UVA President Jim Ryan says he is optimistic about working with local partners to improve community safety. Photo by UVA Communications.
The University of Virginia Community Safety Working Group released its report aimed at improving community security following an uptick in gun violence in and around Charlottesville.
Formed in the aftermath of the November 13, 2022, fatal shooting on Grounds and a wave of area shootings, the CSWG is a collaborative effort between UVA, Charlottesville City, and Albemarle County leaders. Experts consulted by the group include local law enforcement departments, UVA’s Crisis Intervention Team, city and county public school officials, and nonprofit organizations such as the Uhuru Foundation.
“The Community Safety Working Group took up their charge during a difficult time, with violence hitting close to home on Grounds and in our community,” said President Jim Ryan to UVA Today. “Their comprehensive recommendations provide tangible steps toward a safe, thriving community, and I look forward to working with our partners to implement their proposed actions.”
While the CSWG report was released to the public on January 25, community leaders first reviewed the document and its recommendations in September, according to UVA Deputy Spokesperson Bethanie Glover.
“All of the working groups that operate under the auspices of the President’s Council on UVA-Community Partnerships … submit their reports to the President’s Council for review before they are finalized and moved forward. That process took place in October and November,” says Glover. “Once reviews were completed and the county, city, and UVA agreed that the report offered a comprehensive view of opportunities to decrease gun violence, the report was made available for public view.”
In its report, the CSWG breaks down its recommendations into four major goals: creating protective community environments, enhancing place-based programming and access to care, improving coordination and information flow among the Charlottesville community, and connecting youth to caring adults and activities.
The January 25 report includes several short- and medium-term recommendations, and Glover says that “many of the report’s recommendations are already being implemented through established programs, activities, resources, and courses.”
While the CSWG lists improving coordination and information flow as one of its main goals in strengthening community safety, UVA has not moved on its position to withhold the independent report on the 2022 shooting on Grounds that killed Devin Chandler, Lavel Davis Jr., and D’Sean Perry, and injured two other students. Recommendations from the working group to advance this goal are limited to “center resident input” and the creation of an information hub, caregiver support network, data-sharing system, and community resource app. The CSWG kicked off work in this area with the launch of the Charlottesville Albemarle Youth Opportunity Center in spring 2023, and is currently developing other information coordination efforts, such as hiring “a data scientist to integrate data sets pertaining to youth violence.”
“The university is delaying the release of final reports from the external review due to concerns that doing so now may impact the pending criminal trial of the accused,” Glover says about UVA’s decision to withhold the independent incident report. “We are committed to providing the external review as soon as we can do so without interfering with the criminal proceedings in any way.”
To advance the group’s goal of creating protective community environments, the CSWG recommendations include gun education programs, strengthening community relationships, establishing crisis response teams, and creating a coordinated crisis response plan. Many of the short-term recommendations to support these efforts are still in early development, but coordinated efforts to obtain funding and considerations towards the creation of Crisis Response Teams are reportedly underway. Other initiatives recommended by the CSWG are broadly described as “launch public awareness campaigns” and “offer support and Community-Engaged coursework,” which included a fall 2023 class on “The Wicked Problem of Gun Violence” at the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy.
The work group’s suggestions for improving place-based programming and access to care are equally ambitious, including investing in access to care, bridging university and community resources, and investing in community resources. Short-term recommendations to advance these efforts are relatively specific, including a new clinic operated by UVA Health and Sentara Martha Jefferson Hospital focused on “pediatric neurodevelopmental and behavioral health” that is slated to open this fall.
The CSWG’s steps toward strengthening support networks for local youth include supporting existing community mentorship programs, investigating violence interrupter models, advancing school-based recommendations, and strengthening academic support, youth programming, and reentry programs. Short-term efforts toward advancing these goals include “trauma-informed” and “research-based” training for mentors and uplifting the Comprehensive Care Coordination Program and One-Stop Shop efforts.
According to Glover, next steps following the CSWG report release include sharing the recommendations “with the groups and organizations who have the skills and resources to bring them to life (whether within UVA or across the broader community) so that they can be implemented in the coming months and years.”
Ed. note: This story has been updated from its original January 31, 2024, publishing date to reflect additional information provided by the University of Virginia in regards to improving community security.The date of the Community Safety Working Groupreport’s release has also been corrected.
