Kendrick Meek was named visiting fellow for 2014 at the Ronald W. Walters Leadership and Public Policy Center at Howard University in Washington, D.C. He is a former member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Florida and former chair of the Congressional Black Caucus.
Meek is a graduate of Florida A&M University in Tallahassee, where he majored in criminal justice. Before beginning his political career, he served as an officer for the Florida Highway Patrol.
Tiffany Murphy was hired as an assistant professor at the University of Arkansas School of Law in Fayetteville. She was a clinical professor at the Oklahoma City University School of Law, where she also served as director of the Oklahoma Innocence Project. She also taught at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Murphy is a graduate of the University of Michigan and the University of Michigan Law School.
Stacy Davis, an associate professor of religious studies at St. Mary’s College in Notre Dame, Indiana, was named chair of the new department of gender and women’s studies at the college.
Dr. Davis is a graduate of the University of Tulsa in Oklahoma. She holds a master’s degree from Phillips Theological Seminary in Tulsa and a Ph.D. from the University of Notre Dame.
Linton Kwesi Johnson was named artist-in-residence at the Institute for African American Affairs at New York University. A native of Jamaica, Johnson is a reggae artist and poet.
Johnson has recorded several albums and has published a number of collections of poetry including Inglan Is a Bitch (1980).