A NORTH CAROLINA SUMMIT:
POVERTY AND ECONOMIC JUSTICE IN A TIME OF CRISIS
Speaker Biographies
Rev. Dr. William Barber, President, NC NAACP
Rev. Dr. William Barber is president of the North Carolina chapter of the
NAACP. He serves as pastor of Greenleaf Christian Church Disciples of
Christ in Goldsboro, a 120-year-old congregation with over 400 members
and 30 active ministries. He is chairperson of the Rebuilding Broken
Places Community Development Corporation, a non-profit organization
involved with building affordable single family homes and senior citizen
housing and providing job training, affordable child care, and inner city
revitalization in Goldsboro.
Barber has held adjunct faculty positions at both Duke University and
North Carolina Central University, and is the author of the book Preaching
Through Unexpected Pain. He graduated cum laude with a B.A. in Public Administration from NC
Central University, earned his Master of Divinity from the Duke Divinity School, and his doctoral
degree from Drew University in Madison, NJ. He has served as executive director for the NC
Human Relations Commission, appointed by Governor James B. Hunt, and is a noted advocate for
social justice issues in North Carolina.
Andrea Bazán, President, Triangle Community Foundation
Andrea Bazán is president of the Triangle Community Foundation, a
philanthropic organization with assets of over $135 million. She has held that
position since 2005. Prior to that, she was executive director of El Pueblo, a
Latino advocacy and public policy organization, and a lobbyist at the NC
General Assembly for several years. She also held positions at the UNC
School of Public Health and the North Carolina Department of Health and
Human Services.
Bazán is an active member of the community, serves as a mentor to students
and is a frequent speaker at local and national events. She served on the
board of the National Council of La Raza, the nation’s largest Hispanic civil
rights organization, including a term as chair. She sits on the Leadership Council of Hispanics in
Philanthropy and on the boards of BlueCross/BlueShield, the Friends of the Nasher Museum,
Women’s Forum of North Carolina, Triangle Tomorrow, and Wachovia Bank/Wells Fargo in
Raleigh. She holds an appointment to the Department of Homeland Security’s Southwest Border
Taskforce under President Obama and is a member of the NC Institute of Medicine, initially
appointed by Gov. Hunt. In February 2011, President Obama appointed Bazán to the President’s
Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships.
Bazán has been named one of the 100 Most Influential Hispanics by Hispanic Business magazine, and
Latino Leaders magazine included her in its list of 101 Top Latino leaders in the US. She has received
numerous awards and also has a scholarship named in her honor that supports Latino students
established by El Pueblo.
Anita Brown-Graham, Director, Institute for Emerging Issues, NC State University
Anita Brown-Graham joined the Institute for Emerging Issues (IEI) as
director in January 2007. Previously, she worked at the University of North
Carolina’s Institute of Government since 1994. Prior to that, she served as
law clerk to the Honorable William B. Shubb in the eastern district of
California and as business litigation counsel in a Sacramento, California law
firm.
Brown-Graham has provided significant training and written books and
articles focused on developing the economic base of distressed
communities. She also currently serves on the boards of several
development organizations and foundations. Brown-Graham earned an
undergraduate degree from Louisiana State University and a law degree from the University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Angela Bryant, Representative, District 7, NC House of Representatives
Angela R. Bryant represents District 7 (Halifax and Nash counties) in the
NC House of Representatives. She is a senior consultant and co-founder of
VISIONS, Inc. She is the former director and one of the developers of The
Wright’s Center, VISIONS’ award winning multicultural adult day health
care project in Rocky Mount for elders, disabled adults, their caregivers, and
service providers.
Bryant has 30 years of legal experience and was a state administrative law
judge for ten years. She earned her J.D. at the University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill. Since then, she has held several appointed governmental
positions of significant responsibility, including membership on the UNCCH Board of Trustees and the UNC Board of Governors. Bryant was a Charter Member and
former president of the North Carolina Association of Women Attorneys. She was named the 1983
Lawyer of the Year for the NC Association of Black Lawyers for co-founding the Land Loss
Prevention Project at NCCU School of Law, and she received the 2006 Distinguished Alumni
Award from UNC. Bryant actively supports numerous community organizations, has served on the
City Council of Rocky Mount and briefly served as Mayor Pro Tem before being appointed to the
House of Representatives in January 2007.
