A new resource to fight racism unveiled in Battle Creek

• The open house for KCC%27s CDI will be Tuesday from 4-6 p.m. at Kellogg Community College%27s Kellogg Room in the Student Center
• The center was funded by a three-year%2C %242.1 million grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation to KCC%27s Student and Community Services division.
• The center hopes to inspire conversation and inquiry of what white privilege and racial equity mean.

The hundreds of people already working to create a more equitable and just Battle Creek have a new resource that leaders hope will enlist even more residents in the effort.

Kellogg Community College's new Center for Diversity and Innovation will debut Tuesday with an open house from 4 to 6 p.m. in the Student Center's Kellogg Room.

Officials say the center will foster leadership and innovation through a racial equity lens, teaching individuals and organizations how to create equal opportunities for all people at work and at home.

The center was funded by a three-year, $2.1 million grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and continues a foundation initiative to train community members in "learning labs" called White Men and Allies, although the center will expand on that earlier work.

Jorge Zeballos was named the executive director of the center in July and has already begun work making connections throughout the city.

"We will help the city of Battle Creek address institutional racism and racial inequities by building the capacity and institutions to tackle that work," said Zeballos.

Zeballos said that providing a multitude of learning opportunities will help the community to understand race and racism in a broader way. In addition to the learning labs, those opportunities will include conversations, panels, movies and other programming.

More than 100 community members have already gone through Allies labs, developed by the Portland, Ore.-based White Men as Full Diversity Partners.

The labs focus on white and male privilege and how to have tough conversations about topics such as racism and gender bias. The labs have inspired several initiatives around town, including Lakeview School District's recent efforts to address racial healing in its schools.

The new KCC center also will train locals to be "community coaches," using a model that's been around town for years and was developed by the Troy, Pa.-based organization Leadership That Works.

Kay Keck, vice president of student and community services at KCC, said center will begin by spreading awareness because the terms used around the work — such as "white privilege" — are unfamiliar to many people.

"Reading racial equity and what the center was going to look like — when you first hear those words they take you back," Keck said. "When you go through training, and the more you read and the more that you research, the more you understand what that means."

Keck said she hopes the center will bring about conversation and inquiry of what white privilege and racial equity mean.

Zeballo said he hopes to collaborate with groups and organizations on events and group discussions and that the curriculum will be based on what the community needs and wants.

"The programming is going to be done both as a direction of the center as well as input from the community on what they feel they need," said Zeballos. "It's not an already established approach that someone else has already put in place; it's going to be very home grown."

Zeballos said because groups in the community have already begun the work, he plans to let them know the center is here as a resource.

"There's already a lot of good energy about this work," said Zeballos. "There are many people in the community that seem to be genuinely interested, invested and looking for how they can be part of this process what they can do."

Zeballos, 51, moved to the area in late July from Greensboro, N.C., where he did similar work as the Latino community coordinator and the director for diversity training and development.

Keck said Zeballos brings a wealth of knowledge.

"Jorge comes to us with so many connections and is a natural speaker himself and brings so much wealth to the center," Keck said. "That's what excites me."

Call Olivia Lewis at 966-0581. Follow her on Twitter: @TheWrittenPeace