Karen Elizabeth Milbourne. Photo by Tristan Williams.
January 29 marks the start of Karen Elizabeth Milbourne’s tenure as the J. Sanford Miller Family Director of The Fralin Museum of Art at the University of Virginia. Milbourne comes to UVA from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art in Washington, D.C., where she was senior curator and acting head of knowledge production. A leading scholar in the field, Milbourne received her BA in African studies from Bryn Mawr College, and Ph.D. in art history from the University of Iowa.
Milbourne has won numerous awards and fellowships, including a Fulbright Fellowship, and several awards from the Smithsonian and others for curatorial excellence. Her writing has been published in edited volumes and journals including African Arts, Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art, Art Papers, ARS, and Collections. Milbourne is the former chair of the Smithsonian Artist Research Fellowship program and currently serves on the scientific committee for Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions, and the advisory board for the Lusaka Contemporary Art Center.
She is arriving at an exciting time for the arts at UVA, with the second Charlottesville Indigenous Art Takeover on view now. The event is sponsored by the Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Collection and The Fralin, in concert with the exhibitions “Maḏayin: Eight Decades of Aboriginal Australian Bark Painting from Yirrkala” and “Voices of Connection: Garamut Slit Drums of New Guinea” at The Fralin. The former, the most significant exhibition of bark paintings to tour the United States, was largely curated by the artists themselves, who formed the concept, selected the works, and wrote all text associated with the exhibition, including catalog essays. A collaboration between Papua New Guinean scholars and UVA faculty, students, and museum staff, “Voices of Connection” showcases the instruments and people of Papua New Guinea and its offshore islands. Correlating exhibitions and events will be happening at the Kluge-Ruhe, Les Yeux du Monde, Second Street Gallery, and the Upper West Oval Room of the Rotunda.
Just as exciting are the plans to expand and elevate the arts at UVA by constructing a new multidisciplinary arts center. C-VILLE sat down with Milbourne to discuss her role.
C-VILLE Weekly: Can you tell me about your personal history with art? What set you on your path?
Karen Milbourne: I did not officially start studying art history until graduate school. I was always interested in the arts and took studio classes throughout college. I actually started out as a psychology major, but wasn’t loving running rats through mazes. I took an African art history class and suddenly everything made sense. It was just the right place for me. And so I created an independent major in African studies with a minor in studio art. For my junior year I applied to a program through Colgate University at the University of Nigeria in Nsukka. I was extremely fortunate because artists who now are incredibly world-famous, like El Anatsui, taught there. He used to just let me hang out in his studio while he was working. His monumental work “Behind the Red Moon” is currently installed at Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall.
I came back knowing this was something I was passionate about. That summer, I had an internship at the Museum for African Art in New York City, which led to my first job. Around the same time, Bryn Mawr was given an African art collection and I was made curator of it as an undergrad. So, I wasn’t technically studying art history because Bryn Mawr didn’t offer a focus on Africa in its program, but I was quite focused on the subject. I wrote my senior thesis on Nigerian modern art and then worked at the museum in New York for a couple of years before going to graduate school.
Lisa Waup’s screen painting “moving tides” is part of “close to the wind” at Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Collections of the University of Virginia. Photo courtesy of the Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Collections of UVA.
Looking at the exhibitions you’ve curated at NMAfA, the African art you focus on is contemporary mostly, isn’t it?
Mostly. I work largely in the global contemporary. I’ve worked with Africa’s arts across time and a lot of my effort has been to undermine or unsettle assumptions about what is or isn’t African art. For instance, people don’t understand that there’ve been African photographers since the 19th century and that masquerade is a contemporary art form.
Of all those exhibitions, which are you most proud of?
I’ll give you three examples because each represents something different. The first, “Earth Matters, Land as Material and Metaphor in the Arts of Africa” was a really wonderful collaboration across the Smithsonian campus. It included partnerships with the Environmental Film Festival, Dumbarton Oaks, the National Air and Space Museum, the American History Museum, and the Smithsonian Garden. So bringing all of those different groups together and looking at what the Earth means to all of us was really exciting and rewarding. And intellectually, it was thrilling to have that ability to pull that project together. But it also made me realize how challenging big projects can be in terms of sustainability. So many of the things that I wanted as relationships or because of changing institutional structures weren’t possible.
