Latest news with #BlackNationalAnthem
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Jacksonville city councilmembers want more inclusive tourism materials from Visit Jacksonville
Some Jacksonville City Council leaders are calling on Visit Jacksonville, the city's official tour guide agency, to be more inclusive in their selection of attractions. Councilman Jimmy Peluso had a meeting alongside Councilman Dr. Rahman Johnson and Councilwoman Ju'Coby Pittman to address what the members call gaps in historical and cultural sites featured in brochures. Visit Jacksonville CEO, Michael Corrigan, was in attendance. He said he always welcomes opportunities to talk about tourism in the city. 'Anytime you can get multiple elected officials to gather with you and talk about tourism - the good ... even some things that need help ... that's always good,' Corrigan said. [DOWNLOAD: Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks] Peluso, who represents parts of Northwest Jacksonville, said he'd like to see the inclusion of destinations like Edward Waters University, Florida's oldest historically black university, as well as James P. Small Park. 'We had Hank Aaron play in that field. That's something that people should want to do. We just want them to add more things to their brochure,' Peluso said. Johnson also drafted his list of recommendations for tourism materials. In the draft letter, the councilman mentions: The Ritz Theatre and Museum, a premier institution celebrating African American history in LaVilla and once known as the 'Harlem of the South,' is omitted from the 'Spots to Check Out' section despite its national cultural significance. Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing Park, located at the historic site of the Johnson brothers' family home, lacks clear visual and editorial prominence. This is the birthplace of the hymn known as the Black National Anthem—a song embedded in American history and reverence. The absence of Edward Waters University, Florida's oldest private institution and first HBCU, from the 'spots to check out' portion of the guide represents a significant cultural oversight. EWU is not only a center of academic excellence but also a historic institution instrumental in shaping Jacksonville's intellectual and civic landscape. The Clara White Mission, founded in 1904 by Dr. Eartha M.M. White, is similarly excluded. Located in the historic LaVilla neighborhood, the Mission houses a museum showcasing one of the country's foremost collections of African American artifacts and continues to serve the community with hot meals, transitional housing, and workforce development. Its cultural and humanitarian impact make it a vital site for heritage tourism. [SIGN UP: Action News Jax Daily Headlines Newsletter] Johnson also said the exclusion of the Jacksonville Public Library Special Collections and the absence of Latino and Filipino cultural narratives can be problematic for a city that wants to not only welcome tourism, but keep tourists coming back, too. That's why Johnson said he is pushing for more inclusive tourism materials. 'In doing so, Jacksonville moves closer to becoming not just a city worth visiting, but a city where every story finds a home,' he shared in his draft. Corrigan said the latest edition of the tourism brochure should come out around June or July. He said his team is excited to listen to their community and incorporate some of the council's feedback into the guides going forward. Click here to download the free Action News Jax news and weather apps, click here to download the Action News Jax Now app for your smart TV and click here to stream Action News Jax live.
Miami Herald
20-02-2025
- General
- Miami Herald
‘I feel more seen here': Black history is central to this microschool in Overtown
Faith Ladson recognizes a vibrancy in her daughter Journey since enrolling her in Urgent Academy, a microschool in Miami's Overtown neighborhood. She's more jovial and outspoken, Ladson said, and she noticed Journey was more excited to learn, particularly about Black history. 'She's excited about the fact that she doesn't have to be restricted with what it is that she learns,' Ladson told the Miami Herald. 'She's very happy about the fact that they give her freedom to be able to explore whatever it is her interests are, and they support her in doing that.' That's the environment Urgent Academy founder Saliha Nelson wanted to foster for students in the Overtown neighborhood. The micro middle school is Nelson's brainchild after hearing students in the Urgent, Inc. afterschool program complain about school, she said. Nestled in Miami's Overtown neighborhood, a historically Black community, Nelson created the school with the hopes that students could learn in a diverse environment that embraces and celebrates them and was different from the traditional school setting. 'We get to know our students very well,' Nelson told the Herald. 'That means having conversations around who they are, their histories, pieces of their culture that they want to lift up, and then providing an opportunity for them to showcase that and elevate the issues and concerns that they care about.' RELATED: This Miami native wants to teach Black students things they might not learn in school A place where students can learn their history Growing up in New Jersey, Nelson said Black history was regularly taught to her in school. At eight, when she and her family moved to San Diego, she noticed that was no longer the case. 