N. Yolanda Burwell, Fellow, NC Rural Economic Development Center, Inc.
N. Yolanda Burwell is a senior fellow with NC Rural Economic Development
Center where she looks at barriers to and incentives in economic opportunities.
Prior to this position, she taught social work for 25 years in undergraduate
programs in Louisiana and North Carolina.
Her research interests and publications are on social welfare history in African
American communities and early female leaders and organizations. She has
been a scholar-in-residence at five schools/departments of social work to speak
on social work history and African American contributions. In addition to
research and teaching, she has conducted numerous successful trainings and consultancies on teamworking, cultural competence, conflict resolution and communication.
Burwell received her bachelor’s degree in social work from North Carolina A&T State University,
her master’s degree from the George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington
University in St. Louis and her Ph.D. from Cornell University.
Patrick Conway, Bowman and Gordon Gray Professor of Economics, UNC
Patrick Conway is Professor of Economics at the University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill and has been on the faculty of since 1983. During that
time, he has taught courses in introductory economics, international
economics, development economics and macroeconomics both to
undergraduates and to graduate students. He was awarded the William C.
Friday Award in 2001 for excellence in teaching.
His research has focused upon the international aspects of trade and finance
with developing countries. He is the author of three books and many refereed
journal articles, including “Crisis, Stabilization and Growth: Economic
Adjustment in Transition Economies” in 2001. His current research interests include the impact of
IMF lending programs on developing-country welfare, the development of financial markets in
transition economies, the welfare impact of exchange-rate depreciation in developing countries, and
the impact on US workers of US textiles and apparel imports.
Conway served in the Peace Corps in Cote d’Ivoire in 1975-77, and as a special assistant to the
Undersecretary of State for Economic Affairs in 1980-81. He has served as an international and
macroeconomic expert on World Bank missions to Morocco, Tunisia, Kazakhstan, Georgia and
Belarus, and has twice been a visiting scholar at the International Monetary Fund. He was named a
Council on Foreign Relations fellow in 1989 for his work on the implications of the debt crisis for
developing countries. He received his B.S.F.S. from Georgetown University, and his M.P.A. and
Ph.D. in economics from Princeton University.
William A. “Sandy” Darity, Jr., Arts & Sciences Professor of Public Policy Studies and Professor
of African and African-American Studies and Economics, Duke University
William A. “Sandy” Darity, Jr. is Arts & Sciences Professor of Public Policy
Studies and Professor of African and African American Studies and
Economics at Duke University. Previously he served as director of the
Institute of African American Research, director of the Moore Undergraduate
Research Apprenticeship Program, director of the Undergraduate Honors
Program in economics, and director of Graduate Studies, all at the University
of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Darity’s research focuses on inequality by race, class and ethnicity,
stratification economics, schooling and the racial achievement gap, NorthSouth theories of trade and development, skin shade and labor market
outcomes, the economics of reparations, the Atlantic slave trade and the Industrial Revolution,
doctrinal history and the social psychological effects of unemployment exposure.
Darity was a fellow at the National Humanities Center and a visiting scholar at the Federal Reserve’s
Board of Governors. He is a past president of the National Economic Association and the Southern
Economic Association. He has also taught at Grinnell College, the University of Maryland at
College Park, the University of Texas at Austin, Simmons College and Claremont-McKenna College.
He is Editor in Chief of an edition of the International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences (Macmillan
Reference, 2008). His most recent books are Economics, Economists, and Expectations: Microfoundations to
Macroapplications (2004) (co-authored with Warren Young and Robert Leeson) and a volume coedited with Ashwini Deshpande titled Boundaries of Clan and Color: Transnational Comparisons of InterGroup Disparity (2003) both published by Routledge. He has published or edited 10 books and more
than 125 articles in professional journals.
Pablo Escobar, Board Treasurer, El Pueblo Inc.
Pablo Escobar serves as the treasurer of El Pueblo’s Board of Directors. He is
a community volunteer involved with several non-profit agencies in North
Carolina. Pablo is on the board of directors of Wake County Human Services
and Environmental Services, the Environmental Education Fund and various
task forces and steering committees that are trying to mitigate the harmful
effects of poverty. Escobar’s past professional experience includes operations
with Urban Ministries of Wake County, budget management with Wake County
Government, financial management with Kaiser Permanente, and several
consulting assignments in both the public and private sector. Fluency in
English, Spanish, French and Italian and an understanding of cultural
differences help him meet the mission of organizations providing services in a diverse community.
