Stephen Roberts, academic advisor and UDream program coordinator in the University of Delaware’s Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics, and three UD students traveled to Ghana in June as part of a partnership between UD and non-profit organization Leaders of the Free World (LFW).
The international experience and leadership program for young Black men took place from June 2-16, as the students engaged in learning and reflection activities that targeted the social and psychological barriers to academic success, retention and empowered leadership.
The participating UD students included recent graduates Joshua Artis, an engineering and computer science major and Eric Merritt, an engineering major, and Blake Robinson, a health sciences major who is entering his senior year. They were joined by nine other students from various universities around the country.
Roberts was one of seven mentors that accompanied the students on the trip, along with LFW co-founders Lavar Thomas and Ruby Maddox and members from Culture Beyond Borders (CBB).
LFW and CBB staff helped facilitate trip details such as the group’s itinerary, lodging and transportation.
Thomas, who earned his master’s degree in international business from the Lerner College in May 2022, has been instrumental in LFW helping young men take these excursions to Ghana since 2016.
“They were a bunch of amazing people who supported us every step of the way. We couldn’t have done it without them,” Artis said.
“(It was) 14 days of moving and learning – learning about each other and learning about the culture,” Roberts said. “I can’t stress enough how impactful Lavar and Ruby have been with these young men in this program, teaching them core leadership skills and learning about themselves.”
Artis was Introduced to the program two years ago, when a group of students that included some of his friends went in 2022 and described their experience upon returning.
Artis then contacted Vince DiFelice, senior instructor of entrepreneurship and faculty director of venture support in the Lerner College, who introduced him to Thomas. After some encouragement from Thomas, Artis applied and was accepted.
The nine-month program begins with bi-monthly sessions that included group discussions, guest speakers, lectures and assignments, followed by the two-week experience in June.
Following a nonstop flight from JFK Airport in New York to Accra, the group arrived at the University of Ghana, the next day, where theymet with a local professor who spoke about the history of trade in the city, the local currency and how the economic system worked.
The group returned to the university the following day, which focused on how leadership worked in Ghana, specifically the local chiefs and tribes, and what makes them leaders.
The cohort also visited the National Museum of Ghana to view the mausoleum of the country’s first president: Francis Kwame Nkrumah, who earned his bachelor’s degree at nearby Lincoln University in 1942 and a master’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania the following year.
On the third day the group met with a local director of artistry and dance who taught them traditional dances and allowed them to play accompanying drums.
The following day they went to the U.S. Embassy in Ghana, speaking with a panel of Black male professionals who had become U.S. Diplomats. The meeting was arranged by James Ham, who has served as a director of the Peace Corps for several African countries for over two decades and is a mentor of the LFW program.
The cohort then traveled to the city of Kumasi where they visited a school, bringing laptops and sanitary supplies for students while helping build a kitchen and painting the facility.
“The best part was just meeting with the students, playing games with them like musical chairs and volleyball … just learning about them and their personal experiences. I made some great friends there,” Artis said.
The group also visited a chief’s palace in Kumasi, where they were given Kente clothes, and participated in a program in which they were given African names.
“That was a moving experience. It was ceremonial with the chief giving us blessings and praying over us and giving us our names,” Roberts said.
The final day in Kumasi featured a trip to The Last Bath, where enslaved Africans walked from many locations across Africa and bathed in the Pra River before being sent to the Caribbean and the Americans for a lifetime of slavery.
“We walked into the river ourselves, and it was just a moving experience. It’s hard to put into words,” Artis said.
The group then headed to Cape Coast, where they competed in a basketball tournament run by Hoops Care International and played against the organization’s team; completed additional mission work at St. James School, including to help paint the outside of the institution, and again interacted with young children; and toured the Cape Coast Castle, another location that held enslaved persons from across Africa as their final stopping point before being loaded onto ships to cross the Atlantic Ocean.
Following each day, the students and mentors met for reflection sessions to discuss their thoughts and feelings from the day’s events.
“In many sessions we talked about how we would take what we learned with us as we strive to become leaders in our own communities,” Artis said.
“The students were able to reflect on their experience every night, giving their take on what they were feeling, which was very inspirational. We wanted to make sure they were taking in what they were supposed to as being Black leaders,” Roberts said.
“It was wonderful seeing the transformation of the young men from day one at JFK airport and then towards the end,” he added.
Artis was appreciative of the opportunity to experience the trip and apply the lessons learned to his life back in the United States.
“I’m grateful to be in this position to be able to visit Ghana and then share my story with others,” he said. “I’m also grateful for the support of LFW, the mentors as well as classmates during my journey; I learned so much from each of them. We all went through the same trip, but we had individual experiences that impacted us in different ways. So it’s just something to take with us as we live the rest of our lives.”