'We sang the Black National Anthem, negro spirituals as part of choir, and we were introduced to a lot of historical facts just as part of the everyday curriculum,' Nelson recalled of her early schooling. 'It was pretty much normalized.' A graduate of Northwestern University, Nelson moved to Miami 28 years ago, where her husband Henry Crespo founded Urgent, Inc., an nonprofit afterschool program that focuses on youth development in Overtown. The organization celebrated 30 years in Miami last year, and seeks to transform Miami's Black communities through arts, culture and technology. Looking to grow Urgent, Inc.'s footprint and define its role in the nonprofit space, Nelson earned a degree in community and social change from the University of Miami and later received her Ph.D. in applied learning sciences. Nelson conceptualized Urgent Academy through her fellowship with the Drexel Fund Founders Program, a nonprofit organization that helps educational leaders plan and open an 'innovative and effective' private school in eight states, including Florida. The plan for Urgent Academy, which opened last August, had been in the works for eight years. The school received $100,000 in funding from Allegany Franciscan Ministries and all students are recipients of Florida's school voucher program to help cover much of the $10,000 tuition. Nelson said she didn't want to open up the school and figure it out as she went and she didn't want to replicate the traditional school model. Instead she envisioned a school that would build on the Urgent, Inc. model of fostering creativity and entrepreneurship among youth. Right now, the academy has seven students, allowing for more hands-on instruction with at least two teachers daily, which includes a part time math specialist and a humanities instructor. A typical day for the students starts with breakfast and an opening circle, where students set the tone for the day and what goals they want to accomplish. From there, the students rotate learning humanities and math, social emotional learning and focus on career and technical education toward the end of the day. Nelson said part of the curriculum is guided by the students' passions and interests. One unit they discussed was Overtown and its history as the Harlem of the South. RELATED: This historian wants you to learn Broward's Black history. His flashcards might help 'Our community informs what they're learning about. The young people also help elevate issues that they care about,' Nelson said. She referenced the book students were reading for the month, 'The Epic Fail of Arturo Zamora' by Pablo Cartaya, about a Cuban family grappling with gentrification in Miami as they plan to expand their family business. It was a book the students chose to read as it related to some things they were experiencing in their own communities, Nelson said, adding that it reinforces a culture of belonging. 'If who you are and how you're showing up is welcomed and celebrated and lifted up, then for me, that is the most important thing,' she said. For education director Krisanne Stewart, the environment Nelson has created has been a much needed reprieve from the teaching environment she'd dealt with in Texas, where she had to push back against the banning of books by Black and gay authors. Stewart said she was ready to give up on education until she came across a job description that also detailed Urgent Academy's intent. 'I consider her a thought partner, and I consider her so knowledgeable in the area and the nonprofit space,' Stewart said, calling Nelson 'a gentle giant agent for change.' 'I feel more seen here' Monica Bissainthe is an alum of Urgent, Inc. and is now a teacher for Urgent Academy, focusing on humanities. She credits the school for allowing instructors to have latitude in what they teach the students. Bissainthe said discussions on political events and Black history aren't avoided and are often brought up at the behest of the students. One of those topics was the presidential election and understanding the changes President Donald Trump has made or tried to usher in, such as birthright citizenship. Bissainthe said many of the students have also discussed their concerns about immigration and how it might affect their friends. This led to her creating an assignment where the students were president for a day and decided what laws they would enact. 'I'm trying to make sure that they understand that these are going to have long term effects,' she said. 'Let's understand what changes that he's making.' Students also work on passion projects, where they spend a semester working on something they're interested in. Seventh grader Kristian Benn, 13, is designing his own fashion line using online graphic design program Kittl. 'I just started out using my sketchbook just creating designs when randomly, my teacher said you should start a clothing brand,' Kristian said. Students are exposed to other subjects such as photography and African culture through University of Miami's School of Education program Kalula, an evidence-based mentoring program intended to enhance the ethnic identity and socialization skills of Black youth. Kulula is Swahili for 'excel' or 'achieve.' Journey has taken a liking to the Kalula program since she's been in Urgent. 