Cooperative Living June 2020 - 17

CivicPride | by Jamie Ruff, Contributing Writer
Teaching More
than Just Tai Chi
Lonnie Calhoun's range extends
from literacy to martial arts
L
onnie Calhoun III's movements are
slow and deliberate - every turn,
every step, every hand movement.
They are the motions of battle -
albeit, in this instance, he is as a Tai
Chi instructor and they are the motions
of low-impact exercise.
But his actions and speech are
always just as measured, whether he's
teaching martial arts for self-defense
or in a meeting. There is always
something worthwhile to fight for.
" I'm trying to make meaning out of
my life, " he says. " I keep asking myself,
'How do I make meaning?' I want to be a
part of the community and the solution.
I don't want to be a bystander. "
" I like giving to causes - not just the
physical, but the financial is important
too, " Calhoun says. Ultimately, he says,
it is part of contributing to your world.
And, indeed, Calhoun picks up a
pertinent quote from civil rights icon
Martin Luther King Jr.: " Life's most
persistent and urgent question is,
'What are you doing for others?' "
Calhoun made a career promoting
diversity, and it grew out of activism that
taught him the need for involvement.
As a child in the small town of
Lonnie Calhoun III at a U.S.-China
conference in Washington, D.C., in 2018.
The litany of organizations he works
with is a recital of local good causes.
He serves as the founder and principal
facilitator of the Prince Edward County
Literacy Council, vice president of the
United Way of Prince Edward County,
and is on the advisory board of the
Longwood Center for the Visual Arts.
Calhoun is a member of the Farmville
Chamber of Commerce. He has also
served as the director of the Charlotte
County Adult Learning Center and on
the boards of directors of the Prince
Edward Public School Endowment
Fund, the Southside Virginia Family
YMCA and the Robert Russa Moton
Museum (featured in February's
Cooperative Living).
co-opliving.com
Vidalia, Ga., located in the south-central
part of the state renowned for its
namesake onions, he participated in
the local civil rights movement.
The family moved to Michigan and
then to England before returning to
Vidalia in the mid-1960s when Calhoun
was in middle school.
The return " marked the beginning
of my race consciousness, " he recalls.
Calhoun ran into the culture and
customs of the segregated South and
was given what was a standard talk
about how to interact, and not interact,
with white people.
But times were changing and his
father made sure he was part of it. First
his brother and then Lonnie became part
of school desegregation efforts. It wasn't
long before Calhoun and other students
started traveling around protesting.
They were taught not to make eye
contact. " Because when you made
eye contact it became personal, " he says.
From October 1995 until 2010,
Calhoun was Longwood University's
director of multicultural affairs and
Lonnie Calhoun III leading a
Tai Chi class at First Baptist Church
in Farmville.
international student services. He
used his office as a clearinghouse for
" the broad range " of minority issues,
be they religious pluralism or inclusion
of minority students, including a
rapid increase in Chinese students at
the time.
Calhoun's post-Longwood career is
as president and CEO of Cal-Lon LLC:
the Intercultural Professionals, the
Education Specialist. The company
provides strategy, evaluation and
capacity-building services to
foundations, nonprofit organizations,
small colleges and corporate community
involvement programs. He is also a
senior consultant with the Washington,
D.C.-based consulting firm.
But locally that has taken a back seat
to the visibility of his civic efforts.
It was poetic that he ended up in
Prince Edward County, where local
officials closed public schools from
1959 to 1964 rather than desegregate.
The area's history is part of the
motivation and need for his work with
the literacy council, a passion project.
He prompted the creation of the council
a few years ago out of concern that
nothing was being done to help adults
from being left behind or marginalized
because they were unable to read.
He has been the point person in
organizing the council, its primary
contact and chaired its monthly meetings
in the more-than-a-year-long effort.
He's fighting, seemingly in slow motion,
to get it done.
" Making meaning out of my life,
that's important to me, " he says. ■
June 2020 | Cooperative Living | 15
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Cooperative Living June 2020

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