Black Girls Rock to take place Feb. 11
Black Girls Rock, an annual award show, will take place from 6-8 p.m. Feb. 11 in room 221 at the Bovee University Center.
The event will be hosted by on-campus groups — Phenomenal Brown Girl, Pinky Promise, and the Theta Theta chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc.
Detroit junior Briana Tarver who is the president of Phenomenal Brown Girl said event's purpose is to honor and promote women of color in different fields such as the arts, entrepreneurship, academics, athletics and other various categories.
Phenomenal Brown Girl is a multi-cultural organization on campus that is dedicated to women empowerment and sisterhood.
Detroit junior Kiera Vaughn is the president of Pinky Promise. Pinky Promise is an organization that meets every Wednesday to help women strengthen their relationship with God.
Vaughn, along with Tarver, and senior Brianna Hadley, president of the Theta Theta chapter of Delta Sigma Theta, helped start Black Girls Rock last February at Central Michigan University.
“Me and the other groups had an open discussion on how to honor women and we came up with Black Girls Rock,” Vaughn said. “There was a similar event for men of color on campus called 'Black Males Rock', so we said why not have one for women."
The event will have dancers, singers and vendors from women on campus. The vendors will be entrepreneurial young women on campus looking to start or to advertise for their businesses. During this, a cocktail hour will take place with snacks and drinks that will provide an opportunity for women to showcase their businesses and ideas.
The event will host guest speaker Sherelle Hogan, founder of the Pure Heart Foundation. According to their website, the foundation "is a community based non-profit that offers therapeutic emotional learning and embraces experiences for children with incarcerated parents."
“We thought we needed to bring something to campus to celebrate women of color,” Tarver said.
At the end of the event there will be an award ceremony to honor women at the event. Awards will be handed out for categories such as best dressed, athlete of the year and best performance.
“I am most excited for honoring women and seeing the turnout of the event,” Tarver said.
