Frederick Douglass Institute

Welcome!

As part of a consortium of FDIs in the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education (PASSHE), The Fredrick Douglass Institute at Kutztown University is committed to developing understandings of equity, diversity, and inclusion among faculty, staff, and students. Programs at the FDI are designed in alignment with Douglass' philosophies and KU's Strategic Initiative (Goal 1 and 4).

FDI Mission

The FDI at KU organizes and facilitates discussions, research, conferences, forums, and exhibits centered on racial equity, social equality, and anti-racism. Specifically, FDI programming advances Black intellectual traditions through interdisciplinary scholarship and activism in disciplines including literature, philosophy, history, STEM, criminal justice, the arts, and journalism. Douglass wrote (1857): 

If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. 

The new FDI is a space of dynamic knowledge production, in the shared struggle towards self-actualization among Black Indigenous People of Color (BIPOC) in our campus community and the world. In this space, we dig in and do the work. 

Upcoming Special Event

Fall 2024 Events

FDI Student Scholar information session - Nov. 19, 2024, 11a-1:30p in 28 Rohrbach Library

Spring 2025 Events

Black History Month Event - Save the Date: Feb. 20, 2025