Community Development

Community Development Conference

The purpose of the Community Development Conference is to bring together experts, professionals and lay persons to analyze a chosen aspect of community development. This task requires rigorous examination so that integration into a comprehensive plan with stages of implementation can be conceived and executed.

By invitation only, participating individuals representing different disciplines will give expositions in varying formats with particular focus on their area of expertise. These areas will include but are not limited to institutional planning and development, land acquisition, taxes and legal requirements, education, morality and ethics, families and alliances, mental health and spirituality. Upon completion of their exegesis, participants of the conference will CONVENE, STRATEGIZE and EFFECTUATE an action plan on a chosen community development project.

Qualification for participation in the Community Development Conference is done through the submission of a position paper (500 words minimum) clearly stating ideas and resources geared toward a chosen subject area. Papers will be evaluated in part on comprehension and research of topic and applicable innovations.

Discussion Considerations:

A. What resources can you contribute to the development of this project?
B. What benefits can you derive from this project?
C. Outline the challenges and possible solutions.
D. What should the core curriculum and overall ideology be?
E. What are the criterion and necessary modalities for instructors?
F. Independent institutions: why are they necessary, historical
examples, etc.

Schedule of Events:

9:00 a.m.	Continental breakfast
9:30 a.m.	Meet and Greet
10:00 a.m. - 10:30 a.m.	Introduction and Welcome
10:30 a.m. - 11:30 a.m.	Special guest speaker
11:30 a.m. - 12:30 p.m.	PKDG
12:30 - 1:30 p.m.	Lunch
1:30 p.m. - 2:30 p.m	PKDG
1:30 p.m. - 3:00 p.m.	Areas of Discussion
3:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.	Proposals and Summations
5:00 p.m. - 5:30 p.m.	Closing remarks

The year before session one, land was purchased providing the purpose for the conference.

Two years following session one enough funds were acquired to begin construction. Within the following year our first building was up.

Our conferences are practical work study iniatives that produce tangible results.

Click here or see "Center" link for details

Session 1

Select Participants and Areas of Expertise

Dr. Anthony Monteiro - History of Independent Afrakan institutions

Dr. Ayesha Imani – Afrakan centered curriculum development

Aleta Finney M.S. – Environmental responsibility

Cheryl Durgen M.L.A. - Arts and Aesthetics

Paul DeCostas - Contemporary Afrakan involvement in the sciences

Kellie Sparrow - Volunteerism and Recruitment

Sabir Bey – Sovereignty, applications of human rights

Ahmed Tahir – Entrepreneurial success and community organizing

Look for our next session on off grid power systems, water without the utility bill and food production through hydroponic gardening.

Special guest speaker: Dr. Anthony Monteiro

Anthony Monteiro teaches in the Department of African American Studies at Temple University in Philadelphia. His scholarly writings include sociology of knowledge, W.E.B Du Bois Studies, critical Marxist theory and Africana philosophical and social thought. He is co-director of the Institute for the Study of Race and Social Thought at Temple University. As well he has a long activist history in Civil Rights, Black Power, African Liberation and anti death penalty work. Currently he is finishing a book length manuscript on W.E.B Du Bois to be published by Africa World Press.

Dr. Monteiro is a life long resident of North Philadelphia. He grew up in Zion Baptist Church and attended the Philadelphia Public Schools. He received his BA from Lincoln University, attended the University of Chicago under a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship and received his PhD in sociology from Temple University. He has taught at several Universities, including the University of the Sciences, Rutgers and Drexel Universities and the University of Pennsylvania. He has had published over 100 articles on topics related to Black people and the Black struggle.

Dr. Monteiro believes that his activism in Philadelphia and internationally has given him a unique perspective on the problems and possibilities of Black folk in America and Africa. He has traveled extensively in Africa, and in 1975 led a national petition drive collecting 100,000 signatures calling for the expulsion of apartheid South Africa from the UN and for the US to impose complete sanctions upon the racist regime. He was a delegate to the Sixth pan African congress held in Dar Es Salaam. He also participated in the conference held in Havana Cuba on MALCOLM X and Fidel Castro held in 1990. He was a guest of the Angolan government in 1976 at its independence. He worked closely with the ANC and SWAPO during the struggles against apartheid. In 2000 he received an honorary doctorate degree from Lincoln University. He has written and lectured on the Angola liberation struggle. Dr Monteiro has spent time in Ethiopia, Tanzania, Algeria, Somalia and nations of Asia and Latin America. He considers his activism in Philadelphia and on the international level to be part of his effort to link activism, scholarship and revolutionary commitments.

Dr Monteiro’s current book projects include a book on W.E.B Du Bois entitled "W.E.B Du Bois and the Study of Black Humanity" and a volume co-edited with Professor Martin Kilson of Harvard University on One Hundred Years of Black Philadelphia.

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Community Development

Community Development Conference

Session 1