Racial Equity

UM System president Mun Choi said that the Department of Inclusion, Diversity and Equity, which was established after protests about racial equality in 2015, will be dismantled and moved into other offices to reduce political visibility and protect its budget.

Ebony Reed's “Fifteen Cents on the Dollar: How Americans Made the Black-White Wealth Gap,” co-written by Louise Story, follows the lives of seven Black Americans, tying in research about the wealth gap between Black and white Americans.

The longtime activist and community leader spent his life fighting to improve the lives of Mexican American residents in the Westside neighborhood, and was a force of nature who “transformed the community at the sociopolitical, cultural and educational levels.”

The new autobiography "Show Me Justice: The Happy Life Journey of Alvin Lee Sykes" documents the extraordinary story of the self-taught legal scholar from Kansas City. Sykes fought tirelessly to re-open several unsolved civil rights cold cases, including the murder of Emmett Till.

The Brown v. Board of Education National Historical Park is the site of the former Monroe Elementary School, one of four all-Black schools in Topeka before the Brown v. Board decision. Former students will gather Saturday to commemorate the ruling's 70th anniversary.

The 1954 landmark Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education marks its 70th anniversary today. While lead plaintiff Oliver Brown is the most well-known figure in the desegregation case, there were 12 Black women alongside him. Plus: A small Kansas college is trying something unique to recruit Black baseball players.

The Ascend Cohort Program aims to generate a 30% increase of income for Black professionals and entrepreneurs over three years through a series of professional development seminars.

Missouri’s first Asian American woman elected to the General Assembly says it hasn’t always been easy to serve. State Rep. Emily Weber, from Kansas City, reflects on race and equity in Missouri government, and the rest of this year’s legislative agenda.

In 2023, Missouri executed four people, making it one of just five states to use the death penalty — and another execution has been set for this year.

Students, parents, community leaders and activists held a protest to support Black students in the Shawnee Mission School District after a video of a white male student verbally and physically assaulting a Black female student went viral on social media earlier this week.

In her new book “Gray Areas: How the Way We Work Perpetuates Racism and What We Can Do to Fix It,” sociologist Adia Harvey Wingfield at Washington University in St. Louis lays out actionable items employers and colleagues can take to truly support Black employees.

Missouri is one of 16 states that have underfunded land-grant Historically Black Colleges and Universities for decades, according to the leaders of the U.S. Department of Education and U.S. Department of Agriculture.