Who Won The Week? (You Already Know)
Another great week at Dillard. On the King Holiday, members of our Concert Choir sang at the city’s King program before the annual commemorative march. The Dillard choir is a New Orleans treasure for sure.
That day Dillard students were all across the city volunteering in the spirit of Dr. King. It was great that our athletic program, including coaches, volunteered together which also was a great team building experience. This should be helpful as the basketball teams continue in conference play.
Gabrielle Union. That alone is a win. Her new book, “We’re Going to Need More Wine” is a New York Times best seller. She has done a great job discussing sexual assault for over 25 years (including for me at Philander Smith in 2009), and this very personal book discusses that and a number of issues. It really is a Black woman’s coming of age story- great read and great stories.
So the real winner of the week is probably the weather. Tuesday night we got 0.05 inches of frozen precipitation. I’ve seen over half a foot in Little Rock, and even more in Ithaca NY visiting my wife before we were married. But 0.05 inches shut down K-12 schools (and some universities) for 3 days, 20 degree temps burst pipes, and together they caused low water pressure and a boil water advisory. Infrastructure has to be a TOP priority for the new mayor. We can’t be shut down and disabled over small things like this.
We opened up Thursday afternoon. I didn’t want to cancel class because I had Dr. VaNatta Ford from Williams College as a guest lecturer. Her research is on colorism in hip hop. FASCINATING! I can’t wait until her book comes out. The past few years have seen a tremendous increase in the use of color, associating value to skin tone, in hip hop. Listen closely….
On Friday I did a Twitter chat about HBCUs in the Trump era, based on the documentary “Tell Them We Are Rising” and the associated op doc by Stanley Nelson. By the way, we were the first HBCU to host a screening of the movie when they started the tour last fall. You can see the op doc below. I offered some insight into the infamous HBCU president photo op.
Saturday was the Bleu Devil Classic. Prospective high school students. Alumni tailgating. And 2 big games against our fiercest rivals from Gert Town. The ranked Lady Bleu Devils won by 10…
… and the defending GCAC champion Bleu Devils came back to win by 1 and ensure a short-lived ranking for the other squad.
Halftime was punctuated by a Big Freedia performance! We had to show our rivals how to do it!
Who won the week? You already know!
The Prez
