Meet Remarkable Women Finalist, Dr. Alicia Johnson
SAVANNAH, Ga. (WSAV) — 'I'm hopeful that I'm able to plant a seed of hope, plant a seed of joy every time I have an interaction with someone,' Dr. Alicia Johnson, who has a doctorate in business administration, said about her personal mission statement.
'The core is that I've made someone better. That I've made whatever organization that I touched that day or any person that I came into contact with that they are made better,' she said.
For almost 30 years, Johnson has built a long resume of making lives better, through her professional career of lifting others up out of poverty and from inequity, her leadership in the community and through her church, Kingdom Life Christian Fellowship Church.
'The first thing that comes to my mind is servant leadership. Dr. Johnson certainly understands what it means to lead and serve. I would describe her as being very thoughtful, passionate, kind and has a very deep concern for her community,' Pastor Charles Roberson said.
In addition to volunteering at her church for the many food drives and holiday give aways, she leads a program that has already helped almost 90 families buy their first home.
Among her many accomplishments in the community, she's the first African American and native Savannahian to be the Executive Director of Step Up Savannah. She's chaired the Mayor of Savannah's Racial Equity and Leadership Task Force and is a lifetime facilitator for Bridges out of Poverty.
Although she's achieved a lot in her career, there's another title that Johnson cherishes, being called Dr. Fancy by her family, especially her grandson.
'They say I'm fancy,' she said. 'I like all the fancy things. So, after achieving my milestone of getting my doctoral degree, my husband got me a vanity plate. The name has stuck and everyone calls me that.'
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
16 hours ago
- Yahoo
Scholarship celebration honors Black college-bound seniors
BLOOMINGTON, Ill. (WMBD) — Hundreds gathered at a Bloomington church on Saturday to celebrate Black excellence in the classroom. The ceremony was held at 2 p.m. Saturday, June 7, at Mount Pisgah Baptist Church. It was sponsored by the Mentoring and Providing Scholarships Program, a local non-profit that mentors black students to learn etiquette, financial literacy and public speaking skills. More than $80,000 in scholarships were awarded to Black college-bound seniors for their academic achievements and community service. 'The annual Joint Scholarship Celebration plays an integral role in celebrating the successes of African American students,' Carla Campbell-Jackson, co-founder of MAPS, said. 'The MAPS Program is invaluable for students, and for our community, as we are developing 'real time' leaders and thought partners, who will continue to make a difference locally, and beyond.' Money for the scholarships was gathered with the help of African-American sororities, fraternities, and community-based organizations. MAPS looks to help students prepare for the professional world with important skills such as public speaking, said Shaun Harden, one of the students who received several scholarships. 'MAPS has been really great, especially for professional development. For instance, one of our previous sessions was about public speaking,' Harden said. 'We talked about how we were able to approach the stand and how we were able to address the audience properly, how to avoid filler words, a lot of different proper speaking things that you don't really get to learn other than through experience.' Local philanthropists also contributed to the scholarship fund, which helped raise more money for African American students looking to pursue higher education. Keynote speakers for the event included NAACP Image Award Winner and WMBD Summer Intern Bradley Ross Jackson and Teresa Haley, who shared some information and advice with the students. 'I learned that if you work hard, if you stay strong and determined, and continue to try to do your best and give back to the communities that have supported you, that you will eventually be rewarded in the end,' said Gabrielle Johnson, the president of the Bloomington-Normal NAACP Youth Council. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
18 hours ago
- Yahoo
Juneteenth Scholarship Pageant in Milwaukee, kids 'open up'
The Brief The Northcott Neighborhood House presented its Juneteenth Scholarship Pageant. The event aims to "showcase the best of the city's African American youth." Milwaukee is home to the nation's longest-running Juneteenth celebration. MILWAUKEE - Juneteenth is still two weeks away, but Milwaukee has already begun celebrating. Local perspective The Northcott Neighborhood House on Saturday presented its Scholarship Pageant. The event, held at the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center near 17th and Vliet, aims to "showcase the best of the city's African American youth," crowning a Miss Juneteenth, Mister Juneteenth, Little Miss Juneteenth and/or Mister Juneteenth Jr. FREE DOWNLOAD: Get breaking news alerts in the FOX LOCAL Mobile app for iOS or Android "Our kids have an opportunity to let the world see who they are. It takes a lot to get on stage, to open up, to do a poem, to do a dance," said Tony Kearney, Northcott's executive director. "They've got to let you know who they are as they're doing this – there's no hiding – and that's extremely important. It makes me very proud of them." The backstory Milwaukee is home to the nation's longest-running Juneteenth celebration, having held its first in 1971. SIGN UP TODAY: Get daily headlines, breaking news emails from FOX6 News Juneteenth commemorates the end of slavery in the U.S. On June 19, 1865, soldiers arrived in Galveston, Texas with news that the Civil War was over. The holiday observes the date "the people of Texas were informed all slaves are free." In 2021, after decades of lobbying, Juneteenth became a federal holiday. The Source FOX6 News attended Saturday's pageant and gathered information from organizers for this report.
