Wagatwe Wanjuki, the keynote speaker for the Take Back the Night event to be held April 10 on the Lycoming College campus, will discuss the importance of the Title IX regulation regarding sexual assault at 7:15 p.m. She will be followed by poetry readings including those by the Get Lit Players, a nationally-acclaimed group of Los Angeles high school students who perform classic and spoken word poetry around the country.
As an activist and feminist, Wanjuki speaks and blogs regularly about feminism, the campus rape culture and the Title IX regulation, which states that no person shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from, denied benefits of, or subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance. Her work focuses on ending campus sexual violence and using new media for social change. She is a founding co-organizer of the Know Your IX ED ACT NOW campaign focused on holding schools accountable for protecting the right to an education free of sexual violence. Her story and commentary are featured in Jennifer Baumgardner’s “It Was Rape,” and “The Hunting Ground” by the makers of “The Invisible War.”
The Get Lit Players are an award-winning performance troupe with an innovative curriculum that fuses classic, iconic poetry with students’ original spoken word responses, and places the greatest poets of our time in dialogue with more than 20,000 teens each year to help them transform their lives and communities through art and social consciousness. The Get Lit Players have performed on several national television shows including the “Queen Latifah Show” and the “Hollywood Bowl.”
Other guest performers for the evening include Poetic Rockstar, a spoken word poet based in Washington D.C., and singer Cara Clase, Millersville University alumna.
A candlelight vigil for those who have died because of sexual violence will be held later in the evening.
The Take Back the Night event is planned by Lycoming’s Revolution Against Rape, a student-led organization that educates the campus community and others on sexual misconduct and rape, and provides a safe environment and support system for survivors.
Register for the event, which starts at 7 p.m., online.