“I Am: Contemporary Women Artists of Africa” came about after I’d gone through the collection of the National Museum of African Art and realized that only 11 percent of the named artists in the collection self-identified as female. So that led to a women’s initiative where we’ve been able to bring the representation of women artists in the collection up to 25 percent. With that exhibition I was really looking at the history of one institution and what institutions need to do to change, and then modeling a different way of showing women artists. It wasn’t that ambitious a project. I wasn’t traveling all over the world and bringing my own new research to it. It was about implementing a different kind of structural change.
“From the Deep” [on view now at NMAfA] wasn’t about me, the expert, going to an artist and saying, “I like this one, that one and that one,” and taking those artworks back to the museum. It was working collaboratively with the artist, Ayana V. Jackson, to help push her practice forward. So it was a six-year process where I worked with her from seed to harvest, providing her the space to create the artwork and bringing it to an exhibition format. We did two pop-ups, one in Johannesburg, one in Cape Town, because she’s based in South Africa. We brought audiences in, the soundtrack wasn’t yet scored, so it was going on live around us and we asked audience members, if you sit this close, if you sit this far, how do you experience it? And Ayana got the feedback of how people were experiencing the exhibition, which then informed the finalization of the artwork. That sort of collaborative process is really very exciting to me.
As director of The Fralin, you’ll be stepping away from your curatorial activities. Are you going to miss that?
Very much so. But the opportunity to envision what a museum should be is such a tremendous opportunity. I’m excited about partnering with the Kluge-Ruhe and creating a museum system that includes the performing arts and is centered on indigenous perspectives. It just didn’t seem like an opportunity I’d ever get again.
Karen Elizabeth Milbourne. Photo by Tristan Williams.
What is the status of UVA’s Center for the Arts? Is it going forward?
Oh, it’s definitely going forward. The Fralin, the Kluge-Ruhe and the new performing arts center will all share a single space, which is really exciting to think in a multidisciplinary fashion. I’ve worked with a lot of live artists, so it’s wonderful to think about partnering with the performing arts.
You’ve been recognized for your collaborative approach. How do you plan on collaborating with other creative and performing arts entities across UVA and Charlottesville?
It’s exciting thinking about the brilliance that one can find around the UVA campus. I would love to partner with the new [School of] Data Science. One of the main issues facing museums is databases, particularly, how to create databases that are flexible to allow for differing knowledge systems. For example, we might label something Yoruba artist, 19th century. Well, Yoruba might identify that same thing by clan. So where do you put the clan name instead of cultural name? How do you account for gender fluidity? How do you both have a backend where you can input data to allow for greater inclusion, and create it so that it’s outward facing in a way that’s not contradictory to how anybody wishes to identify themselves.
There is also potential for collaboration with the law school looking at ethical stewardship of collections, looking at cultural patrimony laws and understanding those in relationship to our collections and thinking about how we take care of them and interact with and share them. So these are things I’m really excited about, as well as really thinking in a more multidisciplinary fashion.
Another reason I’m so excited is the new building. We have the opportunity to think flexibly from the get-go, and can include things like a sprung floor for dancers and comprehensive electrical cabling that can support something complicated like an immersive video.
I would consider you on the front lines of the culture wars, and we’re a divided country and UVA is kind of a microcosm of that. The Fralin’s diversity efforts in recent years are really admirable, but there are many who are resistant to this. How do you remain positive and effective in the face of these challenges?
I’ve never worked anywhere where there weren’t challenges. I think that’s sort of the nature of being alive in this world. But I think all of these individuals are looking at the world around them and trying to imagine new futures. And that’s what I’m trying to do, I’m imagining a future with the museum. So it’s really trying to work with somebody on that front rather than hashing out what you said or they said, or was it this way or that way. I’m interested in, What is the future that we can build together? I think that’s the space where we can find common ground.
Do you have any hobbies? What do you like to do in your free time?
I’m an avid walker. I walk upwards of five miles a day with my dog. And, as soon as I can find a pool, I will go back to swimming. So those are two passions of mine. I love to hang out with my kids (ages 13, 16, and 19), and I love to read.
What are you most looking forward to about moving to the Charlottesville area?
Well, outside of the brilliant colleagues at UVA, it probably is the mountains. The physical environment was definitely part of the appeal, and I would also say, the vineyards.
