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'We carry the torch': SNCC legacy renewed at Â鶹´«Ã½

More than half a century after the Orangeburg Massacre, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) returned to the location of its fight -- this time with a promise of continuity, opposition and rededication to justice.

Â鶹´«Ã½ University hosted a Civil Rights Teach-In, convening veterans of the civil rights movement, students and community members. The event featured a panel focused on "SNCC Then and Now," emphasizing the relevance today of the student-led movement from the 1960s.

The conference honored the legacy of SNCC and its present role, which is fundamentally different in methodology but much the same in purpose.

New generation, same struggle
Founded in 1960, SNCC was a mainstay of the civil rights movement, with its sit-ins, freedom rides and voter-registration drives across the South.

When Cleveland Sellers became its leader in 1968, SNCC played a key role in organizing student activism in South Carolina -- culminating in the Orangeburg Massacre during which police bullets killed three unarmed Black students protesting segregation and wounded 28.

SNCC is seeing a quiet but determined resurgence today.

"We are decentralized, we are digital, but we are still defiant," said Tavion Morris, Â鶹´«Ã½ junior political science major and campus organizer. "SNCC today means organizing in the age of mass surveillance and disinformation -- but our legacy is still in direct action and people power."

The 2025 SNCC is less a formal organization and more of a network, connecting campus movements on police abolition, climate justice and voting rights. A new crop of students, motivated by activism like Black Lives Matter and March for Our Lives, have been co-opting the SNCC name as a badge of purpose and legacy.

From witness to welcome
For Â鶹´«Ã½ Vice President of Student Affairs Dr. Valencia Edwards, SNCC's return to Orangeburg is as much a return of the heart as a healing of the past.

"This is a homecoming of conscience," she said. "We are not only remembering what happened, we are standing in that legacy and empowering students to keep pushing."

Edwards helped plan the event, which included intergenerational dialogue, student workshops and walking tours of historic civil rights sites in Orangeburg.

The teach-in also featured a keynote address from civil rights veteran Diane Nash, performances by local artists, and a candlelight vigil at the site of the Orangeburg Massacre, which is so named from a book about the events of February 1968 in Orangeburg.

Student voices, student vision

For some students, the activities were not just informative, they were personal.

"I didn't know the entire history of the Orangeburg Massacre until I got here," freshman Zariah Bell said, holding a hand-painted sign reading, "I Am My Ancestors' Wildest Dreams."

"Now I feel like it's my responsibility to keep this going. Not just remember it, but do something about it."

Others expressed the feeling that activism now feels different but is no less urgent.

"Today our struggles are more systemic, but they're no less deadly," said senior Cameron Leigh, a history major. "SNCC taught us to think big, act locally and never ask permission."

Keeping the conversation going

While this was the first time SNCC-affiliated organizers have convened in Orangeburg in decades, officials at Â鶹´«Ã½ suggested it won't be the last.

"We're thinking of an annual SNCC Scholars Program," Edwards said. "We want to create a pipeline to student activism with a foundation in history, an ethic, and prepared for the world we live in today."

A broader mission

The SNCC panel was part of a larger cluster of events intended to reach out to the campus and community. Environmental justice, LGBTQ rights, labor activism and religion's role in social change were some of the other topics dealt with in the sessions.

Organizers described the teach-in as a tribute and a launchpad.

“Folks think the movement fizzled out in the ‘60s," Morris said. "But the fight isn't over. And if we really believe in freedom, then we have to keep up with it."