Escobar has lived in many different places including Texas, New York, California, Alabama, Mexico,
Italy, Belgium and West Africa, where he was a Peace Corps volunteer. He holds a B.A. from the
University of Texas at Austin and a M.P.A. from NC State University.
Chris Fitzsimon, Executive Director, NC Policy Watch
Chris Fitzsimon is the founder and director of NC Policy Watch, a
progressive public policy think tank that is a special project of the NC Justice
Center. He writes the daily Fitzsimon File, delivers a daily radio commentary
that is broadcast statewide on the North Carolina News Network, hosts News
and Views, a weekly radio news magazine that also airs on the network stations.
He also appears weekly on NC Spin, a North Carolina television news talk
show aired on stations across the state. He is a frequent speaker on
government and politics and has been quoted in scores of national
publications including the New York Times, USA Today, The Christian Science
Monitor, the Nation, and Columbia Journalism Review.
Prior to NC Policy Watch, Fitzsimon served as the spokesman of the Campaign to Protect
America’s Lands, a national, nonpartisan advocacy organization based in Washington, DC. Before
heading to Washington, Fitzsimon was the founder and for nine years the executive director of the
Common Sense Foundation in Raleigh, North Carolina. He was an award-winning television news
reporter for nine years, including four years at North Carolina Public Television and three years at
WRAL-TV in Raleigh, where he covered government and politics. He left WRAL to become
Special Assistant for Policy and Communications for House Speaker Dan Blue before founding the
Common Sense Foundation. Fitzsimon has a B.A. in journalism from the University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill.
William C. Friday, President Emeritus, UNC
President Emeritus William C. Friday has had a long and distinguished
career of service in North Carolina’s public life. He served as assistant
dean of student at UNC-CH from 1948 to 1951, and was named
assistant to President Gordon Gray in 1951. He was appointed
Secretary of the University in 1956, named Acting President in 1956 and
became President later in the same year. Friday served in this position
for a full thirty years until his retirement in 1986.
As President of UNC, Friday worked to ensure processes of fairness
and integrity through North Carolina’s turbulent desegregation era in
the 1950s and 1960s, mediating between the legislature and student activists. During his tenure, the
UNC system grew from three to sixteen campuses.
He has served on a number of national committees, commissions and boards, including the
Association of American Universities; the Commission on White House Fellows; the Presidential
Task Force on Education; and the Board of Governors of the Center for Creative Leadership. He
served as the first executive director of the William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust from 1986 to
1996, and was a founding co-chair of the Knight Foundation Commission on Intercollegiate
Athletics. He continues hosting his UNC-TV program NC People, which has been on the air since
1971.
Friday graduated from NC State University with a B.A. in textile engineering in 1941. He served as a
lieutenant in the United States Naval Reserve from 1942 to 1946, and received his J.D. from the
UNC School of Law in 1948.
Irene Godínez, Legislative Director, Latin American Coalition
Irene Godínez is a native North Carolinian of proud Mexican
heritage. Growing up in Durham in an immigrant household, as a
first-generation US American, gave her a unique perspective on race
relations, economic disparities and a desire to pursue social justice.
As an undergraduate student she was exposed to North Carolina
politics through an internship with Lieutenant Governor Beverly
Purdue’s office. Godínez earned a B.A. in political science from
North Carolina State University. She then worked with the North
Carolina Office of the Governor in the Office of Hispanic/Latino Affairs while pursuing her Master
of International Studies at North Carolina State University, which she completed in 2006.
Godínez was the director of the advocacy program and lobbyist for El Pueblo, Inc. prior to moving
on to the Reform Immigration FOR America national campaign where she was the NC District
Director. She then transitioned into the Latin American Coalition (LAC) where she and the
Advocacy Team launched and executed a statewide, non-partisan civic engagement campaign in the
fall of 2010. Currently Godínez is the Legislative Director for the LAC and represents the agency’s
interests while lobbying at the NC General Assembly. She is passionate about education equality,
youth issues, immigration and public policy.
