Dr. Toni Sims-Muhammad, a native of Louisiana, is Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and coordinates the Black Studies Minor housed in the College of Liberal Arts. Dr. Sims-Muhammad began her teaching career over 20 years ago and has taught at several institutions across the United States. Her areas of teaching, research interest and expertise are marriage and the family, social class and social stratification, race and ethnicity, black studies, black women in Islam, and multiculturalism. In 2007, Dr. Sims-Muhammad, established Vanguard Educational Services, www.vanguardeducational.org a not for profit community outreach ministry organized for… charitable, educational, religious and scientific purposes that focuses on self-improvement as the basis for community development with an emphasis on entrepreneurial, technical and vocational training.