Juan Carlos Morales Named 2025 North Star Faculty Fellow
Juan Carlos Morales, Associate Professor of Graphic Design, has been named one of 33 North Star Faculty Fellows announced this month by the New England Board of Higher Education.
1/16/2025
Juan Carlos Morales, Endicott’s Associate Professor of Graphic Design, has been named one of 33 North Star Faculty Fellows announced this month by the New England Board of Higher Education. The North Star Faculty Fellowship is a professional development program for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) faculty members whose institutions belong to the North Star Collective.
A semester-long fellowship created by BIPOC faculty for BIPOC faculty in New England, the North Star Faculty Fellowship has been previously awarded to Endicott Associate Professor of Security Studies Ashlie Perry, Distinguished Professor of Broadcast and Digital Journalism Lara Salahi, Associate Professor of Sociology Adilia James, and current adjunct professor (and former Assistant Professor of Education) Annabelle Estera.
“I’m incredibly grateful for this fellowship and the opportunities I've already had to get to know and learn from an insanely diverse group of hard-working and smart-thinking individuals across the BIPOC and Latinx community in New England,” said Morales.
Grounded in tenets of reparative justice, the fellowship promotes racial trauma healing by providing a nourishing community of care, mentorship, and professional development for BIPOC faculty in all fields. The fellowship runs from January to May 2025.
During the fellowship, Morales is exploring how sound imagery creates a sense of mood.
“How different types of imagery, still and moving, along with sound—from ambient patterns and nature to traditional music—are combined in what I call ‘sound imagery’ to create an explicit sense of mood in its many variations,” he explained. “I'm looking at how they can be experienced, even engaged interactively, in art installations, potential student projects, and perhaps even a healing capacity.”
Morales’ research has led him to redesign and rethink learning, creative, and innovation spaces for teaching and learning.
“I'm looking at how we can develop genuinely experiential activities and creative spaces for teaching, learning, innovating, performing, and perhaps even healing across a variety of visual arts and disciplines like the ones found at the School of Visual & Performing Arts at Endicott,” said Morales, who added that his conversations with other North Star Fellows have helped validate the research he’s started and where he can take it.
The New England Board of Higher Education established the North Star Collective in 2021. In addition to the Faculty Fellowship, the North Star Collective provides programming for institutional members to collaborate, share best practices, and problem-solve on issues related to faculty racial equity on their campuses. These include in-person, one-day gatherings for campus administrators, staff, and faculty working on racial equity for faculty on their campuses.
Learn more.