Cornell University will present a live, interactive Public Broadcasting System (PBS) telecast Wednesday, Jan. 27, addressing the question of how higher education should prepare its students to resolve the legacies of racism and to promote racial reconciliation. This PBS national town meeting, titled "Racial Legacies and Learning: How to Talk About Race," builds on efforts by the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) to encourage campus-community learning and dialogue about race in American society.

The Cornell program, which is open to the public, will be from 12:30 to 3:30 p.m. in the ILR Conference Center, Room 105. The PBS telecast will be shown, live, from 1 to 3 p.m., and participants at Cornell will be able to call in with questions. For a half hour before and after the telecast, there will be a local discussion facilitated by Robert L. Harris Jr., Cornell associate professor of African American history in the Africana Studies and Research Center and special assistant to the provost.

Findings from the President's Advisory Board on Race, so-called "best practices" to improve race relations in the classroom, on campus and in the community, and results from the first-ever national poll on public understanding of the value of diversity in higher education will form the focus of the conversation.

Panelists for the PBS telecast will be Mildred Garcia, associate vice provost for academic affairs at Arizona State University-West and editor of Affirmative Action's Testament of Hope: Strategies for a New Era in Higher Education; Rachelle Hood-Phillips, chief diversity officer for Avantica Restaurant Group and the key person working to transform Denny's restaurants; Carol Geary Schneider, president of the AAC&U and developer of the Racial Legacies and Learning Initiative; Wayne Winbone, leader of the National Conference for Community and Justice "Community Dialogues" to fight bias, bigotry and racism; and Derald Wing Sue, professor of psychology at California State University/Hayward, diversity trainer and author of seven books on race, culture and ethnicity.

People can attend and join in the program at any time between 12:30 and 3:30 p.m. Because of limited space, those planning to attend should contact Doreen Silva at (607) 255-3976.