The Anita Mackey Service Awards recognize undergraduate and graduate students for outstanding scholarship and social justice work. The awards honor and continue the legacy of Anita J. Mackey, who served on the Advisory Committee of the Center for Black Studies for 35 years, since the Center’s inception in 1969.
During her 40 years in Santa Barbara (1964–2004), Mrs. Mackey served on dozens of local and national boards including the Civil Rights Commission, the Mental Health Association, and the Fire and Police Commission. Her awards—locally, nationally, and internationally—are too numerous to name, but include being listed in several editions of Who’s Who of American Women and receiving the Santa Barbara NAACP Award for outstanding service (1990), the Santa Barbara News-Press Lifetime Achievement Award (1989), Santa Barbara Woman of the Year (1976), and Seventh-day Adventist Distinguished Woman Award (1976).
2017 Award Recipients
Mariah Boyd has done remarkable work in service to the Black community and Black students as, among other work, chair of the Black Student Union, a participant in the CBSR’s study trip to Haiti in 2015, and a
co-author of an article on the Haiti trip in the Journal of Haitian Studies.
Saxon Cropper-Sykes is an exemplary student-scholar, founding the Black Student Engagement Program, serving as the Goodspeed Intern in the Office of the Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs, and receiving the Michael D. Young award for Engaged Scholarship.
Lois Harmon, PhD in Education, was active with the Black Student Graduate Association, including co-developing their Colloquium series; she represented UCSB at Graduate Research Advocacy Day in Sacramento in 2017 and participated in a number of undergraduate research and teaching programs.
Anita Mackey Archives
An oral history of Mrs. Mackey is being compiled for the archives at the Davidson Library and her papers have been deposited at the UCSB California Ethnic and Multicultural Archives. The Center for Black Studies Research is also working to transform her oral history transcripts into a published book.
Community Birthday Celebration
In 2014, the Center organized a community celebration of Anita Mackey's 100th birthday.