Included in “Maḏayin: Eight Decades of Aboriginal Australian Bark Painting From Yirrkala” at The Fralin, Gunybi Ganambarr’s “Garrapara,” uses natural pigments on eucalyptus bark. Photo courtesy of The Fralin Museum at UVA.
Charlottesville Indigenous Art Takeover 2024
The Fralin Museum of Art at the University of Virginia
“Maḏayin: Eight Decades of Aboriginal Australian Bark Painting from Yirrkala,” February 3-July 14.
If you’re not so keen on the UVA men’s basketball team this season, get your Wa-hoo-wa on at a live screening of the UVA women’s basketball game as the Hoos take on their ACC rivals at the University of North Carolina. Snag a comfy theater seat, stock up on concessions, put on your foam fingers, and cheer on the Cavs as they aim to crush the Tar Heels.
Sunday 1/14. Free (registration recommended), 4pm. The Paramount Theater, 215 E. Main St., Downtown Mall. theparamount.net
The Alderman Library project, which cost more than $100 million, included renovating 100,000 square feet of the original structure and a 130,000 square-foot addition. Photo by University Communications.
The University of Virginia will reopen Alderman Library on January 8 after nearly four years of renovations. As work continues on the project during the spring semester, the UVA Board of Visitors will also consider renaming the university’s main library ahead of the official grand opening in April.
Since closing in March 2020, Alderman Library has undergone extensive renovations to improve the buildings’ safety, accessibility, and amenities. New features include the secondary entrance on University Avenue, two study courts, and more natural lighting.
“We are eager to welcome the UVA community back to the newly renovated library,” says UVA Deputy Spokesperson Bethanie Glover. “Library visitors can expect more study spaces, better accessibility, more natural light, a student-run café, and more following the reopening.”
Glover says the university is opening the building now to allow the Class of 2024 the opportunity to use Alderman before graduation. Most elements of the library will be accessible in January, but the book and material relocation process will continue throughout spring. More than a million books will be moved by library workers in what is expected to be a six-month process.
Beyond book relocation, another crucial item is still up in the air: the library’s name.
The University of Virginia is one of several major institutions that has considered and, in many instances, renamed buildings that are named after problematic individuals. One example is UVA’s 2020 decision to drop enslaver and confederate supporter J.L.M. Curry’s name from the School of Education and Human Development.
The university’s main library is currently named after UVA’s president from 1905 to 1931, Edwin Alderman. Proponents of renaming the library say Alderman should not be honored, given his staunch support of the pseudoscience of eugenics and white supremacy during his time as university president. A 2018 president’s commission report examining slavery at the UVA noted Alderman’s aim to make the university a “leading eugenics research center.”
“The topic of renaming the library is expected to appear in the March 2024 Board of Visitors meeting materials for discussion,” says Glover. She did not say whether new signage referring to the building as Alderman Library was created during the renovation process.
While the Board of Visitors was slated to take up renaming the library in December, it pushed consideration of the name change to March 2024. At press time, the Board of Visitors had not responded to a request for comment.
The university is not expected to hold any special events related to the reopening prior to April’s official opening.
Fifth District Rep. Bob Good was named chair of the House Freedom Caucus on December 11, and will start the job in January. For years, the Freedom Caucus has played a prominent role in congressional politics, including the ouster of former House speaker Kevin McCarthy and the lengthy process to elect a replacement speaker.
In a press release announcing his appointment, Good said, “I look forward to building on the work [Scott Perry] has done and continuing the fight to reduce government spending, secure our borders, and defend our constitutional freedoms.” The Virginia representative will replace Pennsylvania Congressman Perry as chair of the ultra-conservative caucus.
Good was elected to Congress in 2020, and has gained significant influence amid a divided Republican party. Though his new leadership position may bolster his national prominence, the local impact of Good’s chairmanship is likely to be limited, according to University of Virginia Crystal Ball Editor Kyle Kondik.
Rather than give him direct access to additional resources for Virginia’s 5th District, Good’s appointment affords him additional political sway within Congress, due to the narrow Republican majority in the House.
“The Freedom Caucus as a group does exert some power within the Republican Conference,” says Kondik. “There’s a lot of must-pass bills that have come down the pike this past year. And typically, the majority party is the one that’s on the hook for providing the votes for that. But the Republicans haven’t had party unity on a lot of these things.”