'We're learning about our community, we're learning about ourselves, we're learning about the Black community, we're learning about our past,' she said. 'We're learning about what might happen in the future with the Black community.' Journey said she feels more confident expressing herself while being in Urgent, having come from a school where she said racist behavior, such as saying racial slurs, was tolerated. 'As a young Black person, really a young Black female, I feel more seen here,' she said, adding any off-color jokes get shut down. Sixth grader Emma Hunter, 12, echoed Journey's sentiments, saying that for her it's been comforting being around other Black students. 'It offers a lot more creativity than my last school, because my last school was very uptight,' she said of Urgent. 'At this one, the more you know, the more you learn.' READ: 'It's a story that needs to be told.' Historic Black neighborhood in Broward gets honor Right now, the school has students in grades six through eight, and has received at least 5 applications as of mid-February to enroll new students. The school, which operates out of Urgent, Inc. headquarters, will move to a 50,000 square foot space at the Children's Village ahead of the upcoming school year, allowing for the school to have five larger classrooms. But Nelson is already thinking of what a potential Urgent High School would look like. She also understands the concerns some may have about their child transitioning from a non-traditional school back to a more traditional high school, but said Urgent Academy students will be self-directed learners. 'They're going to be critical thinkers,' she said. 'So, no matter what content they get introduced to, they're going to know how to break that information down and manipulate it to get where they need to go.'
Yahoo
09-02-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Mystic celebrates Black History Month
Mystic — More than 50 people at the Union Baptist Church on Saturday stepped out of their comfort zone and greeted, talked and laughed with people they did not know. Kevin Booker Jr., the founder of Booker Empowerment LLC, encouraged people at a Black History Month program to talk to two people they did not know for a minute. He said titles should go out the door because at the end of the day, humans are genetically 99.9% the same. The Black History Month celebration, held by the Greater Mystic Chamber of Commerce with the Mystic & Noank Library and Booker Empowerment LLC., featured poetry, speeches, and music, and a youth panel. Black History is everyone's history," Booker told the audience. The crowd first gathered at Liberty Pole Square where Secretary of the State Stephanie Thomas spoke, and State Troubadour Nekita Waller sang "Lift Every Voice and Sing," also known as the Black National Anthem. They then marched up West Main Street, where there is a Black History Month banner, to Union Baptist Church. This is the fourth annual event, and Bruce Flax, president of the Greater Mystic Chamber of Commerce, said "we wanted everyone to know that they're welcome in Mystic." Booker said everyone is struggling and dealing with different trials and tribulations, things they're seeing, and a nation that's shifting. But he said one thing they are at the event to do is to celebrate the contributions that so many have made and make sure their voices thrive and continue to inspire future generations. Aster Haughton, 18, graduated from Ledyard High School last year, where she was a member of the More Than Words club, whose mission is "to promote respect for diversity, facilitate communication, and build trust among members of our community." She moderated the student panel and shared her poetry at the event. She said during the march that it's important to celebrate Black History because "if you don't learn about your history, there's the chance that you'll repeat mistakes so that things will get worse than they were before, when we should always be striving to improve." "It's just important that we celebrate because it's good to be proud of where you come from and who you are, so that even when you feel lost you can remember that there was a history that you should be proud of," she added. "And if you can't find yourself in the future, you can look back and be proud." Her sister, Forest Haughton, 14, of New London High School, said "it's important to celebrate Black History because I feel like what's the point of only learning half the history when there's so much more you can learn?" One of the speakers at the event, Shamare Holmes, representing the Connecticut Sun as manager of community relations, said that if people are ready to roll up their sleeves and get to work, to please connect and "let's really start pushing forward this dream that Martin spoke on so long ago." Marvin Espy, an artist with a gallery in New London, spoke during the program about how he always loved channeling his imagination into art and painting for wonder, and he was the kid who could draw anything. While most of the Black art he saw was protest art, he didn't want to be confined to that. But he reflected on how by May 2020, there had been a number of instances of police brutality that led to the death of Black and brown people. He said after the public execution of George Floyd, he did not want to give himself