Six HBCU’s reach partnership deal with Regions Financial.

Regions Financial Corporation, which operates 1,700 bank branches and 2,400 ATM’s in 16 states, entered into a partnership with six historically Black colleges and universities. Regions is based in Birmingham, Alabama and brings in billions of dollars every year.

The partnership includes Alabama A & M University, Alabama State University, Florida A & M University, Jackson State University, Spelman College and Tennessee State University.

During the program, the bank will launch a financial education curriculum at the partnering institutions. Regions Financial will mentor students, recruit students and graduates for employment and internship positions. A lecture series will be created with business schools at the institutions.

Regions Financial already has other partnerships with the United Negro College Fund, the National Urban League, and the National Black MBA Association. It is also the official bank of the Magic City Classic, a football game between HBCU’s in Birmingham, Alabama.

The financial corporation plans to add more HBCU’s to the program in the coming years.

Rapper 2 Chainz Fires Up Bowie State Fans

By Anayka Pomare, HBCU Buzz Staff Writer

It’s officially homecoming season and Tauheed Epps, better known as rapper “2 chainz” performed for Bowie State’s homecoming last Thursday.

“Everyone come from behind the net and come to the front,” was the first statement the amped rapper made before performing. 2 Chainz walked on stage with authentic leather skinny jeans, the exclusive Yeezy 2’s, a white fitted t-shirt, two gold chains, and three huge gold flashy bracelets.

At one moment, he paused, panned the stadium, and said “Why they got y’all behind this net like y’all going to attack me or something, everyone one come from behind the net and come to the front.”

The excited Bowie State fans ran on the field to get up close and personal with 2 Chainz.

After performing two full songs he stopped the show and made an announcement. “I apologize for wanting to entertain y’all, this is what I do for a living,” stated the upset rapper, after being told he’s fans were not able to stand on the field at Bowie stadium.

Seemingly frustrated, the rap sensation sat down on stage with his arms folded and said, “I might as well start singing R&B since we can’t get hyped.”

2 Chainz later complained about media being on the field, since his fans lost the right to stand on the field.

“Nobody can stand on the field if my fans can’t, even the camera man, nigga [sic] get off the field,” shouted 2 Chainz, and refused to continue performing until the lead cameraman covering his performance removed himself from the field.

Watching his performance, I must say 2 Chainz is beyond a GREAT performer. His energy is crazy live. (I definitely had to catch myself and remember that I was at work.)

After the performance, I had the pleasure of asking 2 Chainz his feelings towards his overall performance. He responded, riding away in a green lawn cart, “I love my fans, I wanted to get up close and personal with them. I wanted to get hyped but the [expletive] ass security complained about the students messing up the field.”

Bowie State fans were hyped after the performance, and I decided to catch up with a few of them.

When I asked sophomore Tarshena Hooks how she felt about the performance, she stated, “I love Titty Boy [the rapper’s former stage name], that nigga [sic] there knows how to put on a show.”

I guess I wasn’t the only person who felt the wild energy 2 Chainz left behind.

For more of the unpredictable rapper, you can catch him at Howard University’s legendary yard fest, performing live on Friday October 19, 2012.

HBCU Buzz Radio Show in Homecoming Season

The HBCU Buzz Show will be featuring HBCU Schools who are having Homecoming on their show this week.  The show is aired each Tuesday from 6PM to 7PM and be heard by clicking on https://hbcubuzz.com/show/
The HBCU Buzz Show wants to highlight all the great events at these schools to help small- to medium-sized or large HBCU institutions gain additional exposure about their university.
The HBCU Buzz Show wants individuals from these schools to call into our show and let us know why their homecoming is going to be the best.
“Generally we want the schools to gain publicity and integrate their events through a national media platform such as The HBCU Buzz Show”, since the inception of our show we have had several HBCU Presidents, an Olympian, and other HBCU dignitaries on the show; however, we want to hear from students as well to get their prospective on things and this show will be a start” says Brittney Quarles, Programming Director of The HBCU Buzz Show.

Former FAMU cheerleader shares her triumph

Rashida Ross left Florida A&M and had no idea she wasn’t going to return.

Ross was a two-sport athlete from Houston, Texas, who came to FAMU to obtain a degree in biology. Her decision to attend FAMU was finalized after she made the 2010-2011 FAMU cheerleading squad.

However, cheering wasn’t enough to satisfy her athletic appetite. Even with a full-time load, Ross decided to walk onto the women’s track and field team for pole vault.

“Freshman year was one that I will never forget,” Ross said.