Newly elected Delegate John McGuire announced he will challenge Good for the Republican congressional nomination in 2024, partially due to Good’s lack of support for former president Donald Trump. Good, however, may get a boost from his new position in the primary election. “Given that primary electorates can be kind of ideological, [it] may be helpful to Good that he’s in with the Freedom Caucus,” says Kondik. “It’s gonna be harder to get to his right.”
Virginia’s 5th District is pretty safely Republican, meaning Good is unlikely to be defeated in the 2024 general election—but the congressman’s new position could bolster a Democratic challenger. “Certainly the case that Democrats would make against Bob Good is just that he’s too far right, even for a conservative leaning district,” says Kondik. “Maybe it’s easier to make that kind of argument when he’s in charge of the Freedom Caucus.”
In brief
Civic duty
The City of Charlottesville announced that it intends to fill a vacancy on the Police Civilian Oversight Board, and that applications are open to the public. The PCOB monitors the Charlottesville Police Department, with a stated mission of promoting transparency, fair policing, and the protection of citizens’ civil rights. Anyone interested in serving on the board, can apply through the Charlottesville Boards and Commissions Vacancies webpage by February 29, 2024.
Special invite
University of Virginia rower Sky Dahl was invited to January’s 2024 Paralympic Selection Camp. Dahl, a junior, is one of 13 athletes participating in the camp, which selects the rowers who will represent the United States in the 2024 Paralympic Games, held in Paris from August 31 to September 1. The camp will host the athletes in Sarasota, Florida.
Sky Dahl. Photo by UVA Athletics.
New rep
The Albemarle County School Board has selected a new representative for the Rio Magisterial District, after the seat was vacated when Katrina Callsen resigned to run for a House of Delegates seat. Charles Pace, a former Albemarle County Public Schools teacher and central office administrator, will fill the role. Pace taught biology and chemistry at Albemarle High School, served as K-12 science instructional coordinator, and as science department chairperson for Blue Ridge School. Despite his recent appointment, he may face competition in November, as the Rio seat will be up for grabs at the next general election.
Since January 2023, Olivia Paschal has been working with UCW-UVA on the Cut the Checks campaign. Supplied photo.
United Campus Workers at the University of Virginia is hosting a budgetary town hall on December 6, once again calling for UVA to cut the checks and improve payment systems for graduate workers. Despite promises made by the university following talks with UCW-UVA leaders earlier this year, graduate workers continue to report issues with timely payment.
In December 2022, UCW-UVA launched its Cut the Checks campaign when dozens of grad workers experienced delayed payment. Months of calls for action resulted in meetings between union and UVA leaders, and the creation of a task force focused on ensuring prompt payment. In its final May 4 report, the task force issued a multitude of short-, medium-, and long-term recommendations “to improve the processes for administering graduate aid.”
Speaking to C-VILLE Weekly about her experience as a graduate worker, third-year history student Olivia Paschal outlined the importance of continued action to ensure timely payment and fair compensation.
Paschal is one of the more than 100 graduate workers whose pay was delayed last December. The TA says this was particularly insulting following the November 13, 2022, shooting, which made her job more emotionally and mentally intense. Devin Chandler, one of the three victims killed in the on-Grounds shooting, was a student in the Intro to American Studies lecture that Paschal TAed for.
“I had students who were on the bus, I had students who were supposed to be on the bus, and, by kind of a miracle, were not on the bus. I had students who were really close with people who were killed and people who were hospitalized,” says Paschal. “My role, and all of the TAs roles, changed from being a teacher … to just being there for students, and trying to figure out how to walk with them through the worst thing many of them had ever experienced in their lives.”
“It felt so insulting and frustrating to have poured my heart out for students,” she says, “and … to just kind of scrape together things, to hold space for them in whatever ways they needed to. And then for the university to not only not pay us, but then not really be able to explain why.”
Despite UVA’s promises to graduate workers in the spring, Paschal had to “chase down payment” this semester. “The reason that the paychecks are so important, that they come on time, is that grad workers don’t make a living wage,” she says. “Many of us are living paycheck to paycheck. And if we don’t get that check on time, folks are going into credit card debt, people have children, and bills to pay.”
