Biography
Nikia Smith Robert is an Assistant Professor of Religious Ethics and Social Justice at the University of Kansas. She earned academic degrees in Information Systems and Finance, a Master of Divinity, and Doctor of Philosophy in Religion with a focus on ethics and public policy. Dr. Robert worked for ten-years on Wall Street in Public Accounting and Investment Banking as an Associate, Senior Associate, and Franchise Controller. She managed multimillion dollar budgets and served clients in the Americas, Asia, Africa and Europe. Dr. Robert has contributed to the religious guild by serving on the Society of Christian Ethics Board of Directors and the Finance and Long-Term Planning committee. Dr. Robert is the Founder and Executive Director of Abolitionist Sanctuary, a nonprofit organization. In this role, she raises funds and manages a growing budget that has increased in value by approximately 400 percent in the current fiscal year. As an abolitionist with a finance background, she is passionate about mutual aid strategies and communal approaches to build morally just and sustaining economies. Dr. Robert has several publications, including, “Penitence, Plantation, and the Penitentiary: A Liberation Theology for Lockdown America” (Harvard Graduate Journal, 2017) and “Leading Beyond the Criminal Line”(Westminster Knox, 2022).
Candidate Statement
As a former tax professional investment banker, I created financial models for Fortune 500 companies that did not always align with the company’s values or my social and personal ethic. This conflict is in part why I quit my job and accepted a call to ordained ministry and the academy. However, I have also witnessed churches and other religious institutions (including colleges, universities, and seminaries) fail to act as good financial stewards. There are no institutions, or individuals, exempt from the moral weight of discerning a fiduciary responsibility to practice sound financial planning. These experiences have led to my own value ethic, which is to oversee budgets using a moral compass that is guided by accountability and aim to build more just and equitable systems for long-term growth and sustainability. In this capacity and with this purpose as a guide, I offer myself to the service of Treasurer.
Budgets are value statements. Income, expenditures, and investments all reveal the priorities of institutions. During the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement there has been increased scrutiny on public budgets and a national call for a people’s budget as an alternative. For example, a budget that allocates more funding for policing and prisons than for education and social programming says more about a government’s investment in punishment than a commitment to providing opportunities for people to self-actualize and thrive. The raising of our collective consciousness is critically important to ensure that institutional values are reflected in a relationship to economy and a mutual care for people.
I bring to this position a wealth of experience (pun intended). My business and academic background coupled with a social justice orientation make me a unique and qualified candidate. I aim to use these skills to work collaboratively and dutifully to hold AAR accountable to its values for the betterment of our religious guild. I am a longtime member of AAR and have served in the leadership capacity as a member of the Liberation Theologies steering community for the entirety of my term limit. As Treasurer, I am keenly aware of fiscal challenges faced by under-resourced departments, dissolving independent seminaries, underfunded libraries and its impact for research, employment insecurities for contingent faculty, scarcity for tenured faculty, and the pressure to conform to capitalist corporate models. These barriers can place additional strain on the guild, which make AAR’s financial planning critically important to support the fragility of religious and theological education in an extremely volatile economy. I pledge to take seriously my responsibility as Treasurer to “propose an annual budget to the Board of Directors and see to the completion of an annual external audit” that considers these shifting landscapes and challenges to secure a sustainable future. I would be honored to represent your needs and our shared values as your next Treasurer.