Call to action

Though recent graduate Ximena Silva-Aguiree '24, a human rights studies major, walked her final steps across campus this May, her work with the University of Dayton has not ceased.

She spent the first two weeks of summer in Atlanta conducting field work with UD Human Rights Center’s program, the Moral Courage Project. Students are trained to identify ordinary individuals who are doing extraordinary things as they make contributions to their community in moments of crisis. Students work together with these individuals to document their stories and their work.

This year, the Moral Courage Project focused on the ‘Stop Cop City’ movement which aims to defend the Atlanta forest by protesting the construction of the Atlanta public safety training center by the Atlanta Police Foundation and the city.

Since 2016, the Moral Courage Project has been an invigorating program for UD's campus starting with its "Ferguson Voices" project. Each year students from diverse disciplinaries collaborate over a course of a year to bring amazing stories from other parts of the conutry onto the UD campus.  

The rest of the summer Silva-Aguiree will be working with Miranda Hallet, assistant professor of cultural anthropology, on community-based research with Latin American Immigrant households in Dayton and the Miami Valley.