In a statement to C-VILLE Weekly, UVA Deputy Spokesperson Bethanie Glover said the university is “unaware of any systemic delays associated with graduate student stipends and funding” and that “a variety of measures have been put into place to ensure the timely distribution of graduate aid.” Measures taken by the university include a new auditing system, the development of a new report identifying in-process reimbursements, and clearer communication around important aid package deadlines. In combination with launching a website detailing the graduate worker financial aid system, Glover said the measures have “been effective in preventing delays in payments.”
Beyond timely distribution, Paschal says issues with graduate worker payment extend to adequate compensation for expected work. “As soon as I began TAing, before I even started teaching, we were told, ‘Oh, you get paid to work 10 hours a week for TA wages, but really, you’ll be working an average of like 14 or 15,’” she says. “That wasn’t explained at all.”
The UCW-UVA budgetary town hall will be held at 4pm at the downtown library on Market Street and on Zoom.
The University of Virginia football team ended an emotional season on a low note, losing 55-17 to Virginia Tech on November 25. The blowout win means Tech, which has won 18 of the last 19 games against UVA, is 6-6 and bowl-eligible.
Despite an 0-5 start to the season, the UVA faithful were hopeful that the Hoos could pull off an upset victory against the Hokies following Virginia’s surprise wins against UNC and Duke. Amid the team’s growing momentum, sixth-year running back Perris Jones was seriously injured during the November 9 Louisville game. (Jones was released from University of Louisville Health on November 28, and has a lengthy rehabilitation journey ahead of him in Virginia.)
After the disappointing end to its season, UVA football’s mishap streak continued after the Tech game, when the field’s sprinklers went off and doused the Hokies while they were taking a team picture. According to Sports Turf Manager Jesse Pritchard, the sprinklers were on a timer, and the soaking was not intentional.
This was not the Hokies’ first run-in with rogue sprinklers—the irrigation system at Tech’s own stadium went off mid-game against Clemson in 2020.
The Cavaliers did receive some positive news on November 27, when it was announced that running back Mike Hollins won the 2023 Brian Piccolo Award, which honors the Atlantic Coast Conference’s “most courageous” football player. Hollins was injured during the on-Grounds shooting that killed his teammates Devin Chandler, D’Sean Perry, and Lavel Davis Jr. last November.
“I told [the team] this was not a ‘me’ award, this was a ‘we’ award. And I really mean that. This year, together, we have gone through something we could have never imagined,” Hollins told Virginia Sports. “I am proud to have been a part of a team that came to work, stayed motivated, and never lost focus. It is nice for the team to receive the recognition for the courage it displayed this year.”
Joe-verlooked
File photo.
Charlottesville is once again in the headlines, with National Public Radio reporting that, despite his frequent references to A12, President Joe Biden has not visited the city.
In 2019, Biden cited August 12, 2017, and former president Donald Trump’s remarks about the violence that unfolded that day as key drivers in his decision to run for president. “At that moment, I knew I’d have to run,” said Biden in a campaign announcement video. “I wrote at the time that ‘we’re in a battle for the soul of this nation.’ Well that’s even more true today.”
Despite his invocation of Charlottesville in the launch of his presidential campaign, in debates, and during speeches since taking office, Biden has not stopped by.
NPR correspondent Deepa Shivaram made the trip to Charlottesville recently to cover Biden’s lack of appearance, and though some residents told Shivaram it was weird the president had not actually been to Charlottesville, others acknowledged Biden’s busy schedule and questioned what a presidential trip to town would accomplish.
In brief
TIME to shine
Photographer Eze Amos, a frequent contributor to C-VILLE Weekly, had his work featured in TIME’s list of the top 100 photos of 2023. The photo chosen depicts a foundry worker using a plasma torch to cut into the head of the Robert E. Lee Confederate monument, during the bronze statue’s October 21 melting process. “Melting down this symbol of oppression and hate, transforming it into hopefully something of peace and love for the entire community to enjoy—this, to me, is a befitting ending to the story,” said Amos in an Instagram post. “And a testament to our resilience as a community.”
Get lit
Photo by Sanjay Suchak.
