A popular virtual talk series focused on highlighting the success of diverse professionals for students at Montgomery County Community College returns for its second semester.

“Prof Talks,” the online interview series, which features working professionals sharing their triumphs, struggles and lessons they’ve learned along the way, returns Friday, Feb. 19, at 12:30 p.m. The series’ first episode guest will be Dr. Fran L. Lassiter, MCCC Associate Professor of English. The series is free and open to the community.

The informal talk series is the brainchild of Dr. Stephanie Nnadi, Biology instructor, and Amanda M. Leftwich, Student Success Librarian, who launched it last fall to help current students gain new insight into their own academic journeys and career paths by hearing the stories of professional leaders.

 “The interview series was designed with Montco students in mind, but it’s open to the public,” said Nnadi. “This semester we’re proud to feature three women of color as our guests. We welcome questions for about 10-15 minutes at the end of each interview. Students love this part. Guests have been kind, funny, open and candid when interacting with students.”

The series had a very successful first season last fall, and Nnadi said the full line up of guests for the fall 2021 semester have already been chosen. In fact, the popular series is already filling up guest slots for the spring 2022 semester.

Lassiter was chosen to kick off this semester’s episodes, partially for the work she and Leftwich did in obtaining a grant from the "Lift Every Voice" initiative, which allowed them to host events focused on Black diasporic poetry at MCCC, Nnadi said.

“Why wouldn’t we choose Fran?” said Nnadi. “She’s an accomplished professor and a leader on campus and in the community. She serves as a role model for students and will make an excellent first guest for the series.”

Lassiter received her Ph.D. in English from Temple University, with a specialization in African American literature and early slave narratives. Her research and teaching focus broadly on questions of gendered and racialized identities in literature, and Africanisms as a theoretical approach for the reclamation of understudied slave narratives. In 2008, she became the first Faculty Diversity Fellow at MCCC. She has presented papers at various national conferences on Black women writers; the rhetoric of 19th-century African American activists; and her paper entitled, “Journey to Equality: From Maria W. Stewart to Barack Obama,” received the Northeast Modern Language Association’s CAITY Caucus Prize in 2010. In addition, her paper “From Toasts to Raps: New Approaches for Teaching the Harlem Renaissance” published in Pedagogy: Critical Approaches to Teaching Literature, Language, Composition, and Culture offers a cross-disciplinary approach for teaching literature of the period. Currently, she is completing a book on a free-Black family in Colonial-era Virginia. She is married and lives with her husband in Montgomery County.

The goal of “Prof Talks” is to allow students to talk to people they admire, Nnadi said.

“It’s important not just hear about role models but also to talk to them, form networks with them,” she said. “It’s a platform to be inspired, for students to have a mentor and feel not alone. We’ve heard many interviews where guests said they face the same obstacles as many students do every day. Seeing role models coming out who are successful allows students to feel hopeful. It’s just what you need to hear to energize you and give you the motivation to keep you going.”

“Prof Talks” will continue with the following scheduled guests:

• Friday, March 26, 2021 at 12:30 p.m.- Jamia Williams

Williams earned her Bachelor of Science in History from the State University of New York (SUNY) at Brockport and earned her Master of Library Science from North Carolina Central University. Williams is a Health Sciences Librarian at SUNY Brockport’s Drake Memorial Library. She serves as the liaison to the following academic programs, African & African-American Studies, Biology, Health Science/Healthcare Studies, McNair Program, and Nursing. Williams is the co-creator and co-host of the podcast LibVoices which amplifies the voices of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color who work in archives and libraries. Williams founded the DiversityFellow blog which is a platform used to document her journey as a Black librarian.

• Friday, April 16, 2021 at 12:30 p.m. - Felicia Grand-Pierre

Grand-Pierre is a Project Manager for the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia (FRB) where she oversees strategy, process improvement, and information technology (IT) initiatives. She enjoys using her skills and experience to help business leaders plan and implement strategies that make their visions a reality. Prior to coming to the FRB, she spent several years in the health insurance industry supporting IT solution development as a software tester, business analyst, and project manager.  Grand-Pierre holds dual master's degrees in Information Science and Information Science and Technology from Drexel University.  She is a certified Project Management Professional (PMP) and Professional Business Analyst (PMI-PBA) by the Project Management Institute (PMI) as well as a Certified Scrum Master (CSM) by the Scrum Alliance.

For more information, contact Stephanie Nnadi at snnadi@mc3.edu or Amanda M. Leftwich at aleftwich@mc3.edu.