State honor

Mary Sam receives state human rights award
By Steve Waller, Public Information Specialist, Central Lakes College
Mary Sam, Director of Diversity and Student Affairs at Central Lakes College, is a 2010 recipient of the Minnesota League of Human Rights Award, which recognizes outstanding contributions concerning human rights issues.
Described as a “seasoned activist,” Sam received the award Dec. 3 from the Minnesota League of Human Rights Commissions at the Minnesota Department of Human Rights Conference at the Crowne Plaza in St. Paul. This is the second such statewide honor for Sam. She was the recipient of the 1997 League of Human Rights Commissions Award for her distinguished service at Armstrong High School in Plymouth.
The league may present the award to an individual or organization for outstanding effort to protect or enhance human rights in the state. Among previous winners is the Mille Lacs Area Human Rights Commission (2005), the first regional human rights commission to include an American Indian Reservation. Sam helped form that organization.
“This is a great honor and acknowledges Mary’s many contributions in helping to make Minnesota and this area a better place in which to live and work,” said Dr. Larry Lundblad, president of Central Lakes College, Brainerd and Staples.
“Students, faculty, and staff at Central Lakes College benefit from the leadership, vision, passion, and experience that she brings to her position as Director of Diversity. It is great that she had been recognized for her statewide efforts.”
Here is what the league said in presenting the award:
“Mary Sam brings passion, commitment and activism to issues of human and civil rights. Mary is intolerant of intolerance. Her activist role began as a high school student in the metro area where she led efforts to resolve issues of justice and equality in constructive ways.
“In the early ’90s Mary produced ‘Daring to be Different: A Vision of Diversity,’ which is a documentary video on race relationships.
“Her Mille Lacs focus began in 2001 when she took on the role of Government Affairs and Community Relations Coordinator for the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe.
“She organized ‘Voices of Unity’ at Mille Lacs in 2003 with local clergy, spiritual leaders and tribal elders.
“Mary understands that a community’s life blood is built on relationships, improved communication and understanding and being understood.
“It took Mary several years of dialogue with community leaders before she was able to facilitate the foundation of the Mille Lacs Area Human Rights Commission in 2005. She secured the support of the cities of Garrison, Isle and Onamia, the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, schools including Isle, Onamia, and Nay Ah Shing, along with the Mille Lacs Band’s Corporate Commission, Mille Lacs Health System, the Crosier Community, Mille Lacs Academy, and local law enforcement agencies in forming a partnership with all signing human rights ordinances.
The Mille Lacs Area Human Rights Commission is the only commission in Minnesota, and quite possibly in the nation, which is a partnership between several cities, businesses, schools law enforcement agencies, spiritual leaders and the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, an American Indian tribe, a sovereign nation.
“In seeking what works, in doing what is right, Mary does not allow old rules to squelch her clarity of purpose-sense of justice and the valuing of human and civil rights.
“Others have answered her clarion call. Through Mary’s leadership, Mille Lacs received a grant for the training of 26 local leaders, male and female, white and Indian, from the Blandin Rural Leadership Foundation.
“She continues to not look away, to speak up about abuses of human and civil rights. As long as intolerance is tolerated, Mary Sam will be present, bold and purposeful.”
The League of Minnesota Human Rights Commissions, founded in 1972, is a coalition of local human-rights commissions that have been established by charter or ordinance in communities throughout Minnesota. The league is the only private, state-wide agency concerned with fighting all forms of illegal discrimination, and with enhancing the rights of all groups of people defined under the Minnesota Human Rights Law (MS 363).