Monday, November 16, 2020
Sunday, November 15, 2020
Wednesday, November 11, 2020
Another First
An excerpt from Black Enterprise -
MEET THE FIRST BLACK WOMAN TO RECEIVE A PH.D. IN NEUROSCIENCE FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF ROCHESTER
by Dana Givens
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| Image via University of Rochester Alumni |
Dr. Monique Mendes has become the first Black woman to receive a Ph.D. in neuroscience from the University of Rochester. The Jamaican-born, first-generation college graduate says the announcement came as a shock to her, not even realizing she had done so until informed.
“I didn’t know I was the first Black woman, but I’m excited,” said Mendes to Diversity Education. “I feel empowered; I really want other students in the Rochester city schools, just around Rochester that are Black, who are people of color that know that this is possible and that they can pursue a Ph.D. in neuroscience.”
Her desire to obtain her degree came after she became apart of the McNair Scholars Program at the University of Florida, a program designed to help undergraduate students from low-income and marginalized backgrounds offering financial assistance in addition to mentorship to help them prepare for their doctoral degree. From there, her interest grew and she became more immersed in studying the complexities of the brain, hoping to establish a career in neuroscience.
https://www.blackenterprise.com/meet-the-first-black-woman-to-receive-a-ph-d-in-neuroscience-from-the-university-of-rochester/
The Youngest Composer for the NY Philharmonic
An excerpt from Black Enterprise -
THIS 12-YEAR-OLD IS SET TO BECOME ONE OF THE YOUNGEST COMPOSERS FOR THE NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA
by Dana Givens
Teaching music to children has been said to offer positive growth during their early development. For one Brooklyn girl, her love for music led her to continue her dream toward composing original work while achieving remarkable milestones.
Grace Moore is a young musician who is poised for greatness and achieved a huge milestone this week. WPIX 11 reported that the seventh-grader is one of the youngest composers to enter the New York Philharmonic. Moore is enrolled in the organization’s Very Young Composers program designed to teach participants as young as 8-years-old how to create original scores. The members of the program will also get to see their work performed by professional musicians in the orchestra.
https://www.blackenterprise.com/this-12-year-old-is-set-to-become-one-of-the-youngest-composers-for-the-new-york-philharmonic-orchestra/
Making History @ Annapolis
An excerpt from CBS Baltimore -
Midshipman 1st Class Sydney Barber Will Be The First Black Woman To Lead US Naval Academy’s Brigade
By CBS Baltimore Staff
ANNAPOLIS, Md. (WJZ) — For the first time, a Black woman will serve as the U.S. Naval Academy’s brigade commander.
Midshipman 1st Class Sydney Barber will be the commander for the spring semester, the academy’s commandant said.
Credit: US Naval Academy
The first female brigade commander ever was then-Midshipman Juliane Gallina, who served in 1991.
Barber, a graduate of Lake Forest High School in Illinois, is a mechanical engineering major and aspires to commission as a Marine Corps ground officer.
https://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2020/11/09/midshipman-1st-class-sydney-barber-will-be-the-first-black-woman-to-lead-us-naval-academys-brigade/
Tuesday, November 3, 2020
Saturday, October 31, 2020
April 7, 2020
Was April 7, 2020 the day that sealed the fate of America?
By Thom Hartmann
On April 18, Bob Woodward recorded Jared Kushner saying that Trump had taken control away from the doctors and was going to open the country back up. So what might have provoked that? What was happening right around that time?
Trump’s official national emergency declaration came on March 11, and most of the country shut down or at least went partway toward that outcome. The economy crashed and millions of Americans were laid off, but saving lives was, after all, the number one consideration.
Trump put medical doctors on TV daily, the media was freaking out about refrigerated trucks carrying bodies away from New York hospitals, and doctors and nurses were our new national heroes.
And then came April 7, 2020, when the New York Times ran a front-page story with the headline: “Black Americans Face Alarming Rates of Coronavirus Infection in Some States.”
Across the American media landscape, similar headlines appeared at other outlets, and the story was heavily reported on cable news and the network news that night. White American conservatives responded with a collective, “What the hell?!?”
