The Deaconess Foundation has established its Institute for Black Liberation, an effort towards “healing the hurts of internalized racism.”
According to a release, the Institute will “give Black leaders in the Eastern Missouri and Southern Illinois region the opportunity to name, reckon with and heal from racial trauma and the pervasive effects of internalized and structural racism.”
“The well-being of the Black community and its people is determined not just by external progress but internal liberation from the profound impacts of white supremacy,” said Bethany Johnson-Javois, Deaconess Foundation president and CEO.
“With the Institute, we cultivate a much-needed environment of self-discovery, reflection, listening, and learning for leaders that will enable them to drive and sustain the societal change we want to see within the next seven generations.”
Johnson-Javois said the initiative will “prime participants to accelerate the creation of conditions that promote a just, whole society and future with impact felt most profoundly within the Deaconess footprint.”
The Institute “centers Black lives, Black thoughts, and Black liberation,” says Rudy Nickens, Institute for Black Liberation program director.
“We firmly believe that we have the ability to free ourselves from the behaviors that resulted from the oppression we’ve endured and to build a community that reflects our truth,” said Nickens.
The Institute is a space for us to acknowledge and define the effects of generations of dominant culture on our individual souls, lives, and our communities to ground ourselves to recover from it and build a profoundly different future.”
The inaugural cohort will meet both in-person and virtually over the course of 9 to 12 months, including facilitated all-day in-person immersion sessions, ongoing monthly two-hour virtual group sessions and individual coaching.
Institute participants will take part in the process of “self-discovery, reflection, intensive training and learning focused, in part, on healing racial trauma and promoting well-being,” according to Deaconess.
They will be “identifying and dismantling internalized oppression, examining and exploring strategies for celebrating racial identity, building power through collective development of leadership skills and kinship with others, and developing tools to sustain change through generations.”
The Institute’s framework is inspired by Dr. Barbara J. Love, who says liberatory consciousness is essential to “ensuring that Black leaders committed to changing systems and institutions characterized by oppression to create greater equity and social justice,” operate effectively.
The multi-year pilot of the Institute is funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
According to Deaconess, the grant will be used to expand its role as an institutional advocate working towards the improved health of the Eastern Missouri and Southern Illinois communities.
Applications for the Institute are now being accepted. The application deadline for the inaugural cohort is Monday, June 26th, 2023.
Deaconess says applications are open to Black people, including people of African heritage, located within the Metropolitan St. Louis region, with a special emphasis on St. Louis City, St. Louis County, and East St. Louis, Illinois. Interested individuals may apply at deaconess.org/institute.