But as exciting as the highs were, the lows hit in the pit of her stomach. After completing her second semester in April 2011, Ross was diagnosed with stage 5 lymphoma, a type of cancer. Her first thought was, “Oh no, I have to tell my mom and she’s so emotional.” read more…

Thirty honored as Black Achievers in Industry

Thirty people were honored at the annual Black Achievers in Industry Awards dinner recently in Adam’s Mark Hotel.

It was the 40th year for the event, which provides an opportunity for business, civic and religious organization to recognize individuals who have made significant contributions in career and community endeavors.

The 2012 honorees are:

• Jonathan Abrams, an information management analyst for HSBC Bank USA, began at the bank 21 years ago as a telephone customer service representative. read more…

Rap Game. Black/African Americans: This is Not Who You Are!

Rappers Lil Wayne, Jay-Z, Kanye West, “P” Diddy, 50 Cent, and hip-hop businessmen Russell Simmons, and Robert Johnson, just to name a few, are members of the 100 Million Dollar Club—Robert Johnson perhaps being the lone billionaire. The accomplishments that each has attained is remarkable; however, the means to which they used to make their mark is reprehensible, dishonorable, blasphemous and downright cowardly.  Cowardly because they weren’t men enough to stand up against a systemic whose primary objective is to maintain a national objective that’s never been abandoned, the further perpetuation of mental exploitation and suppression of an unsuspecting group of people—the Black/African American; a major contributor was BET when Bob Johnson was its owner. read more…

Walking a controversial line: Do black people support Obama because he’s black?

Surviving slavery, segregation and discrimination has forged a special pride in African-Americans. Now some are saying this hard-earned pride has become prejudice in the form of blind loyalty to President Barack Obama.

Are black people supporting Obama mainly because he’s black? If race is just one factor in blacks’ support of Obama, does that make them racist? Can blacks’ support for Obama be compared with white voters who may favor his Republican challenger, Mitt Romney, because he’s white?

These questions have long animated conservatives who are frustrated by claims that white people who oppose Obama’s policies are racist. read more…

Black Men gala honors dreams, accomplishments

Just because the Grenada County is full of folks who once “chopped” cotton doesn’t mean folks can’t dream big.
That was the message from the Rev. Neddie Winters, president of Mission Mississippi, as he spoke at the Fourth Annual Scholarship Fundraising Gala for the 100 Black Men of Grenada Thursday night.
A packed house of more than 350 turned out in the Corey Forum at Holmes Community College.
Winters, a Christian minister, former financial consultant and lifelong civil rights activist, had fun with the crowd. read more…

‘You Gon Learn Today’: Black History, sealed and well conserved

Waking up at 7:00 a.m. this morning (earlier than most students I know), I prepared myself for yet another busy week ahead of me. That’s pretty much college anyway in a nutshell, right?

After knocking out fifth-teen or so pushups, a “fact” the Twitter account Fact Book suggest best helps wake people up in the morning, I made an unusual visit to the café for breakfast to set up this present moment perfectly.

(Hence, I’m working on time management, and personal fitness.)

It’s my first day of work as an English tutor today. And I’m thrilled, to say the least.

Finally going over a regular routine (checking emails, composing emails, contemplating emails, and reading kick-ass articles published on HBCU Buzz, The Root, The Huffington Post, and etc.), I came across an article on The Root titled, 100 Amazing Facts About the Negro.

Insert Facebook “like” button.

Of course, the general theme of the article is “100 Amazing Facts About the Negro,” though I learned 100 plus more interesting things as an result.

The small book was printed in 1934 by Joel Augustus Rogers, an acclaimed journalist in the black press.

In his “Amazing Fact #8,” Rogers writes, “Beethoven, the world’s greatest musician, was without a doubt a dark mulatto. He was called ‘The Black Spaniard.’ His teacher, the immortal Joseph Haydn, who wrote the music for the former Austrian National Anthem, was colored, too.”

Foolishly, I quickly stormed off to the Twitter airways, tweeting, “One thing that irks my soul is how history repaints some of the most visionary people to ever live as white, erasing their actual blackness.”

I soon found Roger’s claim to be false, apparently (which tells you to never trust any source without proper and valid research). As a cause and effect, however, I stumbled across something far more factual.

Is it me, or is Black history sealed and well conserved, against the grain of Blacks today?

Maybe it’s me; I am in this little “rebel against ‘the Man,’ government, and other corrupt entities” stage of my life. But then again, maybe I’m right.

(Go figure.)

Since childhood, I have been indirectly taught by media, family and friends that blacks were inferior to whites and the other great races of our time. And since childhood, I have kept that modeled perception alive and well, allowing it to consume my life, like my mother’s ambition for natural hair products.

