The Center for “Race,” Culture and Social Justice at Hofstra University

Hofstra University Club, David S. Mack Hall, North Campus Thank you to Gwendolyn Wade, the BHAA officers and the Dinner Committee for the invitation to speak to you this evening at the annual Black/Hispanic Alumni Association Dinner. It is an honor. Congratulations to all the honorees and scholarship recipients. Let’s give them another round of applause. I’ll tell you like Jennifer Lopez told P Diddy, Cris Judd, Tommy Mottola, Casper, Ben Affleck, and Drake, “I won’t hold you long”. If I were to give my remarks a title, it would be: Wake Up! Stay Woke! Leadership for Social Justice in the New World Order I will attempt to make connections between the title of my talk and the theme of this year’s affair, Raising the Bar for Defining Excellence. Now I must be straight up with you. I come from the old school and the Black Church tradition of Call and Response. Black preachers and orators don’t like speaking to a dry, quiet or dead crowd. In fact, there is a story of a Bl