When he was 11, Randolph Carter turned to God for answers and made a promise that would shape the rest of his life.
Carter’s native Liberia was embroiled in its first civil war, and before the violence reached his home of Monrovia, his parents sent him to a village near the Sierra Leone border for safety. Separated from his parents, Carter was the primary provider for his 7-year-old brother and 5-year-old cousin. During that time, the rebels tried to conscript him many times.
“One time still stands out; I had to run away from these guys,” he said. “During the course of running and hiding over two days, I wanted God to give me an explanation as to why I’m having to suffer, why life is so difficult, where my parents are and are they alive or dead,” Carter said. “Finally I said to God, ‘If I can really survive this, I’ll work to make sure that other young people don’t have to go through what I’m going through.’ “
Carter and his family did survive and were reunited back in Monrovia. Shortly after, Carter, who is the coordinator of faculty and staff development in the Office of Institutional Diversity, was selected for a United Nations program.
“The pilot program was to train 40 kids to do peer mediation, conflict resolution and trauma counseling,” Carter said. “The idea was to take the young people, train them on this and put them back in their schools.
“Because, think about if you saw someone your age kill your parent in cold blood with their AK-47, after the war subsided, they aren’t carrying the AK-47, and they’re sitting next to you in the classroom-that’s a fight,” Carter said.
Being chosen for the program was a reminder of his promise to God, and Carter “realized it was time to do it.” From 1993 to 2009, Carter continued his work in international development, specifically around children and youth affected by armed conflict. During that time, Carter worked in 18 countries in Africa and Asia.
In 2009, Carter, his wife, Litashia, and daughter, Rayna, moved to Georgia so that he could attend UGA as a graduate student. Litashia Carter is an academic adviser at UGA.
He started in the Office of Institutional Diversity as a graduate assistant, a role he held for two years. In 2011, he consulted part time for OID, working on strategic planning. After a restructuring, Carter applied for and accepted his current position-something he said isn’t too far from what he used to do globally.
“It’s kind of the same because outside of the travel, I see what I was doing as one of two things: one, impacting change in my world. And in that capacity, my world was huge,” Carter said. “The second thing was building the capacity of people, engaging with people in a way that they become better.”
At UGA, Carter helps faculty, staff and students grow and develop through the Diversity and Inclusion Certificate program, which requires one core class and five electives. More than 1,000 UGA employees have taken one course in the program, which is managed by Carter. In the core class, “Diversity @ UGA: Beyond the Numbers,” Carter discusses various aspects of the university’s diversity.
“One example of a dimension (of diversity): When I came to Athens, Georgia, I learned that there were students here who have learned my father’s dialect, Kpelle, and I can’t even speak my father’s dialect,” he said. “For me, that’s fascinating linguistic diversity, which people don’t talk about.”
Carter also works with what he calls his “UGA family,” partners throughout the university who have helped him on programs or initiatives.
Carter also has a “soccer family.” For the last five years, he’s coached a group of boys, now 16-17. He also has coached a group of 11-year-old girls for nearly two years.
Carter, who currently is pursuing a doctor of Christian ministry degree from Liberty Theological Seminary, said helping break down stereotypes or assumptions is what drives him. He said his “little steps” are helping to engage students, faculty and staff in ways that can change the university landscape.
“I come to work because every day, every meeting, every interaction contributes to something bigger than myself,” he said. “If we can change the mind of any of the young people who walk this campus, if we can change the perspective of what respect means and how to give it to someone outside of what color their skin is or their sexual orientation, then we can change the world.”
