Saint Louis University's newest learning community is located in Walsh Hall, the THRIVE: Black and Talented Learning Community. This learning community celebrates Black diasporic identities and promotes mentorship and professional networking.
Why Choose the THRIVE: Black and Talented Learning Community?
SLU's THRIVE: Black and Talented Learning Community helps students deepen their cultural understanding and awareness of the African Diasporic experience and develop the skills and tools to address institutional and societal change. The community engages in common courses and activities, including optional spring break excursions. In addition, frequent dialogue with faculty, staff and alumni fosters students' learning and development. As part of the experience, participants will take part in a mentoring program dedicated to personal and academic excellence during the undergraduate experience and beyond.
This learning community is open to students of all majors. As part of the curricular component of this learning community, students will be enrolled in courses within African American studies, American studies, communication, theology, psychology, sociology, women's and gender studies and others from the College of Arts and Sciences.
Faculty Associate
Christopher M. Tinson, Ph.D., is an associate professor of Africana studies and history at Saint Louis University, where he is the director of the African American Studies Program. His scholarship and teaching focus on African Diasporic intellectual and political history, U.S. Ethnic Studies, critical media studies, incarceration, and race and sports. His writings and reviews have been published in The Black Scholar, Equity & Excellence in Education, SOULS and Counterpunch. His first book, entitled "Radical Intellect: Liberator Magazine and Black Activism in the 1960s" is published by UNC Press, and was the winner of the inaugural Pauli Murray Prize for best book in African American Intellectual History.
Professor Tinson is a highly sought-after speaker and mentor who has led professional development workshops and lectured at numerous college campuses, high schools and carceral institutions throughout the country. He is an avid lover of basketball, used bookstores and good coffee.
Richard Marks, Ph.D., Director
Cross Cultural Center for Global Citizenship
Ryan Wilson, Program Coordinator for Community Projects
School of Education