Category: Racial Justice

We are highlighting examples of Black excellence throughout the year! Feel free to send us suggestions!

Thank you to Patti Permenter at PREPS in Mississippi for connecting us with their Rural Teacher of the Year award recipients. In addition to being an affiliate state of the National Rural Education Association, Mississippi is included in our Black Belt Regional Hub headed up by the University of West Alabama.

The road one travels in life is often filled with sharp turns and scenic detours, and a rural teacher’s route into the education field can be just as meandering. Jamesha Keithley, a stellar rural teacher, shared her story with us about her journey to become a rural science teacher in Leland, Mississippi.

For Jamesha, the road into rural teaching began close to home. She now teaches in the school her mother grew up in, but that wasn’t always the plan. Although from the start Jamesha was determined to graduate high school and college as an example to those around her, she actually began her journey with the goal of becoming a doctor. But she adjusted her course of study into teaching, another in-demand and highly skilled profession, after reflecting on the liberating empowerment that education can provide as a career.

“I’m originally from Greenville, Mississippi, and I graduated from Greenville High School. I’m the youngest of five children, so I’m pretty much the baby, but also the one that they’re looking up to because most of my siblings did go to school but they didn’t graduate, and my mom never completed high school. So, of course education is my key to success. That’s why I’m so passionate about it and [why] I constantly push it on my kids. I knew I had to finish college because I have a niece and nephews. I’m currently not a mother, but I know I have people looking up to me, so I was like, ‘Okay, I don’t want to continue what others around me did.’ So I had to graduate college and high school.”

Coming from a rural area herself, Jamesha knew firsthand the challenges of being a teacher, but it was her determination to be an example for her niece and nephews that spurred her to explore the profession. Through teaching, Jamesha channels her passion for service and building community into the classroom:

“Teaching was pretty much my last [choice], because I was in a rural school and I was like, ‘I’m seeing what these teachers are going through, so I know this is not a profession for me.’ I realized I wanted to become a teacher because of my niece. She kind of forced it on me! She used to come home and say, ‘I need help with my homework,’ every day. So I kind of went into this profession for my niece, honestly. God led me here and I do not have any regrets in the world.”

“Of course education is my key to success. That’s why I’m so passionate about it and [why] I constantly push it on my kids.” – Jamesha Keithley

With her new direction set, Jamesha finished school and began teaching 8th grade science at Leland Middle School. Now going into her fourth year, she has tried to make sure her students receive the very best, and ensuring student autonomy, creativity, and innovation in the classroom is at the core of her approach to education:

“As a rural teacher, I don’t let my surroundings define me….We’re going to have fun even if we have to go outside and just go look at the grass. I’m not the kind of teacher that holds kids within four walls because I want them to get out and explore and feel independent and feel that they can explore and do things on their own without me because I won’t always be there around them.”

One place Jamesha opens the gates for more student engagement and leadership is in her plate tectonics lesson–her favorite to teach. She shares that students enjoy the opportunity to take charge of their own learning, especially using the environment as a tool:

“I love, love, love plate tectonics because it gives them a sense of creativity. They are able to move plates and pick up anything around the classroom to move it and show how plates underneath the earth move. During plate tectonics, we’ll go outside – it’s a lot of just soil back there – and we talk about landforms and how plates underneath the earth cause those major landforms, like subduction or mountains. I will get a group of kids and have them play as the teacher and show me some examples using soil or plants, building up those mountains or plates and how they move. They enjoy that a whole lot because it gives them that sense of independence.”

“I’m not the kind of teacher that holds kids within four walls because I want them to get out and explore and feel independent and feel that they can explore and do things on their own without me.” – Jamesha Keithley

Ms. Keithley’s emphasis on giving kids space in the classroom is a way for them to cultivate their own sense of identity, too:

“They’re seeing so much because of social media. It kind of tells them who they are before they find out who they are. Giving them that sense of freedom and independence would [help them] know who they are. This age group is so easy to influence, so I want them to just find themselves, find out what they like, what they don’t like, and just be okay with who they are.”

Jamesha is still in the early years of her career, but already she feels that focusing on students is what defines teacher leadership in her daily life:

“I still feel like I have some learning to do, but I am on the way there. I always put the students first. You have to understand the role of students first, and make sure that those kids feel comfortable and understand the mission and the goals and values of a school district. Yes, there’s some things that we may not agree with, but your mission is to make sure that you’re teaching those kids what they need to be taught.”

However, Ms. Keithley underscores that a teacher’s role in the classroom is only one part of the equation. Engaging parents, building relationships with them, and even sharing knowledge and learning with the community are key parts of her work as well:

“As we are learning to improve the community around us, we need to share that same information with parents. Building a relationship with my parents, that is number one for me and has been the roots of my success, and letting the parents know that they do have a say–letting them know that they do have a voice within the school community, asking them for their opinion and help, and letting them take that role in leadership as well–builds positivity in that community.”

Ms. Keithley is the embodiment of RSC’s mission to strengthen the bonds between rural schools and communities. Teachers like Jamesha who are vibrant community leaders, bring such joy and energy to their classrooms and beyond.

