THE SOUTH FLORIDA PEOPLE OF COLOR
Our Origin Story
In 2015, South Florida People of Color (SFPoC) was established to give every resident of Miami Shores a real seat at the table — not the symbolic kind, the kind where decisions get made in the town of Miami Shores. Our core vision aimed to bring people whose stories don't usually meet, building real community through the conversations most people won't have and the meals strangers wouldn't think to share. This collective effort has given rise to a range of initiatives that have garnered recognition and acclaim, including:
The renowned "Awkward Dinner" series has been honored with prestigious awards. These dinners provide a unique platform for strangers who would never share a sidewalk, let alone a sentence, to come together and explore uncomfortable topics, asking the questions polite company avoids.
The celebrated Unity360 Community Dialogues have received widespread acclaim. These are the kind of conversations that follow you home, serve as a room built for honesty for community members to engage in open conversations about who we are, where we come from, and what shapes the way we move through the world, aiming to discover what we've been missing in each other.
The Unity360 Critical Film Series, an esteemed program that showcases films that refuse to let us look away — from this region's history, from the lives of the people living it, from the conversations the news won't host. Through this series, we create opportunities for rfilms that refuse to let us look away — from this region's history, from the lives of the people living it, from the conversations the news won't host.
Unity360 Event Programming: We design every program around the people who will be in the room — because the room is the program. We understand the significance of customization in fostering meaningful connections. Alongside information sharing and knowledge dissemination, we emphasize experiential activities and storytelling to encourage individuals to engage with these subjects on a profound level, promoting the moments when someone hears something they have heard a hundred times and finally lets it land.
The Unity360 Institute was founded in 2018 to extend SFPoC's craft beyond the dinner table — into workplaces, classrooms, and the institutions whose decisions shape the region. We help organizations slow down, listen harder, and rethink the assumptions everyone carries without noticing. The work is patient. It is also honest. It is built on the conviction that culture changes one room at a time, and that the room is where we begin.
WHAT WE DO
We develop enriching and educational programming that brings sharply different points of view into the same room and creates a rare table where neighbors who would not otherwise meet break bread. By through history, food, art, and the kind of storytelling that doesn't flinch, we create a platform for deep dialogues that help people feel known, heard, and at home in a region still learning to know itself.
OUR VISION
A South Florida shaped less by what divides it than by the conversations its people are willing to have — across age, neighborhood, and the histories none of us inherited alone
OUR COMMUNITY
South Florida People of Color was founded in 2015 to give every resident of Miami Shores a real seat at the table. Nearly a decade later, we are known for something both simpler and harder than politics: we host the conversations most people won't. Around dinner tables. On bus tours through neighborhoods drawn by the redliner's hand. In rooms where strangers leave as something closer to neighbors. Our work is built on a wager — that a region's future is shaped less by the speeches it gives itself than by what its people are willing to say to each other when no one is performing.
+ OUR EXECUTIVE BOARD
Janice M. Graham
Executive Director of Casa Valentina
Christian Ulvert
President of EDGE Communications. Christian
+ MANAGEMENT TEAM
Dr. Pamela Hall
Associate Professor of Psychology at Barry University
JoHanna “J” Thompson, MPA
Unity360 Institute
Executive Co-Director, Florida Restorative Justice Association
Mo Beasley
Events Director
Kechi Okpala
Social Media Director
+ PARTNERS
