement and development, Washburn University. “Voices like Carter G. Woodson who has been coined the ‘father of Black History Month.’ This Harvard educated historian fought to bring us the stories of all Americans, an endeavor we continue today with the events we hold throughout Black History Month and beyond.”

WUmester

      WUmester is intended to foster a university-wide conversation on a topic related to social justice that will change each spring semester. The goal of the program is to engage the entire Washburn community in a cross-disciplinary learning experience on timely subjects and help students see the connections between the subjects they study in the classroom and real-world debates and problems. The spring 2025 WUmester will examine the essence of our humanity, engaging academic disciplines from across campus and a diverse range of co-curricular programming. We will tackle pivotal questions about the human condition amidst environmental shifts, genetic engineering, expanding knowledge of nonhuman animals and our connections to them, the ascent of artificial intelligence, the ongoing search for life beyond earth, changing demographics in the United States and beyond, and intense national and global debates surrounding citizenship and basic human rights.

      WUmester 2025 invites us to reflect on our shared human qualities—empathy, creativity, morality—while we celebrate our diversity, contemplate our place in a more-than-human world, and craft more inclusive and sustainable ways of being human. Join the conversation during the Spring 2025 semester as we confront the centuries-old question: What does it mean to be human?

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