“I always put the students first. You have to understand the role of students first and make sure that those kids feel comfortable.” – Jamesha Keithley

For her work to ensure everyone’s voices are involved in the school community, Ms. Keithley was honored as the Rural Teacher of the Year for her Congressional District by Mississippi’s Program of Research and Evaluation for Public Schools (PREPS), an affiliate of the National Rural Education Association. While Jamesha has been humbled by the experience, she reflects earnestly that what she does is what all great teachers would do:

“Whether it’s me or someone else, hats off because teaching it is a work of art. Sometimes you have good days, and you’re gonna have your bad days, but to me teaching does not feel like work. I just get up and I’m looking forward to getting up. Before teaching, I was not a morning person, but now I’m looking forward to work. It’s not even work, it’s just my passion.”

“My name is Jamesha Keithley and I am a rural teacher.”

We are grateful to Jamesha for sharing her story with us about cultivating student autonomy in her classroom. If you would like to share 30 minutes of your time for an interview, please reach out to us at info@ruralschoolscollaborative.org. The I Am A Rural Teacher campaign is a collaborative effort with the National Rural Education Association and made possible through a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

https://ruralschoolscollaborative.org/stories/jamesha-keithley-leland-ms

We are highlighting examples of Black excellence throughout the year! Feel free to send us suggestions!

Glenn Harrell is the third owner of Say Cheese, a cheese shop in Los Angeles’s Silver Lake neighborhood that celebrates its 50th anniversary this month. The business has been in Harrell’s hands since 1999 and he likes to call himself the longest-running fool of its three owners, though this bit belies his deep love of the work. 

Born into a family of chefs and cooks, Harrell knew he wanted to be in the food industry at a young age, but his route to cheese shop owner wound a circuitous path through department store restaurant management and the European railway system before landing him in dairy territory. Harrell got his start at Say Cheese as a monger, a role he occupied for three years before getting a chance to run it himself. Read on to learn how he came to own one of LA’s longest-running (and most-beloved) cheese shops.

This interview has been edited for length. 

culture: I like to start by asking people how they got into the wild world of cheese.  

glen harrell: I had gone to Europe and lived in London for three months. And I tried to find work in London and couldn’t, so I decided I’m going to explore Europe! I took the coach from Dover, England, to France and just traveled throughout Switzerland, I went to Italy, I went to Prague, I went to Germany, I went all over and was floored by all the amazing, beautiful cheeses that I had… I think my destiny was not to really so much to explore Europe and historical landmarks, I think it was more to discover food and cheeses. 

I love that! 

GH: It’s so funny, in all the interviews that I have given, I have never said what I just said to you! 

So, when I had come back to the States, I was raised in Silver Lake, grew up in Silver Lake, and always knew of this famous cheese shop [Say Cheese] here in Silver Lake. And it was the first place that I had honestly come to, to look for work. And my first-love cheese, the one cheese that I fell in love with, was this Swiss cheese called Vacherin Fribourgeois, and I had asked if they carried that cheese and they said yes, and I thought, oh my god I want a job here! They carried my cheese! And she [then-owner, Julie] was floored by my resume, she didn’t want to hire me. I used to work for Nordstrom’s in senior restaurant management and I had a really good resume, and I made a lot of money for Nordstrom’s. 

Did you go to culinary school before that?

GH: You know, I didn’t. I really, really wanted to go to CIA [The Culinary Institute of America] in New York, it was really my dream. I graduated from high school in 1986. But you know, New York wasn’t safe. You would read in the papers and hear in the news all the time how the crime in New York was just so bad. I was terrified! And all of my family is all here in Los Angeles. I come from a big family, and I just could not see myself moving to New York to do that, as much as I really wanted to. And at that time, the big school on the West Coast to go to was up in Napa, but it didn’t have the reputation, and I was raised to always have the best of the best. So I said, I’m not doing that. I had been offered this amazing job at Nordstrom’s through a friend and I was made manager within a matter of weeks. I worked for the company for seven years and just had done really well. But getting back to Julie and working for her, she did not want to hire me. She was like, you’re not gonna last here.

Did she want to bring you on as a monger or as a chef?

GH: Cheesemonger. I just was so interested in it. One of the things I learned being in France was that in France alone, back then, there were over 5,000 cheeses just in that country. There were so many different types and styles and, you know, I’ve always been this big guy. I’ve always enjoyed eating. I come from a family of chefs and foodies, and I love cheese, but I never knew that cheese could be as gourmet or different as it was. And the only reason why I had known that and had learned that was through traveling. So, my direction had completely changed. And Julie, I had told her, I live with my parents, I just need gas money, and I need to pay my phone bill. I had to beg her for this job, I did all the right things, I wrote her a thank-you letter. When I had come back in to see her in person, she pointed her finger in my face and she said, I will hire you based on one condition. I was hired on October 17, and that was 1996, and she said, I will hire you only if you stay until the beginning of the year. And I just thought that was the strangest thing! Like, until January and it’s October? You don’t think that I’ll last that long?

Q4!

GH: Well, Linni, let me tell you, after working here the first week, I understood why. It was a challenge for me! It was a challenging place to work because the volume was so intense and there was no other gourmet cheese shop in the city of Los Angeles. Everything was just hard, but it was so much fun because I was learning about cheese and flavors and taste and tasting things. I ended up working here for three years, and then I left to go work at Sweet Lady Jane’s. And then Julie was gonna be selling the business here [at Say Cheese], and she couldn’t give it away. She had asked me if I would come back and work until she sold, because she needed help managing. And so I said yes! I had planned on going to Europe that year and I needed the extra money. Needless to mention, I didn’t go to Europe that year! Because she had then offered the business to me. 

