UROP Research Mentor Project Submission Portal: Submission #1015

Submission information
Submission Number: 1015
Submission ID: 19671
Submission UUID: 35baddb3-abdf-4930-a2e1-cb7999208afa

Created: Wed, 05/28/2025 - 11:10 AM
Completed: Wed, 05/28/2025 - 11:29 AM
Changed: Tue, 09/09/2025 - 01:14 PM

Remote IP address: 68.46.228.97
Submitted by: Anonymous
Language: English

Is draft: No
Primary Research Mentor Name Dr. Chris Omni, MPH, MLS
Research Mentor Preferred Pronouns She/Her
When potential research assistants are reaching out via email, what is your preferred honorific? Dr.
Contact Email (FSU Email if affiliated) comni@fsu.edu
Position Title Faculty
FSU College (if applicable) Social Sciences and Public Policy
FSU Department or Non-FSU Organization Affiliation African American Studies
Headshot (optional) Omni.Headshot.jpeg
Research Assistant Supervisor (if different from above) Eryn Files
Research Assistant Supervisor Preferred Pronouns She/her
Research Assistant Supervisor Preferred Honorific? Miss
Contact Email (FSU Email if affiliated) eef23a@fsu.edu
Name of Other Faculty/Collaborator(s) (if applicable) Gemini Williamson
Other Faculty/Collaborator(s) Preferred Pronouns she/her
Other Faculty/Collaborator(s) Preferred Honorific?
Contact Email (FSU Email if affiliated) GOW23@fsu.edu
Title of the Project Dear Beloved SoulFlower: The Building of a Social Media Brand
Project Keywords Nature; Storytelling; Love Letter Writing; Healing-Centered Curriculum; Autoethnography; Social Media; Public-to-Personal Narrative
Are you currently looking for research assistants? Yes
Number of Research Assistants Needed 2
Relevant Research Assistant Major(s) Preference: Communication, Journalism, English, Photography, Education
Open to all majors
Project Location: meeting via Zoom
If the project location is off campus, does the research assistant(s) need to provide their own transportation? No, the project is remote
Please select the choice that most accurately describes your expectations for the research assistant(s): Fully Remote
Approximately how many hours a week would the research assistant(s) need to work? 7
Roughly what time frame do you expect research assistant(s) to work? Flexible schedule (Combination of business and outside of business. TBD between student and research mentor.)
Overall Research Project Description Dear Beloved SoulFlower is a creative and healing-centered research project that explores the power of love letter writing as a gentle, reflective method of storytelling. Born from a 2017 public wellness campaign in Topeka, Kansas titled Dear Black Women, the original project placed billboards across the city that offered affirmations of visibility, worth, and joy. Seven years later, that public expression of care has quietly transformed into a deeper narrative practice—one that now lives in the form of personal letters, social media offerings, and curriculum design.

At its heart, this project asks a simple question: What happens when we write with love? Through the Dear Beloved SoulFlower series, letters are written to students, elders, ancestors, memory, and land. Each letter begins with “Dear Beloved SoulFlower” and ends with “In Love and Light, (insert name)” These are not casual messages; they are invitations. Each one offers a moment of pause, an opportunity for reflection, and a space to be seen, heard, and held. Over time, this practice has become an integral part of a broader eco-spiritual curriculum rooted in reverence, embodiment, and joy.

This research embraces autoethnography as a way of honoring lived experience as data. Drawing from The Omni Process™—a framework that centers ancestral listening, cultural memory, environmental embodiment, and joy as a source of knowledge—this study uses love letter writing as both method and message. It resists the traditional boundaries of academic research and instead embraces the sacred, the relational, and the restorative. It asks not only what we know, but how we feel what we know—and how that feeling shapes what we choose to remember, teach, and pass on. Ultimately, Dear Beloved SoulFlower is a living methodology. It is a reminder that research can be rooted in care, that curriculum can be an act of love, and that writing can heal.
Research Tasks Assist in locating supportive scholarship on love as method, arts-based inquiry, or healing-centered pedagogy.

Summarize 10 key sources in 3CQ+Q (Compliment, Comment, Connection, Question, Quote) format

Reflect on how those sources resonate with or contrast Dear Beloved SoulFlower.

