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Time To Network....

10 Things About Michelle Obama...

What do you really known about Michelle Obama? You might know quite a bit about the woman who will go down in history as one of the most popular first ladies ever, but here are a few things that you might not know:

1) Her middle name is LaVaughn. Her father (Fraser) was a worker at the city water plant and her mother (Marian) was a secretary at a Spiegel’s catalogue store. Her father was involved in politics, working as a Democratic precinct captain in the south side of Chicago.

2)  Michelle’s paternal great-great grandfather, Jim Robinson, was a slave in South Carolina. Her maternal great-great-great-grandmother, Melvinia Shields, was impregnated by a white man.

3) Both Michelle and her older brother Craig skipped the second grade.

4) Michelle went to Whitney Young High School, where she was a classmate of Jesse Jackson’s daughter Santita. She commuted three hours to school every day and graduated Salutatorian of her 1981 class.

 5) Both Michelle and her brother graduated from Princeton.

6) Her graduating thesis at Princeton was called “Princeton-Educated Blacks and the Black Community,” where she said, “I remember being shocked by college students who drove BMWs. I didn’t even know parents who drove BMWs.”

7)  In college, she majored in Sociology and minored in African American studies, graduating c*m laude with a BA in 1985. She then went on to earn her JD at Harvard University in 1988.   During her time at Harvard, she participated in demonstrations to get the law school to hire more Black faculty. Since that time, the number of Black faculty at Harvard has barely increased. Her husband’s appointee to the Supreme Court, Elena Kagan, served as dean of the Harvard Law School for six years and did not hire one under-represented minority for a tenure track position.

8)  It is said that Michelle is an honorary member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority but need more clarification.

9) Her first date with her husband, Barack Obama, was to see the movie “Do the Right Thing” by Spike Lee. They married in October, 1992.

10) According to her tax returns, Michelle earned far more money than her husband while working as the Vice President for Community and External Affairs at the University of Chicago Hospitals. She earned $273,000 per year, and her husband earned $157,000 as a United States Senator. Money does not make a marriage but team work does.

Mrs. Obama is a prime example on how a women of color should stick by her man (NO MATTTER WHAT). They say when there is a strong man, a strong woman is right beside him.

Word On The Street Is......

Word on the street is that Ms. Paula Deen called a someone a NIGGER and this is what said about the situation..........

On Wednesday, Paula Deen appeared on TODAY with Matt Lauer to address the scandal over revelations that she had used racial slurs in the past. Her apology and explanation for her behavior was lengthy, but opinions are split over how effective her 13-minute mea culpa really was.

"She appeared very genuine," said Lily Golightly, owner and publicist with New York-based Golightly Media. "Her YouTube videos were kind of strange, and this interview should have cleared things up."

Unfortunately for Deen, the interview may have had the opposite effect.

As black people, we use the N-word so freely one to another but when another race call us the N-word we get really offensive. I believe we should just do away with the word and let this be lesson learned.

Another HBCU In Danger.......

 

 Howard University may disappear if it doesn’t fix financial problems, says trustee

  
 Howard University is in financial trouble and may disappear if it doesn’t learn to be more efficient in the way that it’s being managed. All of this is part of the claim of a vice chairwoman of the school’s board of trustees, who feels that the school may be digging itself into a financial grave.

According to a report published this week as part of a letter in The Chronicle of Higher Education, Renee Higginbotham-Brooks said that “Howard will not be here in three years if we don’t make some crucial decisions now.”

The letter is dated April 24^th and lists quite a few reasons that the school is going to continue to have trouble due to some very bad financial habits and circumstances.

According to Higginbotham-Brooks, Howard is facing sever e competition from less-expensive state universities and a drop in federal support from the Obama Administration. She also claims that the university’s staff is entirely too large, and that the school has not invested in developing a strong fundraising system.

Rachel Mann, a spokeswoman for Howard, wasn’t saying much about the letter, and only deferred questions to the board chairman, Addison Barry Rand.

“Spirited debate and discourse are part of the culture of higher education,” said Rand. “The board and the university’s leadership team continue to work tirelessly to address many of the tough issues facing colleges and universities like Howard.”

Higginbotham-Brooks is a Howard University graduate and attorney in Fort Worth, Texas.   She has been on the board since 1997 and vice chairwoman since 2005.

Howard’s president, Sidney A. Ribeau, has been accused by Higginbotham-Brooks of being an ineffective leader. Also, in 2012, faculty senate leaders protested bonuses given to administrators in the middle of budget cuts.

Dr. Boyce Watkins recently supported another HBCU president, Dr. Walter Kimbrough, when he appealed to Dr. Dre, asking why he gave $35 million to USC instead of an HBCU.  Dr. Watkins says that everyone who cares about the African American community should support an HBCU, even if they didn’t attend one, since these schools are a critical part of educating Black students.

At the same time, Dr. Watkins says that the public should speak up honestly about areas in which HBCUs can and should do a better job.

“It’s a shame that so many Black colleges struggle while Black athletes earn billions for predominantly white universities,” said Dr. Watkins, who says he once applied for a position at Howard University.  “But we must also be honest when our schools are being run inefficiently.  I’ve heard quite a few complaints from both students and faculty about Howard’s stubbornness when it comes to making changes that are critical for its survival. Even when my friend and I both applied to Howard after getting our PhDs, we were stunned at how disorganized and unresponsive the administration was when reviewing our applications. It actually made me sad.”

