Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation Center

Purpose Statement

The goal of the Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation Center (TRHT) enterprise is to create a positive narrative about race in the community; to promote racial healing activities on campus and in the community; and to erase structural barriers to equal treatment and opportunity within the economic, legal, educational, and residential components of the community.

At Rutgers University—Camden, we envision that we will be a place that: 

• Is committed to dialogues and actions that recognize and acknowledge the legacy of racial prejudice and discrimination both at our institution and in the surrounding community, and through these dialogues and actions address the inequities of the past;
• Embraces cultural pluralism as the foundation of society beginning with our commitment to racial healing and working to become a more welcoming and inclusive university;
• Has policies and practices, curriculum and co-curricular activities that are centered on racial equality, understanding, and healing within our campus community; and
• Works in partnership with the community and city of Camden to remove structural barriers and create equal treatment and opportunity that have historically disenfranchised the black and brown residents of Camden for generations.

Rutgers University-Camden Goals:

• Create a safe space for a positive narrative about race to be developed through acknowledging lived experiences from both the campus and local Camden city community 
• Synergize allyship between the campus and community in effort to promote meaningful, challenging, and constructive conversations about the influence of race and racism on society and inequities 
• Through education, awareness and allyship transform behaviors and biases by minimizing prejudiced perceptions of marginalized racial and ethnic groups 
• Embrace, value and prioritize diversity, equity and inclusion

Background

The Truth, Racial Healing & Transformation Center (TRHT) at Rutgers University Camden is a part of a nationwide community-based initiative based on a framework developed by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. Recipients of a grant sponsored by AAC&U, the goal of the TRHT at Rutgers University-Camden is to assist the campus and local community in leading transformational change that dismantles structures, behaviors and biases rooted in racism and oppression. A core initiative of the center is to bridge the gap between academia and community by building diverse inclusive collaborative spaces that promote healing, empathy, equity, justice and belonging.

Education and Recognized National Events

• Bi-Weekly: Healing Circles (open to campus community) 
• Monthly: Wellness Wednesdays 
• Ongoing Education: Training & Development Series