I was working on catering for Arnold Schwarzenegger who was gonna be on the Jay Leno show, and I was putting together catering platters, and this gentleman who Julie had met with, she was excited because he was like the 30th person who was interested in her business, and he was very serious. I think she spoke to him for maybe 45 seconds on the floor. When she came back, she threw her pencil at the wall and she said, this business is yours. And I said what do you mean, it’s mine? And she said, you are talented, you’re gifted, and you deserve it. You have the drive and the energy for it, and I can’t sell this. And I would be willing to sell it to you at a price that’s affordable. And by golly, she did. 

Wow.

GH: Wow is right. And I had put my thinking cap on and got some investors and was so excited to get people to believe in me and my concept and my bright ideas. And I paid out my first investor within maybe 30 days… and paid my second investor within 90 days. I had taken over Say Cheese, November 15, 1999. And I had the opportunity to go through a really successful holiday and, you know, Silver Lake being Silver Lake, really open-minded, it’s a really free-spirited community that was not of color or anything else back in the day. It used to be the armpit of Los Angeles, and it’s [now] one of the top neighborhoods to live in the US. People…didn’t have issues, but I also didn’t let it be known that it was Black owned either. I always just told people that I managed it because I didn’t want any problems out of anyone, and my business had done so well. My point is, was that I was able to pay out my second investor. And then I don’t remember the year, but when I turned 40, which was 13 years ago, I had done a Visa commercial and I was able to pay out my third and final investor and had become the sole owner-proprietor of Say Cheese 13 years ago. And you know, there was just this liberty and this freedom of like, oh my god, what an accomplishment, that this is mine now. You know? 

Absolutely.

GH: But you know, ironically, as much as I wanted to go to CIA so that I could learn more about food… my food experience has been through my grandfather, who was a professionally trained chef in the Navy, and he taught my mom very well. I’ve been saying to my mom for years that she should have been a chef, I learned so much from her. People ask me all the time, you could go to Europe to learn how to cook. And I’m like, no, there was just a bar in my family where, you know, we didn’t eat like my good friends did, where they ate at McDonald’s half the nights of the week. My mother cooked, there was a meal on the table at least minimum five nights a week. 

Yeah, I had planned to ask if you were from a foodie household, but it sounds like it’s a definite yes!

GH: Yes, for sure. My best critic is my mother, and I love my family because they’re not biased people. And so, they let me know when I’m right and they tell me when I’m wrong.

So, you learned from a combination of family and eating your way through Europe!

GH: Absolutely. I couldn’t agree with you more. And I feel that when I first worked here at Say Cheese, that first year was my training course, and I ate so much cheese. I must have gained 30 pounds that year, I kid you not. But you know what I learned the most? Was that certain cheeses taste differently certain times of the year. And that was my biggest question that I had asked people once I owned my own business, why does this taste so much better during the spring and the summer, or the fall in the winter? And they’re like, it’s better then because of what the animals are eating!

Your shop has the feel of an old-world cheese counter. Was it a choice to emphasize European classics? Do you also carry some of the newer American-made riffs on classic styles?

GH: So, we do, I don’t carry them all the time, but I love American cheeses. I haven’t been exposed to as many as I would like to… I sometimes have a little bit of a hard time with some of the American cheeses that are so expensive. I am the type of buyer that buys product that you feel like you’re getting a good bang for your buck. And I’m not knocking it at all, but you know—

You can only carry a few at a time, because you’re not going to be going through a $36-a-pound wheel that fast.

GH: Exactly. And it’s so interesting because there are so many European cheeses that we carry that are like, for instance, there’s the Stinking Bishop, that’s $35 a pound, and we do exceptionally well with that. There’s a gorgeous blue cheese that comes from, I believe it’s Oregon. And they only carry it during—

Rogue River?

GH: Yes, thank you! Yeah, so there’s those kinds, like that cheese? That’s a phenomenal cheese!

Yeah, that cheese is so special. 

GH: But it’s, when I say expensive, I mean expensive in a good way, like it’s worth every penny of what you pay. But then like, we’re one of the top, if not the top cheese shop here in Los Angeles, and we have such a hard time getting that cheese! Like I was allocated one wheel last year. So, I’m not on the radar for being the go-to place to go and get an American cheese, people don’t go out of their way to send things to me. I do know that there are other cheese shops in town that specialize more in American cheeses and so I assume that people are going to those spots where they can get those items, where my name is more like 90 percent European and 10 percent American.

Your shop is in Silver Lake, which has changed pretty much completely over the past two decades or so. I’m curious how that’s affected the business.

GH: Oh, it’s affected the business tremendously. I mean, we were the place to go to for so many years. Say Cheese has been here since 1972, and we’re still standing. The community has grown so much, food has become more important to people. We really add value to this neighborhood. 

I have to admit, I read your Yelp reviews, and it sounds like people just, they always say how much thought and care you put into every single personalized basket or platter, and that you’re just a pleasure to work with. 

GH: Yes. And that’s what really sets us apart. I mean, we are literally, I am not lying, 30 feet away from the door of Trader Joe’s. We are about 120 feet away from Gelson’s. Both of those supermarkets have stepped their games up with ordering product that we have always carried. Obviously they’re doing their research and homework. And, you know, I’m constantly stepping my game up because I have to, and what really sets us aside from those places is the attention to detail, the sampling, for instance. We’re still in a pandemic, right? In business you have to be creative. 