UVA’s Lighting of the Lawn is scheduled for Friday, December 1, at 7pm. The event began in 2001 as a gesture of unity after the September 11 terrorist attacks, and has continued to celebrate the spirit of community at the university and throughout Charlottesville. This year’s Lighting of the Lawn includes a glow-in-the-dark disco called Disglow, where visitors are encouraged to bring glow sticks and wear flashy disco outfits.
Celebrate Kwanzaa
The Jefferson School African American Heritage Center will celebrate Kwanzaa on Sunday, December 3, from 1 to 4pm, with a market of Black-owned farms and businesses, a performance by the Eko Ise Drummers, and a children’s craft table. Market participants include Carter Farms and children’s spa MxA Collection and Spa. The free event is open to the public and hosted in the JSAAHC auditorium.
Throughout the day, members of the university and Charlottesville community held several memorials in remembrance of the three football players who were murdered on November 13, 2022. Photo by Eze Amos.
The University of Virginia community came together on Monday, November 13, to remember the lives of D’Sean Perry, Devin Chandler, and Lavel Davis Jr. Throughout the day, the one-year anniversary of the shooting that killed the three football players and injured two other students, a range of memorials were held around Grounds, including a moment of silence at 12:55pm at the University Chapel, whose bells tolled “Amazing Grace.”
Sitting outside the chapel, surrounded by hundreds of mourners in complete silence, was an intense experience—both as a reporter and a UVA alum. For such a large university, UVA is a small, tight-knit community. I remember attending lectures with the victims, sitting by the family of Mike Hollins, who was injured in the shooting, during my American studies departmental graduation ceremony, and hearing my first-year hallmate talk about the really cool guy she had just met, D’Sean Perry.
Seeing her talk about Perry and his artwork in a video that played before Monday’s Batten School panel, which included Perry’s mother and other gun violence survivors, made me realize that covering the anniversary would be difficult.
The panel, “Beyond Boundaries: A Dialogue on Healing from Gun Violence,” featured Happy Perry, A’Dorian Murray-Thomas, Tracy Walls, Kevin Parker, and Denzell Brown. It started with a standing ovation from the audience. All of the speakers have lost loved ones to gun violence, and some have survived shootings themselves.
Attendees included teammates, family and friends of the victims, and UVA President Jim Ryan and Head Football Coach Tony Elliott.
Responding to a question about how to support those experiencing tremendous loss, the panelists talked about the importance of compartmentalizing, counseling, and phrases that have personally been meaningful. “People say really dumb things when they’re trying to say really good things,” said Parker, who survived the 1999 Columbine High School shooting and served in the Washington State House of Representatives. “Realize that they’re trying to say something meaningful.”
Photo by Eze Amos.
“No one can begin to understand the pain as precisely as anyone else’s feeling, especially when it comes to murder,” said Murray-Thomas. After her father was killed in a shooting when she was a child, Murray-Thomas founded SHE Wins, an organization that mentors women and girls who have lost loved ones to gun violence. “Just to attempt to try and understand, ‘I’m thinking of you’—to me that goes a long way.”
For Happy Perry, “I love you,” has been a powerful phrase over the last year. Through the support of loved ones, community, and her faith, Perry has kept going. “I find my strength in knowing that I need to move forward and the love and the legacy of D’Sean will move on and will grow, and I’m gonna be okay.”
“I know that I had to get that strength every day to get up and keep going and keep moving,” said Perry. “It was every day finding joy in something that he would, and to live as D’Sean did, and to pour that love into those that pour love into me and my community.”
As part of her work to honor her son’s memory, Perry founded the D’Sean Perry Spirit of Cavaliers, LLC, on November 17, 2022. Through events like bicycle and turkey drives, Perry hopes to continue spreading the love her son had in abundance—and that she has received from her community as she heals from his loss.
“As a member of the UVA football team, … you gave me the biggest blessing ever, being able to wear the number 41 to honor D’Sean Perry this season, and I truly thank you,” said UVA football player Will Bettridge to Happy Perry after the panelists finished speaking.
“Because of your courage, and your leadership, and being there for all of us, we fight and you keep pushing us to be better people on and off the field,” Bettridge said on behalf of the team. “I just wanna say thank you, I’m eternally grateful for you, and I love you,” he added, before embracing his slain teammate’s mother.
