Graduate Student Bios

La’Nora Jefferson graduated from the University of Houston in 2016 with a BA in History. She is currently a 7th year doctoral student and National Academy of Education/Spencer Fellow whose major field of focus is 20th century African American history. Her minor field of study is U.S. history. Her research explores the intersections of Black Power, Black Feminist and Black student campus organizing in the Post-War South. Specifically, it analyzes Black women’s campus organizing, the socio-political mobilization of historically Black colleges and universities, and the transformation of Black higher education pedagogy in the 20th century Black Student Movement. Her dissertation “The Essence of Spelman College is Black Womanhood,’: The Spelman Campus Movement, 1924-2006,”provides a long durée history of Black women students’ organizing at Spelman College at the intersection of the mid to late 20th century Black Power and Black Feminist Movements.