Entering MDiv Student Named One of Boston’s Ten Outstanding Young Leaders by City Awake
September 2020 – New School of Theology (STH) student Omari Jahi Aarons has had a busy and exciting September. This week, he officially matriculated as a Master of Divinity student at STH, and he was recently named to the City Awake “Ten Outstanding Young Leaders” list, a list that is published each year to recognize young leaders dedicated to civic advancement in the greater Boston area.
Aarons strongly believes in inclusion, and recently completed a three-year term as the national co-chair of the Liberty Employees of African Descent and Allies employee resource group. He is pursuing the Global and Community Engagement track in the Master of Divinity program at STH. About the award recognition, Aarons says, “I’m honored and humbled to be named to this list. This recognition is especially significant [at] this moment as we wrestle with what it means to be “diverse” and “inclusive” in real and consequential terms. Justice isn’t a distant concept for us to analyze from the history books; we’re recording it with our smartphones, watching it on TV, and making choices to enact it every day. More than anything, I hope my work, and that of my fellow honorees provides a blueprint for how we can all make social justice work just as real and consequential as the efforts to fight against inclusion.”
Founded in late 2013, City Awake is a program of the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce, and its mission is to “empower next-generation Greater Boston leaders through programming that builds community and fosters dialogue about the most pressing issues facing our region. Through this work, we work to deepen your connections to the broader business and civic communities and recognize your important contributions to our thriving economy.” The full 2020 list of Ten Outstanding Young Leaders can be found here.