Dominican University
Sr. Toni Harris honored with Bradford O’Neill Medallion

Dominican University presented its 2010 Bradford-O’Neill Medallion for Social Justice to Toni Harris, OP, the International Co-Promoter of Justice and Peace for the Dominican Order, during the university’s convocation Sept. 28 in River Forest, Illinois. Harris also served as convocation speaker.

Harris has been a Dominican sister for more than 40 years. With fellow co-promoter of justice and peace Carlos Rodriguez Linera, OP, she advances the work that members of the Dominican Order are doing throughout the world to preach the message of peace and justice. She visits Dominican women and men who are ministering in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, the Caribbean and North America. Her work creates solidarity among Dominicans and shows the depth of the work that the order does for the poor throughout the world.

Harris previously served as promoter of peace and justice for North America, president of the Dominican Leadership Conference, vicaress and prioress of the Sinsinawa Dominican congregation, and promoter of peace and justice for the Sinsinawa Dominicans. She also worked with the Oneida people at the Sacred Heart Center in Oneida, Wisconsin, and was the director of the Anawin Center in Chicago, which serves the city’s Native American community. She also taught art in elementary and high schools for several years.

Harris earned a bachelor’s degree in art education from Edgewood College in Madison, Wisconsin, and a master’s degree in public administration from the University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh.

Dominican University’s Bradford-O’Neill Medallion for Social Justice was named in honor of Sister Vincent Ferrer Bradford and Sister Thomas Aquinas O’Neill, two pioneering Sinsinawa Dominican Sisters. The award is presented annually to an individual or organization whose work reflects and embraces the university’s core mission to create a just and humane society.

Founded in 1901, Dominican University is a comprehensive, coeducational Catholic institution offering bachelor’s and master’s degrees and a doctoral degree in library and information science.