I want to ask you about the past few years. It’s been a weird time to own a brick-and-mortar storefront! How has your business changed in light of the pandemic?

GH: I have to be honest with you. And this is, it’s kind of almost embarrassing, because, COVID has been fantastic for me. Business has come to me where, I don’t wanna say I didn’t have to run after it, I have run after my business for years, this year will be 23 years. But business has finally come to me, because of Black Lives Matter, and being African American. I don’t like for people to support me because I’m Black. I like people to support me because of what we provide, because of the quality, that is what I stand behind… because the space is amazing, because the pricing is fair, and he happens to be African American, cool. But don’t support me because I’m Black. You know, people have sourced out this little business because they want to support a Black-owned business. It’s so sad that people had to be told to support a Black business. My business has thrived because people have sourced out during the pandemic to support Black-owned businesses so that they don’t go out of business. And so, my business went to another level because people did that. But I love the Silver Lake community, because there were so many people who have supported my business before they had to be told, because they haven’t looked at color. And because people have said to me, my regulars have said, oh my god, Glenn, we’re here to support you because we want Say Cheese to be around. And when these people have said that, they didn’t say it in a sense where we want you around because you’re Black owned. No, they want us around because they believe in what I provide to them. 

Voicings: Glen Harrell

We are highlighting examples of Black excellence throughout the year! Feel free to send us suggestions!

Matthew Maxey hails from Decatur, Georgia and currently resides in Atlanta, Georgia. Born with a severely profound hearing loss, and outfitted with hearing aids at 2 years old, it became apparent at an early age that life would be anything but ordinary. Fast forward and Matthew attended the prestigious Gallaudet University in Washington, DC where he began to learn sign language in an attempt to balance the struggle of developing his identity as a double minority in terms of ability and race. In 2014, DEAFinitely Dope was founded as an idea based on providing support to those that felt marginalized and ignored by mainstream America. DEAFinitely Dope started as a brand, and slowly blossomed into a movement, attracting the likes of educational institutions nationwide, CNN, ESPN The Undefeated, GQ, Cole Haan, ABC news, Chance The Rapper, MTV Video Music Awards, and countless more! With both hearing and deaf partnerships in play, Matt strives to continue to break barriers and defy the norms with a fresh perspective on interaction, inclusion, accessibility and equality, as awareness continues to grow!

Matt Maxey

We are highlighting examples of Black excellence throughout the year! Feel free to send us suggestions!

Violet Moses MSN APRN FNP-C PMHNP-BC is a Nurse Practitioner with dual Board Certification as a Family Nurse Practitioner and Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner living in Massachusetts and practicing in the Springfield area. Currently, her focus is in psychiatry with specialties in addiction medicine and eating disorders. She has experience in treating adolescents and adults with dual diagnosis, anxiety, depression, ADHD, bipolar, substance use disorder, binge eating disorder, and many other common mental health conditions. She continues to teach as an adjunct professor. Her approach is holistic and includes the use of traditional and complementary medicine to diagnose, treat, and prescribe medication for children, adolescents, and adults. Complementary/alternative approaches include but is not limited to supplements, vitamins, and lifestyle modification. She believes in managing treatment for the whole person, not just a series of parts. Therapeutic communication and patient-centered care with shared decision-making are the foundations of her practice. She has the experience and appreciates working with clients in diverse clinical settings. She enjoys nature, pets and personal development.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/psychiatrists/ma/springfield?category=african-american

We are highlighting examples of Black excellence throughout the year! Feel free to send us suggestions!

Cori “Coco” Gauff (born March 13, 2004) is an American professional tennis player. She is the youngest player ranked in the top 100 by the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) and has a career-high ranking of world No. 12 in singles achieved on 20 June 2022 and No. 5 in doubles achieved on 6 June 2022. Gauff won her first WTA Tour singles title at the 2019 Linz Open aged 15, making her the youngest singles title-holder on the Tour since 2004. She has won four WTA Tour doubles titles- three of them partnering with Caty McNally. Gauff rose to prominence with a win over Venus Williams in the opening round at Wimbledon 2019.

Born to parents with NCAA Division I collegiate backgrounds in basketball and track and field, Gauff experimented with a variety of sports as a child. She chose tennis, inspired by the Williams sisters and preferring an individual sport.

Gauff had success as a junior, earning a sponsorship to train at Patrick Mouratoglou‘s academy in France. She began playing on the ITF Junior Circuit at 13 and finished runner-up at the junior 2017 US Open in just her fourth ITF event, the youngest finalist in the tournament’s history. She became the No. 1 junior in the world after winning the junior 2018 French Open singles title over McNally. She also won a junior Grand Slam doubles title at the 2018 US Open, this time partnering McNally.

Gauff made her WTA Tour debut in March 2019 at the Miami Open and won her opening match. She received a wildcard into the qualifying draw at the 2019 Wimbledon Championships, where she became the youngest player in the tournament’s history to qualify for the main draw. There she reached the fourth round, and each of her matches was the most-watched of the day through the first week of television coverage in the United States. Later that summer, still aged 15, she reached the third round of the US Open. In 2021 she reached her first major final in women’s doubles at the US Open, and reached her first major singles final at the 2022 French Open, losing to No. 1 Iga Świątek.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coco_Gauff

We are highlighting examples of Black excellence throughout the year! Feel free to send us suggestions!

