West Long Branch, NJ — Monmouth Athletics in collaboration with the Monmouth Intercultural Center hosted a Juneteenth Luncheon Celebration on campus in the Varsity Club for all student-athletes and staff featuring guest speaker Dr. Hettie V. Williams with food catered by Neptune City's Eleen's Soul Food.
 
Dr. Williams, who is an Associate Professor in African American History, Director of Africana Studies Program and the former President of the African American Intellectual History Society (AAIHS) gave a presentation to all student-athletes on campus including football and men's and women's basketball programs Wednesday, touching on the history of Juneteenth.
 
"I wanted them to think critically about the past and prospective about the past," Dr. Williams said. "History is many people talking at once as many historians said so that you can have different prospectives on the same event that might be different, but it's still our shared story."
 
 
Within her presentation, Dr. Williams also shared different classes offered within African American History studies and spoke upon the African Diaspora program at Monmouth for interested student-athletes in the room. Courses offered through African American History studies included a 100-level Race and Sports, along with a 300-level Jazz Age and Harlem Renaissance class and 400-level Race, Satire and the Black Aesthetic.
 
"Some of my best students are athletes," Dr. Williams said. "I always love to have my student-athletes in the class. A lot of times they are leaders in the class because they've learned leadership skills, teamwork skills and they tend to speak up more, so I always love to have them in the classroom."
 
Dr. Williams, who is a recipient of the MLK Unsung Hero Award, the Eugene Simko Faculty Leadership Award and the PGIS Award in Social Justice, also co-founded the Monmouth University Race Conference and was the founder of the Works in Progress Seminar Series, which was nominated for a Distinguished Teaching Award in 2022.
 
"I just want to thank all the sponsors for this event for having me here and it was most appreciated," she said. "It was a great audience."
 
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