Cherita Harrell

Cherita Harrell earned a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at Rutgers University-Camden and a Master of Science in Education at Walden University. She graduated summa cum laude from Rowan University, where she earned a Bachelor of Arts in Writing Arts and was the recipient of the Excellence in Writing Arts Award in 2013. She is a doctoral candidate at Walden University in the Ed.D. program for Reading, Literacy, and Assessment, and her scholarly interests include a focus on critical literacy and racial literacy. Her research examines how critical and racial literacy may help to create spaces that allow for the exploration of students’ lived experiences through forms of expression, such as oral stories, narratives, visual media, and other literary contributions. In her free time, she writes fiction, and her work has been published in Decades Review, Minetta Review, and The Bleeding Lion. 

Media Appearances/Speaking Engagements:

• Black German Heritage & Research Association (BGHRA) Conference

• Conversations on Food Justice: Race and Water Equity

• Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion (DEI) Inclusive Pedagogy Panel

Accomplishments:

• Program for Inclusive Pedagogy and Educational Reform (PIPER) Grant

• Vera King Farris Doctoral Fellowship

• Diversity Fellowship

In my work, I prioritize student-centered, culturally responsive approaches. This involves adapting teaching methods to meet the unique needs of each student, fostering an environment that respects and acknowledges their lived experiences while promoting critical and racial literacy. By engaging students as active partners in the educational process, I ensure that all voices are heard and valued, creating a supportive and inclusive classroom culture that empowers students to succeed.

"Just Takes" is an Op-Ed/thought piece/writing initiative at the Institute for the Study of Global Racial Justice. Affiliated-faculty and Rutgers Researchers on Race can submit pieces of writing of 500 words or less pitched to orient their research towards a more public audience and/or as relevant for a current issue in the broad area of global racial justice. 

See Cherita Harrell's "Just Take" here: https://globalracialjustice.rutgers.edu/Just-Takes

A Directors' Signature Research Project: Institute Codirector Patrick Rosal, Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Rutgers University–Camden

Quilting Water is a five-year international public art initiative. In its local form, the project explores the relationship residents of Camden, New Jersey, have to the increasingly vulnerable public resource of water. A community of Black quilters from Camden will be commissioned to make quilts in conversation with photos and oral histories from their own city. The institute will publish a book of the photos, excerpts of the interviews, and images of the quilts, as well as text about water and the intersections of race and environmental justice.

https://globalracialjustice.rutgers.edu/what-we-do/directors-signature-research-projects/quilting-water