The annual fellowship program established by financial executive Alphonse Fletcher, Jr. to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark decision, Brown v. Board of Education, has named four scholars as 2008 Alphonse Fletcher, Sr. Fellows, Fletcher announced Tuesday. Each fellow will receive a stipend of $50,000 for scholarly work that seeks to improve racial equality in American society and pursues the broad social goals set forth by Brown v. Board of Education.
The Fletcher Fellows are as follows: Dr. Clayborne Carson, professor of history at Stanford University and founding director of the Martin Luther King Jr. Research and Education Institute; Dr. Kellie Jones, an associate professor of art history and archaeology at Columbia University; Kimberle Crenshaw, a professor of law at the University of California-Los Angeles and Columbia Law Schools; and Stacy L. Leeds, a professor of law at the University of Kansas School of Law.
“As in former years, our selection committee has assembled a class of scholars, each preeminent in their individual fields. Whether working from the discipline of art and cultural studies, history or law, each of this year’s fellows approaches the historical and contemporary challenge of race relations through a project of current relevance,” Fletcher said.
This year’s fellows were chosen from a pool of more than 80 applicants. Fletcher added that one of the top considerations within the selection process is an applicant’s ability to bring a proposed project to finish within one year.
“Considering the past accomplishments of this class of fellows, we greatly look forward to seeing these important projects brought to life in the year ahead,” he said.
Projects to be pursued by the fellows:
* Carson will expand The Liberation Curriculum of the Martin Luther King Jr. Research and Education Institute by providing online educational content as a continuation of the King Digital History Project.