and his gift to that image. "I'm tired of painting dead Black men and women, he said. He ended up painting 6 large depictions of the crime scene. He said now four-and-a-half years later, he again feels confronted with painting what he doesn't want to, after learning a white supremacist group set up camp on a highway overpass near Lincoln Heights, Ohio, the mostly Black community his grandfather helped establish. Espy said he hopes he has the courage and compassion to use the gift that was given to him to make a difference. While his talent is art, he said other people's may be their position, their music or business acumen. But he said if people only use that for their own advancement, it's only a matter of time before what happens to the man down the street or the family down the street comes to their own front door. He reflected on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s words that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
CBS News
07-02-2025
- Entertainment
- CBS News
Students from dozens of Chicago Public Schools join voices in honor of Black History Month
CHICAGO (CBS) -- What do you get when 3,000 Chicago Public Schools students join forces during Black History Month to sing? Soulful and empowering songs with a message. Uniting Voices Chicago, formerly known as the Chicago Children's Choir, teaches music to students from 88 public schools in Chicago. They're preparing for a concert series next week at Chicago Symphony Center. The journey through Black history and Africana music begins with the Black National Anthem, "Lift Every Voice and Sing," and continues with "Earth is Ghetto," a viral song by Aliah Sheffield. "I love this song, and I'm excited to be on stage with my fellow choir members," said Tristin Lopez, a 5th grader at National Teachers Academy. Tristin said "Earth is Ghetto" explores what's wrong in the world. What does it mean for her to perform songs like this, especially during Black History Month? "It means a lot to me to perform it, because I'm representing my culture and who I am. It's part of my identity," she said. For 9-year-old Rita Murtagh, the song "Swing Low" serves as a history lesson. "I learned about spirituals, which are songs in the name that can lift your spirit up if you're enslaved," said Rita, a 4th grader at National Teachers Academy. "They also had, like, secret encoded messages, and I didn't know that before." The songs are part of Uniting Voices Chicago's annual Black Futures Concert Series, entitled "Afrofuturism: The Freedom Metropolis." The audience is introduced to the character Kendrick and his dream world, where he explores Afrofuturism. "This is a method that allows us to look at problems, situations in our community, and come up with solutions. And we're looking at the next generation of leaders here, and we're saying you can start changing your world now, shaping the world you want to live in right now," said Lonnie Norwood, conductor and director of Africana studies for Uniting Voices Chicago. The choir will be performing at Chicago Symphony Center on Monday and Tuesday. The 11 a.m. shows are free and open to the public. Tickets are available on the Uniting Voices Chicago website.
Yahoo
07-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Conservatives Are Threatening To Boycott Super Bowl Over This Black Source of Pride?
Conservative NFL fans are demanding a Super Bowl boycott after they discovered that the 'Black National Anthem' will be performed on Sunday in New Orleans. Over the years, 'Lift Every Voice and Sing' has been sung during the NFL pregame events—and has always sparked some type of controversy. The league has announced that Root 100 performer Ledisi will perform the song—in front of Donald Trump—before Jon Batiste does the national anthem. On Tuesday (Feb. 4), Trump shared that he will be at the big game which makes him the first sitting President to ever attend the Super Bowl. 'Lift Every Voice and Sing' debuted at the pregame show in 2021 with Alicia Keys' prerecorded performance. Gospel group Mary Mary sang it in 2022 and in 2023, Andra Day performed her version of the song at the Las Vegas extravaganza. Last year, Sheryl Lee Ralph did a stirring rendition of the classic song. Still, conservative fans believe it has no place at the annual event. 'The Star Spangled Banner is an Anthem for all Americans and discriminates against no race Having a black supremacist 'national anthem' at the Super Bowl is an affront to the great melting pot of America and is racist,' one user on X claimed. Another wrote: 'America has one national Black one is meant to divide our nation...I will not be watching or purchasing any products that supports this.' Andra Day received similar backlash from Republicans and MAGA fanatics three years ago. Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz said he and his wife were opting out of watching the Super Bowl because they believed the 'Black National Anthem' was 'desecrating America's National Anthem.' During Super Bowl LVII in 2023, Trump loyalist and politician Kari Lake went viral for refusing to stand for 'Lift Every Voice and Sing.' After the game, she took to social media and said 'I'm just here for THE National Anthem.' The song was originally written as a poem in 1899 by James Weldon Johnson. For the latest news, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