Academy Award winning filmmaker Matthew A. Cherry is a Chicago native and a former NFL wide receiver who played for the Jacksonville Jaguars, Cincinnati Bengals, Carolina Panthers and the Baltimore Ravens.

In 2007, Cherry retired and moved to LA to pursue a career in entertainment landing work initially as a production assistant for commercials and music videos before transitioning to being a Set PA for the final season of the hit CW TV series Girlfriends and the third season of Heroes for NBC.

After learning on set behind the scenes Matthew started directing music videos in 2008 and now has over 20 to his credit with his first directing credit being the video “I’m Free” for R&B singer Terry Dexter. Since then, Cherry has gone on to direct music videos for various artists, including Michelle Williams featuring Beyoncé & Kelly Rowland, Tweet, Jazmine Sullivan, Chloe X Halle, Lalah Hathaway, Kindred The Family Soul and many others.

In addition to directing music videos, Cherry directed the live action short films “This Time,” starring Reagan Gomez-Preston & Terri J. Vaughn about a soldier coming home from war and trying to win the love of his life back, and “Forward” starring Kenny Copper & Ciera Payton about finding love in an unexpected place. Matthew also created the award winning web series “Almost 30”.

Cherry is also a feature filmmaker and his first indie feature, “The Last Fall,” starred Lance Gross, Nicole Beharie, Vanessa Bell Calloway Keith David, Harry Lennix and Darrin Dewitt Henson. “The Last Fall” is loosely based on the difficulties Cherry’s experienced after he retired from the NFL and attempted to transition back into the real world. The film made its world premiere at SXSW in 2012 and received awards at the American Black Film Festival (ABFF) for Best Screenplay and Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival (MVAFF) for the HBO Best Feature Film Award. After a limited theatrical release, “The Last Fall” was acquired by Image Entertainment and made its television premiere on BET in December 2012 and is currently streaming on UMC.

Cherry’s latest feature film “9 Rides” premiered at SXSW in 2016 in the Narrative Spotlight category and stars Dorian Missick, Omar Dorsey, Robinne Lee, Xosha Roquemore, Amin Joseph, Skye P. Marshall, Thomas Q. Jones & Tracie Thoms. The film, about an Uber driver who receives life-changing news on New Year’s Eve, was shot entirely on an iPhone 6s.

In television, Matthew has also directed multiple episodes of television, including ABC’s “Abbott Elementary,” “Black-ish”, and “The Wonder Years”, plus Peacock TV’s “Bel-Air”, “Saved By The Bell” and more.  

Cherry also served as an executive producer on the Academy Award®-nominated film “BlackKklansman” from Spike Lee while working as a creative executive at Jordan Peele’s production company, Monkeypaw Productions.

Cherry’s latest project “Hair Love” is an animated short film about an African American father attempting to do his daughters hair for the first time. The short, which made its theatrical debut in August 2019 with Sony Pictures Animation’s “The Angry Birds Movie 2,” won the Academy Award in 2020 for Best Animated Short Film and has an accompanying picture book which is a 6 time New York Times Bestseller. Hair Love is now being turned into an animated television series with HBO Max.

Matthew recently signed a first look deal with Warner Bros TV and is set to direct the upcoming comedy heist film The Come Up for New Line Cinema.

https://www.matthewacherry.com/about

We are highlighting examples of Black excellence throughout the year! Feel free to send us suggestions!

Dr. Earyn McGee is an aspiring Natural History TV Show Host. She’s merged her love for lizards and passion for social justice to create the very popular social media game #FindThatLizard. Every Wednesday at 5pm MST, she post a photo of a lizard camouflaged in its natural environment and participants have to find it. The captions that go with each photo often give the players natural history facts about the lizards which double as hints on where to look. But Dr. McGee also uses this as an opportunity to talk about conservation and social issues.

Dr. McGee’s graduate studies focused on the impact of stream drying on the lizard population. She’s also exploring ways to get more black women into natural resources careers.

Committed to diversity and inclusion, Earyn was graduate student mentor to the Doris Duke Conservation Scholars program. The program aims to increase the diversity within the conservation field.

Earyn earned her Bachelor of Science degree in Biology from Howard University. As well as both a Master of Science and PhD in Natural Resources with an emphasis in Wildlife Conservation and Management from the University of Arizona. She lives in Tucson, with her dog Puca.

https://earynmcgee.com/about

We are highlighting examples of Black excellence throughout the year! Feel free to send us suggestions!

Maxwell Alejandro Frost, a 25-year-old gun violence prevention advocate, first became involved in politics after 20 children and six adults were fatally shot at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012.

A decade later, Frost is a leading candidate for the Democratic nomination in Florida’s Orlando-area 10th congressional district, and he’s grappling once again with the implications of the country’s most recent mass shootings in Buffalo, New York and Uvalde, Texas.

“Just last week, I was at a vigil for the Buffalo shooting,” Frost told Insider in a phone interview on Friday. “I’ve actually been to over 60 vigils for shootings in the past decade. 60 vigils that I can remember.”

—Maxwell Alejandro Frost (@MaxwellFrostFL) May 24, 2022

“It is, in a weird way, bringing things full circle,” he added, remarking on the similarities of the school shootings in Sandy Hook and Uvalde and the lack of legislative action in the nearly ten years since then. “I don’t know if there’s a starker condemnation of the government and the inaction than that.”

