By Latunya Evans
The Mississippi Valley State University family received a direct, passionate, and timely challenge on Thursday, during the school’s annual Martin Luther King, Jr., Black History Convocation.
Dr. Glenell Marie Lee-Pruitt, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs and Professor of Social Work at Jarvis Christian College in Hawkins, Texas, gave a spectacular speech entitled, Unmute: And Say Something!
The passion and crispness of her message grabbed the ears, hearts, and attention of the entire audience, and without a doubt, they rose to their feet to give her a standing ovation after her presentation.
“Students who are listening today, you need to unmute for history’s sake. Did you know that it was college students throughout the United States that made this country stand up and take notice of what was going on as related to our Sunkissed sisters and brothers,” said Dr. Lee-Pruitt.
Dr. Lee-Pruitt continued, “College students at Tougaloo and Shaw and North Carolina and South Carolina and Jackson State, at Southern University in Baton Rouge and MVSU and countless other students unmuted in their day and said and did something about what they saw as injustice in this country that promised them equal opportunity.”
Dr. Lee-Pruitt explained how she felt the reason students felt compelled to speak on civic and political issues during the civil rights struggles was that they were in an encouraging environment.
“These students did this because they were in a learning environment that fostered their understanding about more than what was in the textbook but what was happening around them,” said Dr. Lee-Pruitt.
In addition, she connected how collegiate instruction must talk about the history and the role African Americans played in it.
“Students should be able to not only connect to the book, but the book should connect to their lives and become real for them,” she explained.
Dr. Lee-Pruitt continued to implore the entire Valley community to understand the power of lifting our voices to say something about the injustices faced by different communities in the world.
“I believe that is what James Weldon Johnson and his brother J. Rosalyn Johnson was saying when they wrote what is now known as the Black Negro National anthem, she said. The first line is imperative to unmute, lift every voice and sing, till earth and heaven ring,” she continued.
“Let us trust Gid even when we can’t trace him. Unmute and say something not just for Black History Month, but for every month and every day until Dr. King’s dream, your dream, and my dream to live in a place where we can truly walk together and not get weary because of reality,” she said.
Dr. Lee-Pruitt attended Jackson State University, where she earned her Bachelor of Social Work Degree and her Ph.D. in Social Work; Temple University, where she earned her Master of Social Work Degree; and Payne Theological Seminary, where she earned her Master of Divinity. She is currently pursuing her Certificate in Professional Fundraising from Boston University.
Before her tenure at Jarvis Christian College, she served as the Director of Community Service Learning, Dean of University College, Director of the Renaissance Learning Program, and a tenured Assistant Professor in the Department of Social Work at MVSU.
Dr. Pruitt has worked in the social work profession in various positions and settings since 1984 after earning her MSW from Temple University. She has worked as a clinical social worker in both the private and public sectors.
In addition, she worked as Director of Social Services at Delta Health Center in Mound Bayou, Mississippi, the oldest community health center in the nation. Her area of expertise is working with African American children and their families.
An ordained elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church for over 20 years, she is currently in pastoral ministry at St. Matthew African Methodist Episcopal Church in Shreveport, Louisiana, where she has served for ten years. Dr. Pruitt is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated.
