About
Convene. Create. Catalyze.
The Belk Center serves North Carolina’s community colleges by convening leaders, creating tools, and catalyzing social and economic mobility for learners – building stronger, more resilient communities.
Our Mission
Our Vision
We’re working to build a North Carolina where all 58 community colleges are connected, supported, and equipped in their charge to drive statewide prosperity and equity.
Our Commitment to Racial Equity
We commit to racial equity through dismantling the systemic barriers that impede historically and systemically underserved populations, especially Black, Latin*1, and American Indian students, from achieving their academic, economic, and social success through our evaluation, research, and support for developing the next generation of community college leaders.
We commit to enabling executive leaders to utilize evidence-based tools and culturally relevant strategies to inform decisions that lead to equitable student success for historically and systemically underserved populations.
We commit to center the experiences and outcomes of Black, Latin*, and American Indian students in our research and in the preparation of future community college leaders.
1 Following Salinas (2020), we use Latin* to refer to individuals that may have been classified as Latinx, Latino, Latina, Latine, or Hispanic using other classification structures and data sources. The term Latin* is respectful of the various linguistic groups that comprise this racial/ethnic identification and is sensitive to a variety of gender identities.
We work with colleges, educators, and policymakers to advance equitable student outcomes within individual institutions and at the state level.
Our history.