Ferrel Guillory, Director, UNC Program on Public Life
Ferrel Guillory founded the Program on Public Life (formerly the
Program on Southern Politics, Media and Public Life) in 1997 to build
bridges between academic resources at UNC and leaders in government,
journalism and civic life in North Carolina and the South. In addition to
his position at the UNC School of Journalism, he is an adjunct faculty
member in the Department of Public Policy at UNC. Guillory is also a
senior fellow at MDC, Inc., a workforce and economic development nonprofit research firm in Chapel Hill. Through MDC he has co-authored
The State of the South, a series of biennial reports to the region and its
leadership (1996, 1998, 2000, 2002, 2004, 2007). He also co-authored the
book, The Carolinas: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow: An Exploration of Social and
Economic Trends, 1924-1999 (Duke Press, 1999), commissioned by the
Duke Endowment.
Governor Easley appointed Guillory to the North Carolina Education First Task Force and to the
Council on the Southern Community of the Southern Growth Policies Board. He served on the
steering committee of the Rural Prosperity Task Force, appointed by Governor Jim Hunt and
chaired by Erskine Bowles. For the James B. Hunt, Jr. Institute for Educational Leadership and
Policy, he wrote the paper, “Education Governors for the 21st Century.’’ In 2000, Guillory taught
at Davidson College as the James K. Batten Professor of Public Policy.
Before working in academia, Guillory spent more than 20 years as a reporter, editorial page editor
and columnist for The News & Observer in Raleigh. He has had freelance articles published in The
New York Times, The Washington Post, The Economist, The New Republic, America, Commonweal, Southern
Cultures and The Atlanta Constitution. Guillory has contributed chapters to books on David Duke and
the politics of race, on economic transition in tobacco regions and on North Carolina politics and
government. He received his B.A. from Loyola University and his M.A. at the School of Journalism
at Columbia University. He was inducted into the North Carolina Journalism Hall of Fame in 2007.
Bob Hall, Executive Director, Democracy North Carolina
Bob Hall is the executive director of Democracy North Carolina, a
nonpartisan organization that combines research, grassroots organizing, and
advocacy to increase voter participation and decrease the influence of
special influence money in North Carolina politics. His organization co-led
successful efforts to win same-day registration for North Carolina voters, as
well as public campaign financing programs for 25 judicial and executive
branch offices and a landmark package of ethics reforms. His research is
cited in scores of news stories each year, is used by law enforcement
agencies to prosecute wrongdoers, and has helped advance specific voting
rights legislation.
Hall has served on numerous nonprofit boards and commissions, provided
expert testimony in court cases, assisted labor and community organizing campaigns, and consulted
with officials in a dozen states on election reform. Publications include Who Owns North Carolina,
The Green Index, The Democracy Index, and Environmental Politics: Lessons from the Grassroots. He was the
founding editor of Southern Exposure, the magazine of the Institute for Southern Studies where he
worked for 25 years. He holds a B.A. from Rhodes Colleges and M.A. from Columbia University,
and has received a number of honors, including the NC Press Association’s William Lassiter First
Amendment Award, the NC AARP’s Advocacy Friend of the Year Award, and the NC NAACP’s
Political Trailblazer Award.
Jarvis A. Hall, Professor of Political Science and Director, Institute for Civic Engagement and
Social Change, NC Central University; Chair, Political Action Committee, NC NAACP
Jarvis A. Hall is Associate Professor of Political Science and director of the
Institute for Civic Engagement and Social Change at North Carolina
Central University. Prior to becoming director of the Institute, Hall chaired
the Department of Political Science from 1998 to 2005. In addition, he
served as director of the Academic Community Service Learning Program
for two years at NCCU.
Hall attended North Carolina A & T State University as an undergraduate,
received his Master of Public Policy degree from the University of Michigan
and later earned his doctorate in political science from Duke University. He works with several
political and policy organizations on progressive policy issues, including serving as chair of the
Political Action Committee of the North Carolina NAACP. He also serves on the boards of the
North Carolina Center for Voter Education, the North Carolina American Civil Liberties Union,
and the Carolina Justice Policy Center.
Hall has taught at North Carolina A&T State University, St. Lawrence University and Washington
and Lee University. He has been at North Carolina Central University since 1995. His teaching and
research interests include African American politics, social movements, grassroots politics, civil
rights, public policy, and electoral behavior.
