DURHAM (WTVD) -- A large crowd dressed in black with their hands up posed for a photo in front of the NCCU School of Law in hopes of capturing a moment and a movement.
The rally is one of many held across the state following the shooting death of a Ferguson, Missouri teenager.
While mourners attended Micheal Brown's funeral, North Carolina Central University students attended a rally.
NCCU Law Professor and NC NAACP Attorney Irving Joyner encouraged the crowd to vote and to participate in community outreach programs in honor of Brown's memory.
"We know that the question is not if there will be another incident like this but when and where," Joyner said. "If we don't use the resources we have available to us here to develop some strategies, to talk it through and then to go out and help others to deal with this situation, then we will have failed Michael Brown and others."
State NAACP President William Barber announced he will travel to Ferguson after receiving an invitation from community leaders in the St. Louis suburb. Barber says he will help organize a grassroots effort for policy changes in Ferguson.
"We need to be non-violent but courageous soldiers of social change," said Barber. "It's what we have to do in this moment if we're going to truly honor all of the men and boys that have died needlessly."
While Barber and Joyner admonished the violent protests and looting in Ferguson following Brown's death, they also criticized abuses of power within law enforcement agencies across the country. Barber called for unity to combat the problem.
"It's about Michael Brown but it's also about young black men being killed by police," Barber told ABC11. "We've got to call together broad allies. It can't be just black people speaking to this. It's got to be Black, White, Latino, Republican, Democrats because it's just wrong."