Frost, a member of Generation Z and what he dubs the “mass shooting generation,” is running to replace Democratic Rep. Val Demings, who’s making a bid for the US Senate. In 2016, he survived a close brush with gun violence himself at a Halloween event in downtown Orlando when two men nearby got into a shooting match with one another. “We all started running,” he says. “I remember I had to pick up my friend who froze on the ground.”

Now, he stands a very good chance of becoming Congress’s newest, most prominent gun violence prevention advocate.

Running on a platform of gun violence prevention, tackling the climate crisis, reforming the criminal justice system, and preventing future pandemics, Frost has already garnered significant support from national groups, including two major Congressional caucuses, several progressive advocacy groups, and six members of Congress. He also has the backing of Sam and Gabe Bankman-Fried, a crypto industry billionaire pouring millions into boosting candidates focused on stopping future pandemics as part of an effective altruist campaign.

“He really is an intersectional candidate,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington, the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and one of Frost’s biggest progressive backers, told Insider at the Capitol. “I don’t know what I was doing at 25, but I definitely was not thinking about running for office.”

Insider caught up with Frost as he swung through Washington, DC earlier this month for a series of campaign-related events, including a fundraiser at a rooftop bar in the city’s Adams Morgan neighborhood hosted by Data for Progress founder Sean McElwee, former NexGen America Executive Director Ben Wessel, and a smattering of other progressive activists.

“This is my first ever candidate fundraiser that I’ve ever been involved in,” Wessel told the crowd at the May 10 fundraiser. “Because I really believe in Maxwell.”

‘You get in for one reason’

Speaking over the hum of live music and car traffic on the street below, Frost recounted the moment he first learned of the school shooting that served as his “call to action.” Then a student at a performing arts school in Orlando, he learned of the Sandy Hook massacre while “loading up on junk food” at a TGI Fridays shortly before he and his friends were set to perform at a concert.

“There was just kind of a silence that fell across the entire restaurant,” he said. “We all simultaneously looked up at the television screens and saw that somebody walked into an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, and murdered a bunch of students and their teachers.”

Frost begged his parents to let him travel to DC for the victims’ memorial, where he met Matthew Soto, the brother of one of the shooting victims. “I mean, seeing a 16-year-old with the demeanor of a 60-year-old, crying over his sister who was murdered for just going to class that morning,” Frost said. “I made a commitment: for the rest of my life, I’m gonna fight for a world where no one has to feel that way, the way I saw Matthew feel.”

He later became a volunteer lobbyist with the Newtown Action Alliance, jump-starting what has now amounted to a full decade of heavy involvement in political campaigns and causes. He’s since worked on three presidential campaigns, several state-level Florida campaigns including the 2018 “Amendment Four” campaign that restored felons’ right to vote in the state, the American Civil Liberties Union, and as the National Organization Director for March for Our Lives, the gun violence prevention group created in the wake of the 2018 school shooting in Parkland, Florida.

While working for the ACLU in 2019, Frost played a part helping to pressure then-presidential candidate Joe Biden to reverse his support for the Hyde Amendment — which bars federal funding of abortion services through Medicaid — by filming the encounter as another activist pressed him on the issue.

Biden has since sought to repeal the provision as President, though efforts have been unsuccessful so far due to continued Republican opposition in Congress.

“You get in for one reason, and then you find out there’s a lot of things that are messed up,” said Frost.

Frost says he’s worked as an advocate full-time since graduating high school because he couldn’t afford to attend a typical 4-year university. He’s currently enrolled at Valencia College in Orlando and says he plans on finishing his degree while serving in Congress, pointing to Democratic Rep. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, who left college at Boston University after two years to take care of her ailing mother.

Frost was adopted as an infant; his adopted mother is a special education teacher who originally came from Cuba as part of the “Freedom Flights” in the late 1960s, while his father is a musician. “Growing up, there’s always been a lot of music in the house,” he says.

But last year, while being urged by fellow activists to run for Congress, he reconnected with his biological mother in June. He found out then that he was one of eight biological siblings and that his biological mother struggled with addiction when he was born; she told him that he was trembling, as an infant, in the weeks after his birth due to withdrawals from crack cocaine.

“I wasn’t mad. I was just incredibly sad,” he told the fundraiser attendees. “Because my biological mother, a woman of color, was born into a ZIP code where she had gotten in this cycle of drugs, poverty, crime. And I knew it wasn’t her fault.”

It was after receiving the approval of his biological mother that he made his final decision to run for office.

The path to victory

Despite his youth, Frost comes to his first run for office with a formidable degree of institutional backing — far more than other upstart progressives that came before him.

His backers in Congress include Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts — “he’s the kind of leader we need in troubled times,” she told Insider at the Capitol — and Reps. Jayapal, Jamie Raskin of Maryland, Ro Khanna of California, and Ritchie Torres and Mondaire Jones of New York. 

The political arms of both the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and the Congressional Progressive Caucus announced their support for him earlier this month, adding to an existing well of support from gun control prevention advocates and groups including the Brady Campaign and Fred Guttenberg, who lost his daughter in the Parkland shooting.

And he’s already raised close to $1 million — as of March, more than all of his Democratic primary opponents combined — for a bid in one the state’s most Democratic-leaning districts.