George Hausen, Executive Director, Legal Aid of North Carolina
George Hausen is the executive director of Legal Aid of North Carolina in
Raleigh, North Carolina, where he oversees the state’s 25 regional offices
and a dedicated staff of 250. Previously, he served as an attorney at the
Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing in Chicago. In 1999, he became
the deputy director for litigation and advocacy at Legal Services of North
Carolina. In 2001, all federally funded legal services programs merged, and
Hausen was named executive director of the new statewide organization,
Legal Aid of North Carolina. Hausen received his J.D. degree from
DePaul University, and is a former marine.
James H. Johnson, Jr., Director, Urban Investment Strategies Center, Kenan Institute of Private
Enterprise and Kenan Distinguished Professor, Kenan-Flagler Business School, UNC
James H. Johnson, Jr. is the William R. Kenan Jr. Distinguished Professor of
Strategy and Entrepreneurship and director of the Urban Investment
Strategies Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His
research interests include community and economic development, the effects
of demographic changes on the US workplace, interethnic minority conflict in
advanced industrial societies, urban poverty and public policy in urban
America, and workforce diversity issues.
Johnson examines the causes and consequences of growing inequality in
American society, particularly as it affects socially and economically
disadvantaged youth; entrepreneurial approaches to poverty alleviation, job
creation, and community development; interethnic minority conflict in advanced industrial societies;
and business demography and workforce diversity issues. Currently he is researching the economic
and employment impact of white collar job shifts offshore on US competitiveness.
Johnson co-authored studies on the economic impact of African Americans and Hispanics in North
Carolina, and, with support from the Russell Sage Foundation, published research on the economic
impact of September 11 on U.S. metropolitan communities. He has published more than 100
scholarly research articles and three research monographs and has co-edited four theme issues of
scholarly journals. His latest book is Prismatic Metropolis: Inequality in Los Angeles. He received his B.S.
from North Carolina Central University, his M.S. from the University of Wisconsin at Madison and
his Ph.D. from Michigan State University.
Michael D. Jones, Fellow, Edmund J. Safra Center, Harvard University
Michael D. Jones received his Ph.D. in political science in 2010 from the
University of Oklahoma. His dissertation, titled Heroes and Villains: Cultural
Narratives, Mass Opinions, and Climate Change, empirically examines the role of
narratively structured information in shaping public perceptions about
solutions to climate change. Following the line of research began by his
dissertation, he recently co-authored an article titled “A Narrative Policy
Framework: Clear Enough to be Wrong?” in the Policy Studies Journal that
details how policy narratives can be empirically studied. Working in
conjunction with the Cultural Cognition Project at Yale University, the
narrative techniques developed in his dissertation and theorized in the
recent article are currently being applied to the study of public opinion about gay and lesbian
parenting. These narrative techniques will play a central role in his research during his stay at the
Edmund J. Safra Center at Harvard University, where he is a fellow. During his fellowship, Jones
will again be collaborating with the Cultural Cognition Project to examine the role of cultural
orientations and narrative communication in shaping mass opinion about campaign finance reform.
Melinda Lawrence, Executive Director, NC Justice Center
Melinda Lawrence joined the North Carolina Justice Center as executive
director in February 2007. Prior to joining the Justice Center, she was a
partner with the law firm of Patterson, Harkavy and Lawrence LLP from
1979 to 2003 and of counsel to the firm from 2003 to 2007. Lawrence’s
practice was concentrated in the areas of civil rights, and consumer and
employment rights litigation. During her career, she litigated numerous
high-profile cases in North Carolina. These include Willie M. v. Hunt,
which established new rights and services for mentally handicapped
children, and Small v. Martin, which resulted in a major reform of North
Carolina’s prisons. She has also represented countless individuals
challenging discriminatory treatment in their workplaces, schools and
communities.
Lawrence also worked as a city planner for the city of New York, a school counselor in rural North
Carolina, and a lobbyist promoting consumer protections against predatory lenders. She received
B.A. and M. Ed. degrees from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a law degree
from Yale University.
Brian McDonald, Teacher, Jordan High School
Brian McDonald, history teacher at Jordan High School in Durham, has
developed a high school-level curriculum for a course entitled “Poverty in
America.” This course aims to inform a new generation of Americans
about the history, causes, and effects of domestic poverty as well as how
poverty remains a problem in society today. Through reading, writing,
and class projects, students gain analytical skills and a solid understanding
of poverty in the United States and how it came to be. After a lengthy
process initiated by McDonald, the curriculum for this course was
approved by the NC State Board of Education for Durham Public Schools. There is also a servicelearning component of the course and students have been involved with Hurricane Katrina clean-up
issues and, this year, with Urban Ministries of Durham. In addition to the 15 hours of community
service to the organization required for each student, the class is also trying to raise $1,000, and
collect 200 new or gently used towels, 150 sets of sheets, and 100 hygiene packets.
