Ploghoft Lecture to feature discussion of multicultural classrooms

Toby S. Jenkins, a national expert on cultural inclusion and belonging in higher education, will discuss “The Hip Hop Mindset: Turning Up the Volume to Educational Practice” when she visits Northwest Missouri State University to present its fall Ploghoft Diversity Lecture.

Toby S. Jenkins

Her presentation is based on her book, “The Hip Hop Mindset: Success Strategies for Educators and Other Professionals,” which introduces how to implement multiculturalism in the classroom setting. The book received the 2023 Phillip C. Chinn Book Award from the National Association of Multicultural Educators.

The lecture begins at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 23, in the Charles Johnson Theater at the Olive DeLuce Fine Arts Building with a book discussion afterward. The presentation and the book discussion are free and open to the public.

“Pre-service teachers will see how they can take different cultural aspects in the community and engage them into their teaching practices,” Dr. Kiene, an associate professor in Northwest’s School of Education, said. “Every time we have a Ploghoft Lecture, we have the same intent that they will walk away with some strategies or tools that they can use in their classrooms.”

Jenkins is an associate professor of higher education at the University of South Carolina, where she also serves as the interim associate dean of diversity, equity and inclusion in its Graduate School. She also has worked as an administrator at the University of Maryland, Penn State University, George Masson University, Georgia Southern University and the University of Hawaii.

Her work focuses on the use of culture as a politic of social survival, a took of social change and a transformational space within educational settings. She has authored five books focused on the evolving ideologies of culture, family and education in contemporary society. Her individual research projects and studies have taken her to more than 30 countries.

Additionally, she has served as a consultant on inclusive excellence for more than 50 national organizations and facilitated over 100 lectures, keynotes and workshops at institutions across the United States and abroad.

The National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education awarded her the 2022 Individual Leadership Award, and the National Conference on Race and Ethnicity granted her the 2021 award for Outstanding Scholarship.

About the Ploghoft Diversity Lecture series

Northwest’s Ploghoft Diversity Lecture series is funded through the lasting generosity of the late Dr. Milton Ploghoft and his wife, Zella. The series features speakers and activities that broaden the educational perspectives of Northwest teacher candidates and inform all students about the issues facing the education of students from diverse environments.

Dr. Ploghoft, a 1949 Northwest alumnus, authored a number of textbooks in the social studies and lived abroad for many years, founding the College of Education in Kano, Nigeria, lecturing at Saigon University and leading its international programs in such places as Chile, Cameroun, Botswana, the Yucatan, Swaziland and in what was then South Vietnam. In 1992, he became the founding editor of the African Education Research Network. He was professor emeritus at Ohio University at the time of his death in 2018.

Zella, who passed away in 2010, completed her elementary and secondary education at Horace Mann Laboratory School at Northwest.

For more information about the Ploghoft Diversity Lecture series, contact the chair, Dr. Ashley Strickland at 660.562.1838 or ashleyp@nwmissouri.edu.