It is Tuesday, January 31, 2023, and as I begin to write this piece, it is 8:12 PM. I am currently at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport in the Delta A terminal awaiting my flight back to my home near Indianapolis, Indiana. The specificity of my location and the timing of all of this is important because ten years ago, I could have never imagined being right here right now.
Continue reading “Melvin Villaver, IRT ’18: Right Here Right Now”Category: 2018 Cohort
Alumni Accolades, January 2023
Brittney Yancy, IRT ’03
Brittney holds a masters degree in U.S. History and earned a Ph.D. in U.S. History last year from the University of Connecticut. Brittney is currently an Assistant Professor of History and African American Studies at Illinois College.
IRT Alumni Committee Inaugural Members
Renée Wilmot and LaShawnda Brooks are excited to announce the inaugural members of the IRT Alumni Committee.
Karina Fernandez (she/her)
Roles: Curriculum & Summer Workshop Consultant, Events Manager
IRT Class of 2006
Helen Gong (she/her)
Role: 2020 Cohort Representative
IRT Class of 2020
Alumni Accolades – April 2020
~2018 Cohort~
(L-R) Christopher Perez, Program Director, Office of Graduate Diversity & Inclusion at the University of Maryland and Briceno Bowrey, IRT ’18 currently in his first year of doctoral studies in History at the University of Maryland. #IamIRT
~2017 Cohort~
Mariahadesse Tallie, IRT ’17
Mariahadesse wrote her first children’s book entitled, “Layla’s Happiness,” published by Enchanted Lion Books. She is currently a Ph.D. student at Brown University.
Alumni Accolades – January 2020
~1995 Cohort~
Dr. Tiffany M. Gill, IRT ’95 authored an article for the Washington Post entitled, How a black female fashion designer laid the groundwork for Ghana’s ‘Year of Return’ earlier this month. Gill is also the author of Beauty Shop Politics: African American Women’s Activism in the Beauty Industry (University of Illinois Press, 2010) which was awarded the 2010 Letitia Woods Brown Memorial Book Prize by the Association of Black Women Historians.
Dr. Gill’s research has been supported by the American Association of University Women and the National Endowment of the Humanities. A recipient of the 2010 Regents’ Outstanding Teaching Award for excellence in undergraduate education, Dr. Gill was named a Distinguished Lecturer by the Organization of American Historians in 2015. In 2018, Diverse Issues in Higher Education recognized her as one of the top 25 women in higher education and serves as a consultant for the global beauty brand Sephora. Professor Gill is currently working on a book manuscript chronicling the promise and peril of African American international leisure travel since World War One.
Gill participated in the IRT Summer Workshop as faculty during 1998 – 2000. She is currently an associate professor of Africana studies and history at the University of Delaware. You can find her on social media @SableVictorian.
~2002 Cohort~
Laura Chavez-Moreno, IRT ’02/’10 is currently a postdoctoral scholar at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Graduate School of Education & Information Studies. She will be joining UCLA’s César E. Chávez Department of Chicana/Chicano Studies as a tenure-track assistant professor in Fall 2021.
Institute for Recruitment of Teachers 
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