Rush Limbaugh declared soon after that “with the coronavirus, I have been waiting for the racial component. … The coronavirus now hits African Americans harder—harder than illegal aliens, harder than women. It hits African Americans harder than anybody, disproportionate representation.”
It didn’t take a medical savant, of course, to figure out that would be the case. African Americans die at disproportionately higher rates from everything, from heart disease to strokes to cancer to childbirth.
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Tucker Carlson, the only primetime Fox News host who’d previously expressed serious concerns about the death toll, changed his tune the same day, as documented by Media Matters for America.
Now, he said, “we can begin to consider how to improve the lives of the rest, the countless Americans who have been grievously hurt by this, by our response to this. How do we get 17 million of our most vulnerable citizens back to work? That’s our task.”
White people were out of work, and Black people were most of the casualties, outside of the extremely elderly. And those white people need their jobs back!
https://www.rawstory.com/2020/10/was-april-7-2020-the-day-that-sealed-the-fate-of-america/
At 102 years old, my great aunt, born the year of our last great #pandemic, made her way to the ballot box to cast her #vote. If she can do it, you can too! #Vote #VoteEarly #Election2020 pic.twitter.com/3nFCB3c4Ei
— Quentin Youmans (@QuentinYoumans) October 21, 2020
Then and Now
https://www.boredpanda.com/young-celebrities-kids-then-and-now-digital-art-ard-gelinck/
Saturday, October 17, 2020
Blacks Pay More
An excerpt from Complex -
Study Shows Black Americans Are Paying More to Own Homes
BYJOE PRICE
In a new study from MIT, it has been reported that Black Americans are often forced to pay more than any other group of individuals to own a home.
CNN reports that Black homeowners on average pay more in mortgage interest, mortgage insurance, and property taxes than other homeowners. Written by Edward Golding, MIT's executive director of the Golub Center for Finance and Policy, the paper concludes that the vast difference between what Black homeowners and white homeowners pay indicates that it's considerably more difficult for Black homeowners to accumulate wealth through ownership at the same rate as white homeowners.
The differences between mortgage payments is $743 per year, mortgage insurance premiums $550 per year, and property taxes at $390 per year. Totaling $13,464 "over the life of the line," the gap could result in up to $67,320 in lost retirement savings.
"The small differences compounding over the life of the mortgage and during home ownership can add up," writes Golding. "Even if it is a few hundred dollars a year here and there, it can amount to another year's salary families would otherwise have."
https://www.complex.com/life/2020/10/black-americans-pay-more-to-own-homes-study-shows
A Hotel Where Women Reign
An excerpt from Insider -
A new hotel in DC features a Ruth Bader Ginsburg portrait made from 20,000 hand-painted tampons — and that's not even the wildest design
By Melissa Wiley
Called Hotel Zena, it features over 60 bold and provocative artworks dedicated to female empowerment and those who have fought for women's rights.
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| View of the exterior of Hotel Zena, seen from Thomas Circle in northwest Washington, DC. Hotel Zena |
https://www.insider.com/dc-women-rights-hotel-features-ruth-bader-ginsburg-portraity-2020-10#called-hotel-zena-it-features-over-60-bold-and-provocative-artworks-dedicated-to-female-empowerment-and-those-who-have-fought-for-womens-rights-2
HBCU Virtual College Fair
An excerpt from the Sacramento Bee -
Black students in California offered CSU, UC alternatives at HBCU virtual college fair
BY MARCUS D. SMITH
President and CEO Dr. Alan Rowe and his wife, Donna, founded the U-CAN foundation in 1988 when looking to enroll their son in a four-year college or university. They realized the limited resources and programs for Black students and started a foundation that would shape scholars in Sacramento – and California – for the next 40 years.
The HBCU college fair has now expanded throughout the entire state of California.
The United College Action Network (U-CAN) is hosting its 21st Annual Historically Black College and University (HBCU) College Fair online, in accordance with public health regulations.
U-CAN’s goal is to give California’s Black student population the opportunity to attend a four-year university. What started with just five students admitted in 1989 has grown to thousands of students accepted to various HBCUs across the country with their on-the-spot admission annual college fair.
The fair began on Wednesday and will end on Saturday. Registration is free and available every day of the virtual fair online at ucangotocollege.org.
https://www.sacbee.com/news/equity-lab/article246425780.html