DC Mayor Muriel Bowser Delivers Keynote at UDC’S Founders’ Day 2022 Ceremony

Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton presented with the Myrtilla Miner Award for Exceptional Service to Society

University of the District of Columbia (UDC) 2022 Founders’ Day celebration marks an opportunity to acknowledge the groundwork laid in 1851 by abolitionist Myrtilla Miner and the continued barriers still being broken down today. This year’s theme was “Celebrating Our Legacy, Creating Our Future.”

The celebratory program on February 17 was live-streamed and included the Presentation of Colors by the DC Fire and EMS Honor Guard and songs from the UDC Chorale.

President Ronald Mason, Jr. presented the Myrtilla Miner award to Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), describing her as one of the most powerful women in Washington, DC.

“We present the Myrtilla Miner award to the congresswoman today, not only because she’s a great leader and congresswoman, but because she is a soldier for justice who has stood the test of time and has never wavered from that cause her entire life,” said President Mason.

A tenured professor at Georgetown University School of Law, Norton is credited with establishing the $5,000 DC Homebuyer Tax Credit, which increased homeownership in the District. She also created business tax incentives, including a significant wage credit for those employing DC residents maintaining businesses and residents in the District. She has also brought to DC the US Department of Homeland Security headquarters compound, the largest federal construction project in the country. The Congresswoman is the recipient of more than 50 honorary degrees.

“I have worked hard during my time in Congress to ensure that the University of the District of Columbia receives equal federal funding, and that fight continues,” Norton said. “UDC has always had my support and always will.”

Introduced by the UDC Foundation Board Chairman Doug Firstenberg, Keynote Speaker DC Mayor Muriel Bowser offered students, faculty and staff encouragement about the critical work being done at the University at a time of unanticipated obstacles and challenges.

“UDC’s growth and success has been possible only with the support of Mayor Bowser,” Firstenberg said. “When she became mayor in 2015 one of her main goals was to create pathways to the middle class. She promised and delivered on a foundation to accomplish this goal by emphasizing workforce training … and more importantly for us as a university that is the pathway to the middle class for most District residents. Her investments in UDC’s Equity Imperative Strategic Plan further her goals of building a resilient sustainable urban community.”

Firstenberg also acknowledged the Mayor’s resilience faced unprecedented obstacles, including a global pandemic, unrest, protests, and an insurrection.

“You can’t plan for this, but the true measure of leadership is how you respond to such monumental challenges,” he said. “On that score, Mayor being in an academic institution, you are graduating summa cum laude.”

Bowser credits President Mason’s shared vision and leadership for successfully instituting the Equity Plan, including reaching residents across the city. The College Rising Program offers students expanded dual enrollment and mentorship opportunities. The Advanced Technical Center provides students from all DC high schools courses and training in high-demand industries like nursing and cyber security at UDC. In addition, the District-UDC partnerships help students earn college credits from previous experiences and shorten the time it takes to earn a college degree. DC valedictorians and salutatorians earn full rides to UDC, and partial scholarships are given to those with GPAs of 3.0 and above. DC Futures is a $12 million investment to provide scholarships for residents to earn degrees in high demand fields in DC universities, including UDC.

“We have worked so hard together to invest in and support UDC as the premier college for residents from all eight wards,” Bowser said. “We’ve invested because your president is persistent, but his vision is also clear.”

Bowser encouraged students and staff to remain strong and vigilant in the face of a growing environment of hate, including recent bomb threats to HBCUs and white supremacist protests in the nation’s capital.

“It is an all too familiar reminder of the challenges that we have faced as a city and a nation about the forces of hate that still remain that seek to divide us to maintain a system of racial oppression,” Bowser said. “Your mission here is relevant. Your mission is also urgent. These past two years have put a clear spotlight on the fact that our country continues to face a racial reckoning. It’s not just about criminal justice reforms, but certainly that’s a priority. It’s also about a reform of our economic opportunity system. And we know UDC’s critical place in reforming that system.”

She reminded the audience that coming against racial division is at the heart of UDC’s founding with Myrtilla Miner’s vision to provide educational opportunities to young black women who went on to become teachers themselves.

“It was from that foundation that UDC was born and over the years, we have worked together to expand and build the world class institution that we have today,” Bowser said.

Bowser has solid roots and a personal stake in UDC. Her mother earned a degree in nursing from UDC while raising five children and working full time.

UDC’s Founder Myrtilla Miner is considered by some to be the “mother” of public education in the nation’s capital. She fought against the odds to ensure learning opportunities for African American girls by establishing the “Normal School for Colored Girls” in 1851 and earned Congressional support for her groundbreaking institution. Miner’s efforts to privately educate minority youth and the resulting backlash from the broader community were the catalyst for increased support of public education for all children in DC, and ultimately to the establishment of the public University and urban land-grant institution that UDC is today.

Through a series of mergers, UDC’s predecessor institutions include Miner Normal College, Miner Teachers College, Wilson Normal School, Wilson Teachers College, District of Columbia Teachers College, Washington Technical Institute, Federal City College, Antioch Law School and the District of Columbia Law School.

Several awards were presented to students, alumni, faculty and staff during the ceremony.