With a dedicated career helping children and families adversely impacted by immigration, homelessness, abuse, and oppressive systems in South America, Europe, and his native Milwaukee, Luke serves as Director of Program Design and Community Engagement at the Institute for Child and Family Well-being at Children’s Wisconsin.
As an award-winning Senior Columnist for the Milwaukee Independent, Reggie Jackson covers a range of African American issues. He is also a Consultant with Nurturing Diversity Partners, and volunteers as Head Griot for America’s Black Holocaust Museum (ABHM) in Bronzeville.
REGGIE JACKSON: 7x Award Winner in Best Column categories from the Milwaukee Press Club
As a teacher for over twenty years, Dominic Inouye helped students to develop their reading, writing, critical thinking, and, most of all, their voices. He worked as The Pfister Hotel Narrator, a one-year appointment, and currently manages the ZIP MKE project that photo documents the city to promote cultural understanding.
Dominic Inouye: 2x Award Winner in Best Column category from the Milwaukee Press Club
Dr. Kenneth Cole is a Licensed Psychologist who has spent the past two decades helping members of the community in developing the ability to bring about positive change for their lives, and empowering those individuals to advocate for themselves.
Kenneth Cole: 2x Award Winner in Reporting categories from the Milwaukee Press Club
Pardeep Kaleka is the Executive Director of the Interfaith Conference of Greater Milwaukee, published author of The Gifts of Our Wounds, award-winning columnist with Milwaukee Independent, and a clinician specializing in utilizing a trauma-informed approach to treat survivors and perpetrators of assault, abuse, and acts of violence.
PARDEEP KALEKA: Winner in Best Blog category of the 88th Annual Milwaukee Press Club Awards
John Pavlovitz: Winner of Best Blog at the 89th Annual Milwaukee Press Club Awards
Recent Columns
Today’s Jim Crow America: When a political party abandons democracy to “save” the nation
As expected, the House Republicans elected Elise Stefanik (R-NY), Trump’s choice for conference chair, to replace Representative Liz Cheney (R-WY). This means that the four top House Republican leaders — Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), Minority Whip Steve...
What Might Have Been: The inexplicable path that kept me from ending up as another angry White man
I am a person of profound privilege. As a white, cisgender-heterosexual Christian man raised in America, I have had nearly every benefit and buffer afforded human beings, and this has made my path exponentially easier than those not carrying these qualifiers. Simply...
Pardeep Kaleka: What the heartbreaking COVID-19 crisis in India can teach us all here in Milwaukee
It is almost impossible to put into words the level of catastrophe that the recent COVID-19 breakout has unleashed on the people of India. The latest COVID-19 surge has seen new infections top 300-400K every day for the past few weeks. If those numbers alarm you,...
Political Tribalism: Why people who were willing to inject bleach are refusing the COVID-19 vaccination
I recently received a text from our local pharmacy, asking us to contact two friends or family members and tell them to get vaccinated. That this is even necessary, illustrates this nation’s worst present affliction: political tribalism. In the wake of the single most...
Systemic Racism 401: The Myth of American Meritocracy
Reggie Jackson details the institution of racial discrimination that White Americans continue to ignore or support. This feature is part of a special series of articles that takes a closer look at the issue of Racism in the United States, understanding what Racism is...
Republicans blast the same “Woke Corporate America” that has provided them financing to stay in office
On April 19, Senator Rick Scott (R-FL), who is the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, in charge of fundraising to elect Republicans to the Senate, wrote an astonishing op-ed for Fox Business. It lashed out at “Woke Corporate America,” the...
It is hard for people who do not suffer from mental illness to understand people who do
If you don’t suffer from mental illness, there’s something you need to know about those of us who do, because it may be impossible for us to tell you — and we really want to tell you. There is a disheartening pattern that begins on many of our days. We wake up fully...
Reparations 101: Repairing the damage from generations of concentrated disadvantage
“At long last, let America contemplate the scope of its enduring human-rights wrong against a whole people. Let the vision of blacks not become so blighted from a sunless eternity that we fail to see the staggering breadth of America’s crime against us. Solutions must...
Stop using White discomfort to silence the truth: An open letter to Brett Favre and Tommy Tubberville
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of...