Brian McDonald was featured as Teacher of the Week on WRAL News in September 2009, was
named Jordan High School’s 2009 Teacher of the Year and was a finalist for Durham Public
Schools’ Teacher of the Year, also in 2009. He is a Nationally Board Certified Teacher, a graduate
of Elon University and is pursuing a master’s degree from North Carolina Central University.
MaryBe McMillan, Secretary-Treasurer, NC State AFL-CIO
MaryBe McMillan is Secretary-Treasurer of the North Carolina State AFLCIO, representing 130,000 union members throughout the state. With her
election to this position in 2005, she became the first female officer in the
history of the organization. In September 2009, she was elected by
acclamation to a second term.
Prior to working for the AFL-CIO, she worked as Research Director for
the Common Sense Foundation and as State Policy Analyst for the Rural
School & Community Trust. In 2006, Governor Easley appointed her to serve on the NC
Commission on Workforce Development. She chaired the strategic planning committee of the
Commission, and is now serving a second term on the Commission.
McMillan grew up in Hickory, North Carolina. She is a long-time social justice activist who became
involved with union organizing as a student. She graduated summa cum laude from Wake Forest
University with a B.A. in sociology. She also holds a M.A. degree from the University of North
Carolina at Greensboro and a Ph.D. in sociology from NC State University. She is a member of the
International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE) Local 465 in Durham, North Carolina.
Gene Nichol, Director, Center on Poverty, Work and Opportunity, UNC
Gene Nichol is professor of law and director of the Center on Poverty,
Work and Opportunity at the University of North Carolina. He teaches
courses in constitutional law, federal courts, civil rights and election law.
From 2005 to 2008, Nichol was the 26th president of the College of
William and Mary. He was Burton Craige Professor and dean of the law
school at the University of North Carolina from 1999 to 2005; law dean at
the University of Colorado from 1988 to 1995; and James Gould Cutler
Professor and director of the Bill of Rights Institute at William and Mary
from 1985 to 1988. Nichol has also taught at Oxford, Exeter, Florida and
West Virginia. He founded the Byron White Center of Constitutional Law
at the University of Colorado (1990) and the Center for Civil Rights at the University of North
Carolina (2001).
Nichol is co-author of Federal Courts (West, 2d edition, 2011 with Wells, Marshall & Yackle);
FEDERAL COURTS: Cases and Comments (West, 2000 with Redish); and contributing author of
WHERE WE STAND: Voices of Southern Dissent (NewSouth, 2004). He has also published articles
and essays in an array of leading legal journals. From 1998 to 1999, he was a political columnist for
the Denver-Rocky Mountain News, and he has been a monthly op-ed writer for The News & Observer for
almost a decade. His editorials are occasionally distributed nationally by the American Forum. He
has also written for The Washington Post, The Nation, The Chronicle of Higher Education, The Richmond
Times-Dispatch, The Denver Post and The Charlotte Observer. From 1994 to 1995, he was host of a public
affairs television show, Culture Wars, for KBDI in Denver.
In 2005, Governor Easley inducted Nichol into the Order of the Long Leaf Pine, North Carolina’s
highest civilian honor, and Equal Justice Works named him Pro Bono Law School Dean of the year.
In 2007-8, he received Oklahoma State University’s Distinguished Alumnus Award; the “Courage
To Do Justice Award” from the National Employment Lawyers Association; and the Thomas
Jefferson Award, for courage in the defense of religious liberty, from the Military Religious Freedom
Foundation.
Nichol received his B.A. degree in philosophy from Oklahoma State University and his J.D. from
the University of Texas.
Bill Rowe, General Counsel, North Carolina Justice Center
Bill Rowe came to the Justice Center’s predecessor organization, the NC Legal
Services Resource Center in 1991 and has been with the Justice Center since its
inception in 1996. He served as executive director of the Justice Center from
2001 to 2004 and presided over a period of unprecedented organizational
growth.
