Tag: Black Excellence

Stevenson Savart, 25, made history Sunday as the first man to represent Haiti in cross-country skiing at the Winter Games.

After serving as Haiti’s flagbearer at the Opening Ceremony, Savart caught the heart of the crowd while making his Olympic debut in the men’s skiathlon. As he crossed the finish line in 64th place, the fans cheered him on and he took a bow.  

“The goal is still to try and achieve the best possible performance and to push my limits. It’s an immense source of pride and great happiness to wear this outfit and we’re trying to be symbols for our small country,” Savart said in French in a video posted on Instagram, “and give them hope, because right now they are going through a rather dark period, so we’re trying to shine a light on small countries.”

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

Thomas Tyrone “Tye” Tribbett (born January 26, 1976) is an American gospel music songwriter, composer, singer, and multi-instrumental musician.^[1] Tye Tribbett is best known for his blending in various subgenres in Gospel Music, which each aim and vision of his music serving the specific era it is in.. He served the role of choir director and founder of the Grammy-nominated and Stellar Award-winning gospel choir Tye Tribbett & G.A. (short for ‘Greater Anointing.’)^[2]

https://www.npr.org/2023/03/20/1163988915/tye-tribbett-tiny-desk-concert

It was a bit of a tight fit, getting the choir, horns and full rhythm section properly situated behind the center nook of the Desk where Tye Tribbett would eventually stand.

https://www.npr.org/2026/01/28/nx-s1-5631779/ai-schools-teachers-students

Stacks of worksheets sit atop desks and tables in Chanea Bond’s Fort Worth classroom. Her students all have their own school-issued laptops, but Bond has swapped computers for paper — lots of paper.

Each class begins with several minutes of journaling in notebooks, and nearly all assignments must be handwritten and physically turned in.

https://www.columbiaballetcollaborative.com/members-1/alexandra-hutchinson

Alexandra Hutchinson was born in Wilmington, DE, where she began her ballet training at Wilmington Academy of Dance. She completed her pre-professional training at The Washington School of Ballet, supplementing her dance education with summer intensives with Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Alonzo King LINES Ballet, Carolina Ballet, Ballet Chicago, L’Academie Americaine de Danse de Paris, and Nashville Ballet. Hutchinson went on to earn a BS in Ballet from Indiana University. After college, she danced professionally with Nashville Ballet before moving to her current company, Dance Theatre of Harlem. Her repertoire includes: Orange by Stanton Welch, Robert Garland’s Return and New Bach, Paul Vasterling’s Sleeping Beauty, The Nutcracker, George Balanchine’s Valse Fantasie, Western Symphony, Swan Lake, Concerto Barocco, Divertimento No. 15, Emeralds, Rubies, and Giselle.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ren%C3%A9e_Watson_(author)

Renée Watson (born July 29, 1978) is an American teaching artist and author of children’s books, best known for her award-winning and New York Times bestselling young adult novel Piecing Me Together,^[1] for which she received the John Newbery Honor, Coretta Scott King Author Award, and Bank Street Children’s Book Committee’s Josette Frank Award for fiction. Watson founded the nonprofit I, Too, Arts Collective to provide creative arts programs to the Harlem community.^[2] She is a member of The Wintergreen Women Writers Collective.^[3]

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

Eleanor Holmes Norton (born June 13, 1937)^[1][2] is an American politician, lawyer, and human rights activist.^[3] Norton is a congressional delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives, where she has represented the District of Columbia since 1991 as a member of the Democratic Party.^[4] She is serving her eighteenth term in the United States House of Representatives.

Prior to serving in Congress, Norton organized for Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee during the civil rights movement. From 1977 to 1981, she was the first female chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.^[5]

Norton will not seek re-election to the House of Representatives in 2026.^[6]

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

Ryan Speedo Green (born April 1, 1986)^[1][2][3] is an American bass-baritone opera singer.

Life and career

Green was born in Suffolk, Virginia, and grew up in low-income housing and a trailer park.^[1] He has said his middle name was derived from his father: “I was born on April Fools’ Day, and my father, who considers himself quite a funny man, thought he would name me – he’s a bodybuilder – after his favorite sporting brand. I’ve kind of embraced it and made it my own.”^[2] He was sent to juvenile detention at the age of 12 after he threatened to stab his mother and brother.^[1][3]

Green earned a Bachelor of Music degree at the Hartt School of Music^[4] and a Master of Music at Florida State University.^[3] He won several singing competitions. In March 2011, he was one of the five winners of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions.^[2] Following an article by Daniel Bergner in The New York Times about Green and his win in that competition, HarperCollins expressed interest in publishing his biography.^[1] It was published in October 2016 with the title Sing for Your Life: A Story of Race, Music, and Family.^[5] In 2014 he received the George London Foundation Award, won first prize of the Gerda Lissner Foundation, was a finalist in Palm Beach Opera‘s singing competition, and graduated from the Metropolitan Opera‘s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program.^[6][7]

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

Rachel Eliza Griffiths, Lady Rushdie (born December 6, 1978),^[1][2] is an American poet, novelist, photographer and visual artist who is the author of five published collections of poems. In Seeing the Body (2020), she “pairs poetry with photography, exploring memory, Black womanhood, the American landscape, and rebirth.”^[3] The book was a nominee for the 2021 NAACP Image Award in Poetry.^[4]

https://www.drmonicaoneal.com

Hi!  I’m Dr. Monica and I am your ally in every sense of the word.  

I want to acknowledge the real anxiety many of you may be feeling about the incoming administration, particularly if you identify as a racial, sexual, or cultural minoritized person like I do.