My Specialities

Moderating/Mediating

Fostering conversations and finding innovative approaches and common grounds amidst disparate groups and conflictive situations.

Technology and Underserved Communities

Helping scientists and engineers work with communities for innovations that communities will use.
Scientists and engineers are brilliant at creating new knowledge and technology but often face challenges engaging the communities that might use or reject them. Estimates of lost revenue range to the billions. I’ve worked with scientists, engineers, emergency surgeons and facilitated conversations with communities. I co-coined the term and concept “empathetic engineering” and been a technology and community lead for programming and projects for the National Science Foundation, US Department of Commerce, Baltimore City the Smithsonian Museum and Lutece, the IT Office of Paris.
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Baltimore Stories

Giving voice to unheard stories and identifying strategies to raise them.

After the death of Freddie Gray and the Baltimore Uprising, community leaders called for project that would address narratives of race, social class and power. Baltimore Stories: Narrative in the Life of an American City, a narrative project that staged 20 events with 25 Baltimore community partners, was a direct response and cited by the funder, the National Endowment for the Humanities, as a national model for deep community conversation, and modeled by New York City, Charlotte, Fort Worth and Colombia, South American with the FARC rebels.

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Painted Screen Society

Baltimore has hundreds of historic painted screens—what to do with them? Issues of race, social class, immigration, gentrification and architecture required a delicate approach.

A discussion of the politics of artifacts, of race, immigration, social class and the impact of gentrification. European immigrants painted door screens to provide both privacy and airflow. Scholars rescued hundreds from the trash bins of developers but there were differing opinions on how to regard them in a majority Black city. Two successful sessions uncovered the unspoken concerns and jumpstarted a responsive resolution and plans going forward.

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Strategic Planning

Planning that the rich engages diverse or otherwise silent groups.

The best planning requires engaging diverse opinions. When the Sandy Spring Museum was selected to serve as a Regional Folklike Center, they reached out to me to interview regional immigrant and ethnic groups, board and staff members for their strategic planning, my fee funded by the Maryland State Art Council. Other organizations that I have led all or part of their strategic or other planning include the Greater Baltimore Cultural Association, the Baltimore Black Arts District, the Arch Social Club 501(c)3), the Baltimore Development Corporation and the Baltimore City Office of IT.

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Thinkathons

“Everyone who came to the Thinkathon felt heard.” Lamondre Randall, BMore Group

A Thinkathon is a facilitated daylong co-creation workshop of community members, scholars, activists, artists, program officers and funders work in small groups on current global challenges and their impact on local communities. come together. The tangible outcomes of a Thinkathon relate to the breadth of experience in the room and the ability to think openly and collaboratively. I’ve planned and moderated Thinkathons in Baltimore (nine years), College Park, Fort Worth and a dedicated Thinkathon for the child migrant crisis; and University of Maryland campus planning.

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Hoes Heights Action Committee

A successful town discussion of 150 people of the contested future of a historic Beaux Arts water tower area near a historic Black community.
The fate of a paved area around a historic Beaux Arts water tower at the entrance of a historic Black community had become the center of a conflict of race and social class. The parties had stopped talking. I was asked to intervene and to moderate a spirited town hall of 150 live and online participants that led to humor, a successful resolution and a jumpstart toward a solution.
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Let's Connect

1 + 4 =

Dr. Parks brings a wealth of knowledge from her background in everyday aesthetics and her involvement with numerous high-impact interdisciplinary projects. As a speaker at our international symposium on Beauty at Work, she brought to bear insights integrating theory and practice in unique ways. The audience was left inspired by her rich examples of initiatives integrating art and justice which had transformative effects on diverse communities.

Brandon Vaidyanathan, Ph.D., Catholic University

I wanted scientists from around the world to appreciate why our research, constructed carefully in laboratories, matters to a wider world. Dr. Parks’ work with Baltimore youth and with farmers through the Natural Dye Initiative demonstrates powerfully the importance of beauty across race, gender, and social class. Many meeting attendees went out of their way to tell me how Dr. Parks’ presentation moved them and motivated them to think more explicitly about the social relevance of their work.

Anjan Chatterjee, M.D., Director, PENN Center for Neuroaesthetics

Sheri L. Parks rivets listeners with profound insights, drawing on deep knowledge, both academic and experiential, of what it means to endure and, beyond that, to create community today. Marked by remarkable generosity and a playful spirit, her work and her words inspire. It has been a special treat in my career to hear Dr. Parks speak and then to host her at my institution.

Bethany Wiggens, Ph.D., Founding Director, University of Pennsylvania Center for Environmental Humanities

Client Samples