Rowe is a committed anti-poverty advocate with more than two decades’
experience that spans the breadth of the organization’s four strategic areas of
expertise: litigation, community education, research and direct legislative advocacy. He has served as
counsel in class action lawsuits concerning consumer rights, public benefits, and housing law. In
addition, he has represented members of the state’s low-income communities before the legislature
and state agencies on issues related to housing, employment, judicial procedures, and environmental
justice. Over the years, he has developed an expertise in landlord-tenant law and a passion for
advancing affordable housing policies.
Kenneth Schorr, Executive Director, Legal Services of Southern Piedmont
Kenneth Schorr has been the executive director of Legal Services of
Southern Piedmont since 1988, where he has created new programs to
serve persons with HIV/AIDS, non-English speaking immigrants, parents
of dependent and neglected children, and working families with tax
disputes. He has developed innovative multi-media self-help client service
methods and sustained LSSP’s many complex litigation and impact
advocacy programs. Prior to this, he served as the executive director of
Legal Services of North Texas, and taught as an adjunct professor of
poverty law at Southern Methodist University Law School.
He has also held positions as litigation director and acting executive
director of Community Legal Services in Phoenix, Arizona, where he
personally handled major cases involving immigrants, prisoners and consumer transactions. As an
active trial and appellate practice attorney in the 1970s, Schorr represented labor unions and
individual employees, and worked in the legal public interest areas of tax reform, consumer law,
utility regulation, environmental law and civil liberties. He received his Master of Science in
Organization Development from American University in 2001, his J.D. from the University of
Michigan Law School in 1975, and his B.A. in Economics and Environmental Studies in 1972 from
Brandeis University.
Alexandra Forter Sirota, Director, NC Budget and Tax Center
Alexandra Forter Sirota joined the NC Budget and Tax Center as a Public
Policy Analyst in April 2010 and became project director in November 2010.
Before joining the NC Justice Center, Sirota coordinated research on child
well-being and policy analysis on family economic security at Action for
Children North Carolina. She has a broad range of experience at non-profit
organizations and government agencies both in the United States and abroad
in the areas of human rights, community development and anti-poverty
programs, and asset building policy. Sirota received a bachelor’s degree from
Haverford College in Pennsylvania and a joint master’s degree from the
University of Chicago.
Timothy Tyson, Senior Research Scholar, Center for Documentary Studies and Visiting Professor
of American Christianity and Southern Culture, Duke University
Timothy Tyson is a Senior Research Scholar at the Center for
Documentary Studies and Visiting Professor of American
Christianity and Southern Culture at Duke University. He is the
author of Blood Done Sign My Name, a finalist for the National Book
Critics Circle Award, winner of the Christopher Award and the
North Caroliniana Book Award, and 2005 selection of the Carolina
Summer Reading Program at the University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill, assigned to all new undergraduate students. Blood Done
Sign My Name was made into a movie that was released nationwide in
February 2010, and was adapted for the stage in a production by
Mike Wiley.
Tyson’s previous book Radio Free Dixie: Robert F. Williams and the Roots of Black Power (UNC Press,
1999) won the James Rawley Prize and was co-winner of the Fredrick Jackson Turner Prize, both
from the Organization of American Historians. He also co-edited, with David S. Cecelski, Democracy
Betrayed: The Wilmington Race Riot of 1898 and Its Legacy (UNC Press, 1998), which won the 1999
Outstanding Book Award from the Gustavus Myers Center for the Study of Human Rights in North
America. Tyson is a North Carolina native and a graduate of Duke University (M.A. ’91, Ph.D. ’94).
Leslie J. Winner, Executive Director, Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation
Leslie J. Winner joined the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation in January 2008 as
executive director. Prior to her arrival, she served as vice-president and general
counsel to the University of North Carolina. She has also served as general
counsel to the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education and in the North
Carolina Senate. She was an adjunct professor at the UNC School of Law; was
partner in the law practice of Ferguson, Stein, Watt, Wallas, Adkins &
Gresham; was staff and managing attorney for Legal Services of Southern
Piedmont, Inc.; and served as law clerk to the Honorable James B. McMillan,
Judge of the US District Court for the Western District of North Carolina.
Winner is a native North Carolinian and has spent her career as a public interest lawyer and public
servant in North Carolina. Over the course of her career, she has worked on issues including civil
rights, gender equity, affordable housing, public education, and higher education.