The National Multicultural Conference and Summit, a biannual event held to discuss mental health and diversity and sponsored in part by the UH College of Education, will be on Jan. 17 and 18 at the Royal Sonesta Houston hotel. A free preview will be open to the public today.
“We are hoping to draw students, faculty and community members to get a taste of the prestigious event,” said Jeylan Yassin, director of communications for the College of Education.
“The NMCS 2013 would normally involve a conference fee, but by coming to the preview, students get a sense of what these professional conferences are like without paying the fee or traveling to the event.”
The NMCS, first held in 1999, will feature programs on a variety of topics such as appropriate therapeutic responses to LGBT clients, violence on marginalized groups and the best practices in health disparities, according to the official website.
“While we would imagine that psychology students would be interested in this lecture, folks interested in issues — the experiences of ethnical and racial minorities, sexual orientation, gender and gender expression as well as disability, language and learning issues,” Yassin said.
“The discussion will be lively. For anyone who plans to work in the human services fields or among people, these discussions will provide special insights into broader issues.”
The conference will also honor two speakers — former Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders and Phyllis Randolph Frye, grandmother of the National Transgender and Political Movement and the first transgender judge in Texas.
With UH being the second most diverse university in the country, Yassin explained that both the UH and Houston are great hosts for the conference.
“Our students encounter more diverse experiences and will have to understand other perspectives more so than previous generations and more than folks who live in a more homogenous part of the country,” Yassin said.