“He’s an exceptional fundraiser, and that’s not something that a lot of people at any age are,” Jayapal told Insider.

Frost is also set to benefit from $1 million in outside funding in support of his campaign from Protect Our Future — the pandemic prevention-focused super PAC backed by crypto billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried — which called Frost a “champion for pandemic prevention in Congress” in a May 16 press release.

But he’s also competing with a crowded field that includes state Sen. Randolph Bracy, who’s represented portions of Orlando for the last decade, and Rev. Terence Gray, who’s served as the senior pastor at a local church for the past 15 years. Both are likely to have higher name recognition than Frost, and Wes Hodge, chair of the local Orange County Democratic Party, pointed out that money isn’t everything.

“The fundraising is impressive,” Hodge told Insider. “The question is, will he be able to utilize that war chest effectively to get himself introduced to the district?” 

But Hodge also said that the recent redrawing of the 10th district — which shifted the boundaries more towards East Orange County and away from Bracy’s traditional base in the Western part of the county — could make the race more competitive for Frost and the other candidates. 

“You’re getting a younger demographic, you’re incorporating [the University of Central Florida],” said Hodge. “Not that I would discount any of the other candidates, because many do have a lot of connections in the community.”

And the ongoing back and forth between Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis and the state legislature over the final shape of the state’s political maps has led to something of a freeze in traditional campaigning, at least until the contours of the district were finalized last month.

“Nobody’s really been doing anything aggressive because nobody really knew where the lines were,” said Hodge.

‘Different allies in different work’

Frost advocates for standard progressive priorities including Medicare for All, a Green New Deal, and working to “build toward a future without prison.”

“Oh, one hundred percent,” he told Insider when asked whether he supports expanding the size of the Supreme Court.

But he conspicuously avoids aligning himself with any particular faction within the Democratic Party, offering praise for Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut on matters of gun violence and for President Biden on ensuring the rapid distribution of COVID-19 vaccines.

“I wouldn’t necessarily put myself in a specific box,” he said, pointing to his work on coalition-building at both March for Our Lives and the ACLU. “We’ll sometimes have different allies in different work.”

He would also be the first — and potentially the only — Gen Z member of Congress. Currently, the youngest member of Congress is embattled Republican Rep. Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina, who’s now on his way out after losing to a primary challenger earlier this month. That came after a series of scandals that concluded with the leak of several compromising videos of the 26-year old congressman.

“I do think he’s giving young people and Gen Z a bad name,” Frost said of Cawthorn. “Not because of the things that have come out recently, but because he is a fascist, racist person.” 

But while embracing the Gen Z label, Frost also rejects the idea that the problems his generation faces are dissimilar from those faced by other generations.

“The way we describe the issues might be in a different light because of the experiences that we’ve had,” said Frost, before insisting that “there’s a connection between our generations, and our shared humanity and struggle, throughout the systems that our country has in place.” 

Frost has also placed an unusually strong emphasis on pandemic prevention, working with Gabe Bankman-Fried’s Guarding Against Pandemics to develop a plan calling for investments in research, vaccine development, early detection technology, and other measures to minimize the economic harm and loss of human life that could come with a potential future pandemic.

“As an organizer, something I’m always thinking about is how do we win hearts and minds,” said Frost. “Now’s the time to court public opinion and get people excited about research and retrofitting buildings. I think as time passes, it’s gonna be harder to get people excited about that.”

“I’ve been banging this drum in Congress for over a year now,” Gabe Bankman-Fried told Insider. “And the thing that we found was that this issue has a million supporters, but very few champions like Maxwell.”

https://www.businessinsider.com/maxwell-alejandro-frost-gun-violence-prevention-generation-z-congress-2022-5

We are highlighting examples of Black excellence throughout the year! Feel free to send us suggestions!

Henry Walton Bibb (May 10, 1815 in Shelby County, Kentucky – 1854) was an American author and abolitionist who was born a slave. After escaping from slavery to Canada, he founded an abolitionist newspaper, Voice of the Fugitive. He returned to the US and lectured against slavery.^[1][2]

Biography

Bibb was born on May 10, 1815^[3] to an enslaved woman, Mildred Jackson, on a Shelby County, Kentucky, plantation. His father was Senator James Bibb,^[4][5] a relative of George M. Bibb, a Kentucky state senator.^[6] Williard Greenwood, a slaveholder, sold his six siblings away to different buyers. Bibb was hired out by his father for his wages. He received some education at a school operated by Miss Davies, until the school was shut down by locals.^[4]

In 1833, Bibb married another enslaved mulatto, Malinda, who lived in Oldham County, Kentucky. They had a daughter, Mary Frances.^[6] Malinda’s slaveholder forced her into prostitution.^[4]

Around 1837, Bibb escaped to Cincinnati, Ohio. Six months later he returned to free his wife, but he was captured and enslaved again. Bibb and his daughter were sold to a slaveholder in Vicksburg, Ohio. After a failed attempt to escape, Bibb was sold to Cherokees on the Kansas-Oklahoma border.^[4]

In 1842, he managed to flee to the Second Baptist Church in Detroit, an Underground Railroad station operated by Rev. William Charles Monroe.^[4] He hoped to gain the freedom of his wife and daughter.^[6] After finding out that Malinda had been sold as a mistress to a white planter, Bibb focused on his career as an abolitionist.^[7] He was taught to read and write by Monroe.^[4]

