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Protests expected outside EVMS in response to racist yearbook photos

EVMS announced final members appointed to a new, independent volunteer board that will examine the school's "past and present culture."

NORFOLK, Va. — A planned protest is expected outside the Eastern Virginia Medical School campus Friday.

EVMS Communications and Marketing sent out a notice that an "outside organization" has planned to protest from 3 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.

Protesters are asked to use the public sidewalk on the south side of Fairfax Avenue between Children's Lane and Olney Road.

Community Advisory Board on Diversity and Inclusion 

EVMS announced final members appointed to a new, independent volunteer board that will examine the school's "past and present culture."

The board will give final recommendations on improving the school's diversity and inclusion efforts.

The board members include business and community leaders:

  •  Gilbert Bland, MBA, chair of the Community Advisory Board on Diversity and Inclusion
  • Edward L. Ayers, PhD, Tucker-Boatwright Professor of the Humanities and President Emeritus of the University of Richmond
  • L.D. Britt, MD, MPH, the Edward J. Brickhouse Chair in Surgery and the Henry Ford Professor of Surgery and Professor and Chair of Surgery at EVMS
  • Susan R. Colpitts, Founder of Signature Family Wealth Advisors and leads the Client Services Team
  • Delceno C. Miles, President/CEO of The Miles Agency, a Virginia Beach-based niche marketing and public relations firm
  • Xavier R. Richardson, MBA, Senior Vice President & Chief Corporate Development Officer for Mary Washington Healthcare
  • James “Jim” Wood Jr., MDiv, Senior Pastor of First Presbyterian Church
  • Jonathan C. Zur, President & CEO of the Virginia Center for Inclusive Communities

EVMS President Richard V. Homan previously announced an external investigation into past yearbooks following Governor Ralph Northam's racist yearbook photo controversy.

The 1984 EVMS yearbook features a photo of a person in blackface and another person in a Ku Klux Klan robe and hood under Northam's name.

RELATED: EVMS president apologizes for racist picture on Governor Ralph Northam's yearbook page

The school has since said other controversial photos across multiple yearbooks has been discovered.

"The board, like our senior management team, is committed to discovering quickly how unacceptable photos such as these came to be published in the past. Further, we are committed to ensuring that our existing culture is one that would never tolerate such actions today," Homan said in a statement.

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