We really need Howard University alums to please speak up about this matter at hand. There are to may of our HBCU's doing down hill and I am upset about the way HBCU's are heading. 

Death of an HBCU

 

Saint Paul’s College, a historically Black college founded in 1888 in partnership with the Episcopal Church, announced last week that it’s shutting down and working to help current students transfer to other institutions.

The school, located in Lawrenceville, Va., announced that it was closing after a deal that would have allowed Saint Augustine’s College in Raleigh, N.C. to acquire the struggling college collapsed under the weight of Saint Paul’s debt.

Already mired in debt, Saint Paul’s College terminated its sports programs in 2011 to cut costs. When the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges, a regional group that certifies degree-granting institutions, rescinded the schools accreditation last summer, administrators went to court to get it back.

Now, both the accreditation and the school are gone.

In a press release, Oliver Spencer, chairman of Saint Paul’s College Board of Trustees, wrote: “The time deadlines associated with our accreditation issues with SACSCOC and the termination of the pro-posed merger require our Board to take this action in the best interests of our students.”
According to news reports, approximately 200 students were enrolled at the school; 51 students graduated in the spring.

A number of small HBCUs, many of them affiliated with religious organizations, are also at the risk of closing. For ex-ample, Morris Brown College in Atlanta, founded in 1881 by the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME), was saddled with $30 million in debt, filed for bankruptcy to avoid closing. It lost it accreditation in 2002 and recently rejected a $10 million proposal from the mayor to purchase the campus.

“When you don’t have a large endowment, you’re dependent on tuition,” said George Cooper, former president of South Carolina State University in Orangeburg. “The trend in enrollment for a number HBCUs is on the decline, because families just don’t have enough resources to send their sons and daughters to school.”

Black families are reeling from the Great Recession that stripped half of their wealth and an unemployment rate that nearly double the jobless rate for whites.

“The economic crisis that we see today impacts all universities,” said Cooper. “If you don’t get the students, you really don’t maintain the enrollment base necessary to pay the cost associated with running a university.”

Recent changes to the Parent Loan for Undergraduate Students programs made it even harder for parents with weak credit histories to qualify for the loan. Students who attend Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU’s) rely on the loans at a higher rate than other groups.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr., president and CEO of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund, said those changes coupled with anemic alumni support likely crippled St. Paul’s, but that a number of factors likely contributed to its demise.

“It’s a very sad day when any historic institution has to close its doors when we know that there is a significant need for higher education in the African American community,” said Taylor.
The lack of alumni support and feeble endowments often stifle the growth of HBCUs when enrollment dips. The National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education (NAFEO), a non-profit group that advocates for HBCUs, estimated that Black colleges have average endowments that are about one-eighth the size of average endowments at white schools.
Even alumni and private support at top-tiered HBCUs falls woefully behind the support at top white schools.

The combined market value of endowments at Howard University in Washington, D.C. ($460.7 million), Spelman College, in Atlanta, Ga. ($309.1 million) and Hampton University, Hampton, Va. ($232.5 million) were still about $29.4 billion less than the endowment of Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass.

“Unfortunately, in our community the only thing that we’re strongly socialized to give to is the church,” said Taylor. “That’s the biggest part of the problem.”
Taylor fears that it will take more closings of more HBCUs before the Black community wakes up and reacts to the crisis.

“It’s not going to happen until our community starts seeing a trend of HBCUs closing and no one is running to save them,” said Taylor. “Ultimately, the school and its alums have the responsibility to make sure that their [alma mater] continues to grant degrees.”

In the press statement about the closing, Spencer said that the board is “exploring all options” to keep the school open and to continue the school’s historical mission.

Spencer continued: “In pursuit of that goal I call on all members of the Saint Paul’s community to come together to guide and support the College in the next phase of its life in service to the many thousands of students deserving of the very special educational opportunities that Saint Paul’s College can offer.”

It is sad to say this but one of our very own HBCU's is fallen off the map. Ladies and Gentlemen, it is now time that we take our own schools serious and give back. To our future in some communities, an HBCU is really like their only hope. I graduated from an HBCU and it made me a better man and prepared me for the real world. So on that note, we have to do better with taking care of our HBCU's .

Summer Food Florida

Starting this week June 17th Rhema Word Christian Academy will be offering free meals to any child 18 and younger! Please share this flyer with anyone you know in the Pompano Beach and surrounding areas. I really appreciate black organizations when they think about the community and give back to the less fortunate. Bravo!!!

Happy Father's Day

Happy Father's day to all the men fulfilling their father duties around the world.

Dillard High School 2003 10 year Class Reunion

Dillard High School 2003 Class Reunion was last night and it was EPIC. I got a chance to speak to the man of the hour Stanley McClover who was very excited about planning this huge event. He opened his Mansion up to his entire class and said it feels good to see his classmates having a good time. There was a buffet that consist of chicken, sea food rice, mac-n-cheese, bake beans, meat balls and an open bar. Everyone was transported from The Hardrock Hotel to Stanley's home by a charter bus. There was non stop dancing, laughter, and lots of hugs going on all night. Everyone left the reunion with good memories, lasting friendships and hopes of future events to come. #Turnup