It’s a ghoulish good time at The Great Rotumpkin, a spooky celebration that transforms the outside of the Rotunda into a massive movie screen. Multimedia artist Jeff Dobrow incorporates the iconic building’s architecture into a variety of spooky, scary pop-up projections that are sure to send shivers down your spine. Eerie music accompanies the visceral vignettes of dancing skeletons, ghostly graveyards, bubbling cauldrons, ghastly pumpkins, and more.
Friday 10/27–Tuesday 10/31. Free, 7pm. The Rotunda, UVA Grounds. arts.virginia.edu
About 100 people showed up for the Students for Justice in Palestine teach-in on the steps of the UVA Rotunda. Photo by Eze Amos.
Tensions are high across the United States over the conflict between Israel and Hamas. The complex and rapidly developing situation has resulted in accusations of atrocities by both sides, and steadily worsening conditions for those in Gaza. Locally, controversy erupted when the University of Virginia chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine put out a statement following widespread attacks by Hamas on Israeli civilians.
“Students for Justice in Palestine at UVA unequivocally supports Palestinian liberation and the right of colonized people everywhere to resist the occupation of their land by whatever means they deem necessary,” said a UVA SJP Instagram post. “We mourn the loss of human life and hope for long-lasting peace, which cannot be achieved without the firm establishment of equality and justice. In an unprecedented feat for the 21st century, resistance fighters in Gaza broke through the illegitimate border fence, took occupation soldiers hostage, and seized control of several Israeli settlements that are illegal under international law.”
Though a majority of Americans support Israel, according to recent polling, UVA SJP’s stance reflects increased support for Palestine among younger Americans and college students. Some proponents of aid to Israel argue that opponents are antisemitic and the state has a right to defend itself against terrorist attacks, but pro-Palestinian groups have largely argued that Hamas’ actions do not excuse Israel’s attacks on civilians in Gaza and the blockade of basic resources to the region.
The United States government considers Hamas to be a terrorist organization, officially designating the group as a Foreign Terrorist Organization in 1997.
Reacting to the SJP statement on Twitter/X, Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates and UVA alum Todd Gilbert called on the university to take action against the group. “Some students at my alma mater @UVA fully endorse the rape, murder, and kidnapping of innocent people, which we now know includes the beheading of babies,” he posted. “I implore the University @presjimryan to condemn this vile statement in the strongest possible terms and take action.”
UVA SJP held a teach-in about Gaza and Palestinian resistance on the steps of the Rotunda on October 12.
The event started with SJP members giving safety reminders and asking attendees to not speak with the media, before leading a chant of “Free free Palestine!” A significant portion of the crowd wore face masks and glasses, with concerns about safety and post-graduation opportunities arising from public condemnation of pro-Palestine events and statements by political officials. Locally, state Senate candidate Philip Hamilton called on his supporters to counterprotest the teach-in, with a small group showing up with signs listing atrocities allegedly committed by Hamas.
Students shared stories during the teach-in about their connections to Palestine and gave a brief summary of the history of Israel and Palestine. SJP members read letters on behalf of Palestinian students and family members. “This is not a religious conflict, this is a conflict over territory,” said one letter. “I pray for peace, but there can be no peace without justice.”
An SJP member and event leader, addressing accusations of antisemitism, spoke about his personal perspective as a Jewish American. “Israel is a settler colonial state,” he said, before asserting his distinction between Zionism and Judaism.
Beyond personal accounts and the historical recap, the teach-in also featured a poet and several chants. The SJP led attendees through several repetitions of “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” which has been connected to antisemitism by some Jewish groups. “There is of course nothing antisemitic about advocating for Palestinians to have their own state,” according to the American Jewish Committee, an advocacy group. “However, calling for the elimination of the Jewish state or praising Hamas or other entities who do or suggesting that the Jews alone do not have the right to self-determination, is antisemitic.”
Attendees largely refused to speak with the media after the event, but a few students spoke on the condition of anonymity. “I don’t support apartheid, and I don’t think the country that I pay taxes toward should support it as well,” said one UVA student about his decision to attend the teach-in. “I’m from Egypt, so growing up we were taught about how Israel invaded its neighboring countries, including Egypt, so I’ve known about it all my life.”
For now, U.S. aid to Israel is on hold until a speaker of the House is elected, but federal support for Israel has been made clear by President Joe Biden’s visit to the nation.
