Recent news:
Feb. 27, 2008
Jordan, Hickenlooper and Harding among speakers at Sunday’s Noel memorial service
Among the speakers at Sunday’s memorial service for Metro State Associate Professor Emeritus Rachel B. Noel are President Stephen Jordan, Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper and Vincent Harding, Professor Emeritus of Religion and Social Transformation at the Iliff School of Theology ... more >
Feb. 13, 2008
Service set for Rachel B. Noel
The memorial service for Metro State Professor Emeritus Rachel B. Noel will be held at 3 p.m., Sunday, March 2, at Shorter Community AME Church, 3100 Richard Allen Court (Richard Allen Ct. and Martin Luther King Blvd.)... more >
Feb. 6, 2008
Noel community event warms souls on snowy eve
A snowy Colorado evening did little to stifle the warm celebration at the 2008 Rachel B. Noel Distinguished Visiting Professorship Community Event ... more >
Feb. 4, 2008
Mrs. Rachel B. Noel passes away
Rachel B. Noel, 90, passed away in her sleep Monday, Feb. 4. She had been living with her daughter Angela Noel in Oakland, Calif. ... more >
2008 Rachel B. Noel
Distinguished Visiting Professorship
The 2008 Noel Professorship Community Event featured
California Poet Laureate Al Youngin a tribute to Colorado's civil rights leaders
in "Rebels Remembered"
"Like jazz, Al Young is an original American voice."
-Muriel Johnson, Director, California Arts Council, on the appointment of Al Young
as California Poet Laureate
A former Edward B. Jones Lecturer in creative writing at Stanford, Al Young has taught poetry and fiction writing at universities throughout California and the country. His many writing awards include a Guggenheim, Fulbright Fellowships and American Book Awards.
Join Al Young in a tribute to Colorado's civil rights leaders. From 1955 to 1970-the era of Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks, the Black Panther Party, CORE, school busing, Malcolm X and economic boycotts-individuals in Denver and Colorado were carving civil rights for citizens here as well.
The Professorship
The Rachel B. Noel Distinguished Visiting Professorship was initiated in 1981 to foster multiculturalism, diversity and academic excellence at Metropolitan State College of Denver. The professorship brings renowned scholars and artists of distinction to Metro State to conduct classes, seminars, performances and lectures for students, faculty and the larger Denver community.
Rachel B. Noel Distinguished Professors have included such luminaries as Princeton Professor Cornel West, pianist Billy Taylor, author Iyanla Vanzant, former president of Spellman College Johnetta Cole, jazz singer Diane Reeves, the late actor and civil rights activist Ossie Davis and executive editor of Ebony magazine Lerone Bennett Jr.
About Rachel B. Noel
A lion of the civil rights movement in Denver, in 1965 Rachel Noel became the first African American elected to the Denver Public School board and the first African American woman ever to serve elected office in Colorado. On April 25, 1968, she presented the DPS board with the Noel Resolution, which asked the superintendent to develop a plan to integrate Denver's public schools. Under a cloud of threats to Noel and her family, the resolution passed in 1970.
The U.S. Supreme Court would eventually echo Noel's position in its landmark decision of 1973, Keyes v. Denver School District No. 1, making Denver the first city outside the American South to receive instructions by the country's highest court to address segregation with school busing.
A part of Metro State's diverse history, Rachel Noel came to Metro State as a teacher of sociology and African American studies in 1969 and served as chair of the African American Studies Department from 1971 to 1980.
As her legacy continues to be of such value to the Metro State community, the College created the distinguished professorship to honor Noel when she retired. A recipient of many distinctions, Noel, who was born in 1918, has lived to see a Denver middle school named in her honor as well as Metro State's Rachel B. Noel Distinguished Visiting Professorship. She holds degrees from Hampton and Fisk Universities and an honorary doctorate from the University of Denver. Her other accomplishments are many:
- Received the Anti-Defamation League's Civil Rights Award in 2004
- Served on Mayor Wellington Webb's Black Advisory Committee; chaired Mayor Federico Peña's Black Advisory Committee
- Served on the Advisory Board of the United States Civil Rights Commission
- Named among Top 100 Citizens of the Century in a list compiled by the Rocky Mountain News in 2000
- Inducted into the Colorado Women's Hall of Fame in 1996
- Earned the Martin Luther King Jr. Humanitarian Award in 1990
- Served on the Chancellor's Advisory Committee for the Health Sciences at the University of Colorado, Boulder and Denver
- Served as Denver Housing Authority commissioner
- Was the first African American to serve on the University of Colorado Board of Regents (1976-1984); chaired the board for one year
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