Speakers

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  Rodney Foxworth

  Rodney Foxworth is a social justice advocate, community builder, and grassroots grantmaker. Rodney is Community Manager of BMe, a nonprofit social venture organization developed by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation in partnership with Open Society Foundations that celebrates black men as societal assets and funds, promotes and networks enterprising black male leaders across a growing number of U.S. cities. He is also co-founder and co-organizer of SocEnt Breakfast, a monthly meetup that convenes Baltimore-area social entrepreneurs.

  @RDFoxworth
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  Sheri Parks

  Sheri Parks’ research focuses on public aesthetics, with particular concern for popular culture as public mythology and its effect upon individuals, families and minority cultures. Her book Fierce Angels: The Strong Black Woman in American Life and Culture will be released in paperback edition in April of 2013. She is an active public intellectual, appearing in national and local media, and is in demand as a public speaker. Dr. Parks is active in the university’s civic engagement initiatives, as a steering committee member of the Coalition for Civic Engagement and as an instructor whose classes often include projects that benefit non-profit associations. In 2008 she was recognized by the campus as the Outstanding Woman of Color and as Faculty of the Year in the University Honors Program.

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  Senator Bill Ferguson

  Senator Ferguson, 30, was elected to the Maryland State Senate in 2010, then becoming the youngest ever-elected State Senator in Maryland’s history. Bill is currently serving his first term as State Senator for Maryland’s 46th Legislative District. The 46th Legislative District is located entirely within Baltimore City, including neighborhoods in south Baltimore, downtown near and around the Inner Harbor, and southeast Baltimore.

  @SenBillFerg
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  Thibault Manekin

  Thibault (TBO) grew up in Baltimore and graduated from Lehigh University with a degree in business and marketing. In 2006, Thibault moved back to Baltimore and co-founded a real estate development firm called Seawall Development Company. Seawall’s mission is to help improve communities by breathing a new life back into forgotten old historic buildings while at the same time filling them with people who in their everyday lives are making cities better places.

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  Edward Papenfuse

  Dr. Edward C. Papenfuse recently retired as the Maryland State Archivist and Commissioner of Land Patents, positions he has held since 1975. He helped design the Archives building, co-created the Maryland State Archives website, and teaches courses at the University of Maryland College Park, the University of Maryland Law School, and the Johns Hopkins University. He is the author of ''In Pursuit of Profit: The Annapolis Merchants in the Era of the American Revolution'' (1975), with Joseph M. Coale, ''The Hammond- Harwood House Atlas of Historical Maps of Maryland, 1608-1908'' (1982) and ''The Maryland State Archives Atlas of Historical Maps of Maryland 1608-1908'' (2003). He was named a Digital Preservation Pioneer by the National Archives in 2011.