Dr. Carmaletta Williams Resume

Carmaletta M. Williams is Executive Director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion and Professor of  African American Studies at Johnson County Community College (JCCC) in Overland Park, Kansas.  She earned a Bachelor and a Master of Arts degree in English from the University of Missouri-Kansas City and a doctorate from the University of Kansas. She has won a number of distinguished teaching awards including the Burlington Northern-Sante Fe Faculty Achievement Award, five Distinguished Service Awards from Johnson County Community College, the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and Council for Advancement and Support of Education’s Kansas Professor of the Year, and the League for Innovation’s Innovation of the Year award for her videotape entitled: “Sankofa: My Journey Home,” about her Fulbright-Hays Award study in Ghana, West Africa. Williams traveled to Guinea, West Africa where she established a faculty exchange between L’Ecole Nationale de Poste et Telecommunications and JCCC. She was an invited scholar to South African to interview citizens about their experiences during and post-apartheid.  Williams was awarded JCCC’s first “Diversity Award” in September 2005.

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Danny Alexander is a Professor of English at Johnson County Community College and also a faculty sponsor of the JCCC student group Latinos United Now and Always (L.U.N.A.).Parallel to his teaching career, he has written about music for a variety of publications, including the Kansas City Star and The Pitch; he is Associate Editor of the music newsletter Rock & Rap Confidential. In the early 90s, he helped found the Kansas City Missouri Union of the Homeless, the Kansas City Music Alliance and the Greater Kansas City Coalition Against Censorship, and for over a decade he has been working with the national Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign.

Susan McGarvey, Administrative Assistant II, came to JCCC as a student in 1991. From 1993 to 2008 she worked in the Writing Center, two years as a peer tutor and thirteen years as the administrative assistant. In April 2008 she became the administrative assistant in the newly formed Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. By day a humble administrative assistant, Ms. McGarvey spends her evenings and weekends drawing, painting, and just plain getting crafty.

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Lisa Cole, Associate Professor of Accounting, has been a member of the JCCC faculty for seven years. She enjoys teaching all accounting class, but particularly Tax. She teaches a Basic Income Tax class on TV and provides a service learning project for her students to prepare tax returns for low income taxpayers. During the last two years she has had the opportunity to work as new faculty orientation co-facilitator and co-chair of the strategic planning committee to increase minority faculty and staff.

Dr. Kami Day , Associate Professor of English, has been a member of the JCCC faculty for nine years. Her scholarship focuses on writing pedagogy, particularly collaborative writing and co-authoring, but in recent years she has become active in social justice and human rights issues. She was involved in the movement to revise the JCCC nondiscrimination policy to include sexual orientation, and she co-advises the student group Queers and Allies with Dr. Shaun Harris.

Diversity Initiatives Interview

Dr. Shaun Harris, Associate Professor of English, has been a member of the JCCC faculty for ten years. His formal training is in 19th century British literature and cultural studies, but since joining JCCC, his focus has been on writing pedagogy, collaborative learning, inclusive practices in the classroom, Safe-Space training, and student engagement. For the last seven years, he has been the co-advisor (with Dr. Kami Day) of the Queers and Allies student group and has been working for the visibility and inclusion of LGBTQAI (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Ally, Intersex) students, faculty and staff at JCCC.

Samira Hussein is a Professor of Business Administration at Johnson County Community College. Originally from Pakistan, she came to the US as a foreign student pursuing her undergraduate and graduate studies in Clinical Psychology. Later she entered the Graduate Program in Business and began her teaching career at a private college in Missouri. She has been in Higher Education since 1986 and has been associated with JCCC for the last 10 years. Recently, she started a new Financial Literacy initiative at the University of Kansas

Samira remains active in the International Affairs area, by participating in several international programs officially through the College, and has served as an Executive Board member of the International Relations Council.

Samira has been both a popular and much requested speaker at different churches and civic organization on various issues, but most recently on Islam. By working closely with the International Education Office at JCCC, she has taught in Ningbo, China, and has represented the College in conferences and international participation programs in Mexico, UAE, Holland, England and Pakistan. Due to her efforts in both the Business Programs and the International Programs, she has been awarded the Burlington Northern Teaching Excellence Award, the Distinguished Service Award, the National Institute for Staff and Organizational Teaching Award, ACBSP Teaching Excellence and most recently she was awarded the Distinguished International Alumnus Award, from University of Central Missouri for 2007. This summer she was selected as a Fulbright Scholar to Morocco.

Jim Leiker, professor of History, teaches courses on African American and Middle Eastern Studies, as well as U.S. History and Western Civilization. PhD from University of Kansas in 1999, he is the author of two books and numerous articles on Black and Native American history. His current research project is a cultural history of Northern Cheyenne-white settler conflict on the Great Plains. Dr. Leiker has served as a consultant on three federal grants related to Diversity in K-12 and college education, and as a lecturer for the Kansas Humanities Speakers Bureau, where he is regarded as an authority on Kansas and race relations. In 2007, he studied in Egypt and Israel as a Fulbright scholar. Jim has also chaired JCCC's Educational Affairs committee, where he helped implement a Diversity requirement for Associate of Arts degrees, and presently serves as Vice-Chair of the History Department. He is a member of the Organization of American Historians and the Western History Association, for which he serves as chair of the Community College committee.

 Jason Rozelle is the newest Fellow to the Office of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion at Johnson County Community College. He brings with him over 15 years of banking experience and over 20 years of management experience. Jason has a long history of recruiting employees from entry level to managerial position for the banking industry. Previously, Jason has held various positions in banking such as Vice-President, Branch Administrator, Marketing Coordinator, Branch Manager, Recruiter, and the President of Partnership Development Council for Diversity. Jason’s achievements include Sales Manager/Branch Manager of the Year Award, Lend Award for Community Services and various awards for Customer Service. Jason has a strong commitment to education, training, and coaching of employees. Jason has facilitated workshops and training program such as teller orientation and training, personal bankers training, sales and service training, financial workshops diversity awareness programs and FDIC mortgage loan programs. In addition, Jason has completed FastTrac Facilitator Certification training at the Kauffmann Foundation for small business. Jason holds a Master’s degree in Business Administration with an emphasis in Finance and is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in Education.