Bibb traveled and lectured throughout the United States^[6] with Frederick Douglass and William Wells Brown. He supported the Underground Railroad. In 1846, he guided Lewis Richardson across the border and to Amherstbur, Canada. Bibb was a member of the Liberty Party.^[4] In 1849-50 he published his autobiography Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Henry Bibb, An American Slave, Written by Himself,^[6] which became one of the best known slave narratives of the antebellum years.^[8] The passage of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 increased the danger to Bibb and his second wife, Mary E. Miles. The act made it illegal to help escaped slaves. To ensure their safety, the Bibbs migrated with his mother to Canada and settled in Sandwich, Upper Canada, now Windsor, Ontario.^[4][8] In 1851, he set up the first black newspaper in Canada, The Voice of the Fugitive.^[6][9] The paper helped develop a more sympathetic climate for blacks in Canada as well as helped new arrivals to adjust.^[10]

Henry and Mary E. Bibb managed the Refugee Home Society, which they helped found in 1851 with Josiah Henson. Mary established a school for children.^[4][11]

Due to his fame as an author, Bibb was reunited with three of his brothers, who separately had also escaped from slavery to Canada. In 1852, he published their accounts in his newspaper.^[6] He died on August 1, 1854, at Windsor, Canada West, at the age of 39.^[12]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Bibb

We are highlighting examples of Black excellence throughout the year! Feel free to send us suggestions!

DeShuna Spencer, Founder & CEO of Kweli TV

No matter where I go or who I meet, I get asked the same question: “Why did you start kweliTV?”

The inspiration for kweliTV came one evening many years ago while flipping through what felt like 100 cable channels. I was frustrated with the same tired stereotypes, lack of diversity in TV shows and movies as well as the few choices of content that focused on issues important to me. Some networks recycle the same black movies and comedy TV shows from the 80s through early 2000s. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good 90s black romantic comedy or a black sitcom like the rest of you, but I wanted more. And have you watched The History Channel lately? Outside of Black History Month in February, historical content about black people is severely lacking.

I was starving for educational documentaries, global black history, and the cinematic indie films with clever storylines and engaging characters that I discovered from some of my favorite black bloggers. So, I eventually cut cable and got a popular video subscription service hoping I would find more of the independent films and documentaries from black filmmakers. I was again disappointed when I learned that I couldn’t find most of those films unless I physically traveled to a film festival. So I cancelled my video subscription after a few months, and decided to create something myself! That’s how kweliTV was born. From there I started my long journey to making this vision a reality.

Also, as a black person from the U.S., I felt disconnected from the lives and stories about people who look like me in other parts of the world. I was curious about what black culture was like for people living in places like Ghana, Brazil, the United Kingdom, Portugal, Mozambique, Antiqua, Cuba and other parts of the world. Just keeping it 100, because of the slave trade, African people were displaced all over the world.  Many of the African traditions that they brought with them were blended with the culture of their new country—from dance, food, music. Cultural identities that are still strong today. Yet, these are stories we never see in mainstream media. kweliTV’s mission is to fill that void.

Finally, we want to change perceptions. Kweli means “truth” in Swahili so since day one, I’ve been on a mission to curate and eventually create content that is a true reflection of the black experience. When you have people who don’t look like me overwhelmingly occupy newsrooms and film studios, you end up with:

Tragedies like what happened to 40-year-old Terence Crutcher. He was gunned down with his hands up in the air by a white police officer in Tulsa, Oklahoma, after another law enforcement officer looking below from a helicopter said that Crutcher—a father of 4 who was in route home after taking a class at a community college before his car broke down—“looked like a bad dude.”

Two young black men getting arrested in a Starbucks for doing nothing more than sitting there waiting for someone and not ordering anything.

A segment on a major news network that allows a former cop to say that black people are naturally “prone to criminality” and go on unchecked by the journalist.

A presidential candidate giving a speaking on national television and says that “all black people” are “living in poverty” and “have no jobs.”

The police getting called because a group of black women at a golf course, who are members of the course, “were playing to slowly.”

I could go on and on…

The Sentencing Project revealed that implicit bias from producers and journalist shapes how black people are portrayed in the media. Studies show that blacks in criminal roles tend to outnumber blacks in socially positive roles. Negative imagery of black women appears twice as often as positive depictions. This creates a perfect storm for implicit bias. According to Project Implicit, 88% of white Americans have implicit racial bias against black people. All of this negativity affects blacks as well. Some 48% of black Americans also have implicit racial bias against black people. It’s all tied to media images. Negative mass media portrayals are also strongly linked to lower life expectations among black men a study by The Opportunity Agenda found. False perceptions also affect policing, the criminal justice system, hiring practices, wealth building and academic expectations.

The media is charged with telling stories through journalism, television, film, music videos, video games and even advertising. When black people are not the decision-makers at media organizations, people who may not fully understand the complex issues facing our community are left to tell our stories. It results in many networks and agencies missing the opportunity to produce content that gives accurate portrays of the black culture. 

That is why kweliTV exists!

I hope you will join our community as we take control of OUR MEDIA!

Peace & Light,

DeShuna Elisa Spencer

“My Umi says shine your light on the world. Shine your light for the world to see.” – Mos Def

Truth is powerful and will prevail.” – Sojourner Truth

https://www.kweli.tv/pages/meet-our-founder