Boston Globe
2 days ago
- Boston Globe
Scientist at Plymouth conservation nonprofit dies in remote Alaska crash
Schulte had traveled to Alaska to conduct conservation work, the statement said. He and the helicopter pilot were flying west from Prudhoe Bay to an area where he planned to outfit shorebirds with recording devices when the helicopter crashed on Wednesday, according to a spokesperson for Manomet Conservation Sciences. The region Schulte was visiting has become a flashpoint in the debate over balancing the nation's energy needs and confronting climate change. The oil company ConocoPhillips wants to establish an oil drilling venture known as the Advertisement Schulte had also planned to visit the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, where he was to lead a crew tracking the migratory routes of whimbrels, another shorebird, with satellite transmitters, Manomet Conservation Sciences said. The Advertisement The crash occurred on the first day of the bird study about 20 miles west of Deadhorse in North Slope, the northernmost section of the state, Clint Johnson, chief of the safety board's regional office in Alaska, said Friday. 'It's in a very remote part of Alaska,' Johnson said. 'There's nothing there. It's treeless, barren, in the middle of no place.' Earlier in the week, Energy Secretary Chris Wright, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin toured parts of the North Slope to advocate for President Trump's desire to open parts of the Alaskan wilderness to drilling and mining. The helicopter had taken off at about 10:40 am. The pilot had received special weather clearance, known as VFR, or visual flight rules clearance, Johnson said. North-Slope Borough Search and Rescue traveled to the crash site on Wednesday and retrieved the victims' bodies and on Friday afternoon, NTSB investigators visited the scene, which is only accessible by helicopter, he said. An NTSB meteorologist and air traffic controller are working with investigators, who plan to transport the helicopter wreckage to Deadhorse to continue their work, according to Johnson. Officials plan to place the wreckage in a sling tethered to a helicopter for the journey back to Deadhorse, which has an airport, he said. Advertisement Last Saturday, Schulte shared photographs of Schulte coordinated an American oystercatcher recovery program which was launched in 2009 at Manomet Conservation Sciences. Conservation work by the program and its partners along the East Coast helped to rebuild the American oystercatcher population by 45 percent, the organization said. 'Shiloh gave his life in the service of something greater than himself, dedicating himself to preserving the natural world for future generations,' the group's statement said. In March, Schulte discussed progress in regrowing the population of the American oystercatcher, a striking shorebird with long, orange-red bills and black-and-white plumage who live along the Atlantic and Gulf coast, according to a news release from Manomet Conservation Sciences. In 2008, he said the population had dropped to fewer than 10,000 birds across the Americas, a 10 percent decline. Conservation efforts reversed that slide and there are now more than 14,000 birds. 'This success proves that when we commit to conservation, we can restore declining species,' he said in a statement on March 13. Following the devastating BP oil spill which released millions of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, Schulte led a crew of researchers enlisted by the government to document the spill's environmental impact on wildlife. Schulte's team was hired by the US Fish and Wildlife Service to locate resident oystercatchers in coastal Louisiana and outfit the oiled ones with radio transmitters to track their health, he told the Globe in 2010. Advertisement He earned a doctorate at North Carolina State University, where he studied American oystercatchers on the Outer Banks and helped to band and track the birds, according to his biography on the website for Manomet Conservation Sciences. As an undergraduate student, Schulte studied wildlife biology at the University of Vermont. He was a competitive distance runner and earned a second-degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do, the biography said. In April, he ran the Boston Marathon, finishing the race with a time of 2 hours, 52 minutes, and 50 seconds. The time placed him 137th among 2,386 men between ages 45 and 49 who competed, according to results from the Boston Athletic Association. Laura Crimaldi can be reached at