Assist in developing a digital archive or searchable database

Support the visual documentation of the project—e.g., Canva layouts, Instagram story templates, etc.

Help organize content for public presentation (slides, website updates, zine-style summaries). (*If accepted, this work will be presented at an international conference in March 2026).

Maintain a personal journal documenting their emotional and intellectual responses to the research process.

Write your own Dear Beloved SoulFlower letter series based on a pre-identified theme.
Skills that research assistant(s) may need: Required:
1. Time management
2. Ability to engage with emotionally resonant content with gentleness and respect
3. Willingness to grow, be guided, and honor the energy of the project

Recommended:
1.Clear and compassionate writing skills
2. Strong reading and summarizing skills for academic texts
3. A deep respect for story as a source of knowledge
Mentoring Philosophy I take a eco-womanist approach to my pedagogical practices to support the wholeness of students, not just their intellectual well-being. I even offer creative, metaphorical undercurrents of eco-womanist thought because of my deep love and honoring of Mother Earth. I prioritize the "green heart" approach to mentoring as I follow a G.R.O.W. acronym:

To be Gentle: I acknowledge that students may not show up to the classroom or my office in emotional states of readiness; therefore, I create and hold space for healing and self-restoration that complements the educational goals of the course or meets the needs of the meeting.

To honor Reciprocity: I honor the fact that teaching and mentoring are spaces of reciprocity. Although there is a structured system of hierarchy based upon my position as an educator, I frequently remind students and mentees of the power that they, too, possess based upon their own lived experiences.

To provide Oxygen: I honor my Divine assignment to support student's educational and emotional journeys of discovery. I provide a fresh air approach to research as well as my courses. I build in nature-based experiences in every course to allow students time to engage in a Praxis of Pause rather than be consumed by a culture of hyperproductivity.

To amplify Wonder: I ensure that most encounters are full of excitement and potential. I offer opportunities to demonstrate creativity while expanding one’s imagination.
Please provide a link to your publications, a video clip, or a website for your research project (if applicable): https://www.wibw.com/content/news/An-epic-8-count-photo-shoot-brings-awareness-to-black-womens-health-and-more-486416111.html#:~:text=When%20you%20turn%20on%20the%20radio%2C%20you%20certainly%20don't,a%20priority%2C%22%20Omni%20added.&text=%22%3Ehere.
Please add any additional information here (if applicable): Misc. links
1. https://www.wibw.com/content/news/Billboards-at-4th-and-Kansas-bringing-awareness-to-African-American-womens-health-476726123.html
2. https://subscribe.cjonline.com/restricted?return=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cjonline.com%2Fstory%2Fnews%2Flocal%2F2018%2F03%2F17%2Fbusiness-watch-physical-health-through-positive-empowering-thinking%2F12969777007%2F&gps-source=CPROADBLOCKDH&itm_source=roadblock&itm_medium=onsite&itm_campaign=premiumroadblock&gca-cat=p&gca-uir=true&gca-epti=z118079e004100v118079b0080xxd118065&gca-ft=142&gca-ds=sophi
Are you interested in participating in the UROP Research Mentor Roundtable? Yes
Roundtable times and Zoom links https://fsu.zoom.us/my/blackjoy

Wednesday, September 4 from 4pm - 4:30pm EST
Thursday, September 4, from 4pm - 4:30pm EST

If you missed the Roundtable, you can visit this YouTube link for an instant replay - https://youtu.be/9mRxAG2-h1o.
Roundtable Info
  • Day: Wednesday, September 3
    Start Time: 4:00
    End Time: 4:30
    Zoom Link: https://fsu.zoom.us/my/blackjoy
  • Day: Thursday, September 4
    Start Time: 4:00
    End Time: 4:30
    Zoom Link: https://fsu.zoom.us/my/blackjoy
Mentor Handbook, FAQs, and Communication Yes
UROP Performance Evaluation Yes
Materials Grant Yes
UROP Poster Presentation Yes
Year 2025
update url https://cre.fsu.edu/urop-research-mentor-project-submission-portal?element_parents=elements/research_mentor_information/headshot_optional_&ajax_form=1&_wrapper_format=drupal_ajax&token=50QrpG22zIwy7dTEFa79pDLjPh1WjH6Vf_5Y3q096Cs