That’s before I arrived in college; a HBCU, to be exact. And I now know that most of the world has been bamboozled about Blacks and their amazing achievements in every spectrum of life.

Certainly, with all the successes and distinction Blacks have accomplished throughout history, the version of Blacks in America’s media today is, to some extent, accurate, for the reason these people face* three-hundred years of slavery and mental, spiritual, emotional and physical deprivation to that of other races.

Nonetheless, as I wrote on Twitter days ago, people are, sometimes even unconsciously, a product of their environment. But people shouldn’t use that as an excuse, all the time.

(Indirectly, I was criticizing my black networks, and myself.)

Though, this is all an opinion from a crazed college black man who knows no better…

Carry on.

WSSU student wins $10k

Jonathan Figgers, a student at Winston-Salem State University, is the winner of a $10,000 scholarship from the 105 Voices of History HBCU National Concert Choir.

Figgers, a bass from Charlotte, was one of two students who represented WSSU at the event in September at the Andrew Mellon Stage in Washington. He started participating in rehearsals around the country in April and continued those efforts until the week before the concert. Students who attended all of the rehearsals had their names placed in a drawing that was held on the night of the concert. Figgers’ name was selected. read more…

HBCUs’ success hinges on financial aid

Morgan State’s president says lack of resources thwarts many African-American students

Low graduation rates among African-Americans at Maryland’s historically black colleges and universities present a major issue deserving of systematic analysis for solutions. This problem has been well documented by countless media outlets in HBCU communities nationwide, including in a recent Sun editorial.

That editorial also challenged Maryland’s HBCUs on the efforts of their faculty and administration to create and maintain cultural changes that can reverse the systemic trend of underachievement, which begins well in advance of any student’s arrival at any HBCU.  read more…

Howard University Homecoming preview: Drake, Diddy, Meek Mill and 2 Chainz

One week from today, thousands of students, alumni and curious hip-hop fans will pack Howard University’s main quad for Yardfest, the free day-long concert that has become a centerpiece of Howard Homecoming celebrations. Yardfest has become a rite of passage for aspiring music stars: P. Diddy, Jay-Z, Rick Ross, Nelly, Ludacris, Shaggy, Wale and Young Jeezy have all appeared there.

This weekend-long celebration of culture, from the step show and the pre-game parade to the numerous nightclub parties headlined by some of the biggest artists around, is a must. Just remember that last-minute updates are inevitable, and if you go to Ibiza, for example, you may or may not ever see Diddy, even though he’s the “host.” Also, it really pays to buy tickets in advance, as prices can skyrocket at the door on the night of an event. read more…

Supreme Court Case ruling may inspire HBCUs to recruit more black students

Wednesday’s oral arguments in the Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin case has suggested a notion of potentially overruling the admission policies for universities and colleges to be race-conscious in achieving a “critical mass” for diversity, as envisioned in the 2003 landmark case Grutter v. Bollinger. The Supreme Court ruling holds stakes higher than ever for black students, as the abolishment of affirmative action could lessen their chances of admission into selective colleges and universities. Yet, for Historically Black Colleges and Universities, admission rates could by default be on the threshold, as the black student proportion at traditional schools are expected to decline without the legally appointed system that accounted for the rising efforts of diversity at most colleges and universities. During this post-segregation era, the regression of affirmative action has provided a glimpse of hope for HBCUs to retain its most marketable niche, high-achieving black students. read more…

ELECTION 2012: HBCU leadership is endorsed

On Thursday, Oct. 18th, One Stop Early Voting begins in North Carolina. That means unless you plan to cast your ballots on Election Day, Nov.6th, you’ll have between the 18thof October and the third of November to do so early.

As always, this newspaper will make recommendations about the candidates we endorse for public office. Of course, we hope that our readers and community are closely following all of the candidates on the ballot, and make their ultimate choices based on competence and record, not party.

This is a pivotal election in so many ways, not just for the state, but also for our nation, and ultimately our children. Our community made history in 2008. read more…

NCCU Band members deserving of support

In a society where one is considered innocent until proven guilty; for 36 young men and women it was the opposite a few weeks ago. I saw news reports for four days on allegations of hazing against the North Carolina Central University Marching Sound Machine drum line, but only one evening report once they were reinstated. They were innocent victims and convicted before evidence was investigated and allegations examined. What happens to the honor students or those that may be considering applying to grad schools? The negative impact of a long investigation or even allegations getting out the media without all the facts can impact them.

While I applaud the administration of North Carolina Central University for taking the allegations of such a serious manner and acting on them promptly, I do feel more could have been done to protect all the students to keep a cloud from hanging over their heads. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill did just that with the nine reported hazing allegations on campus. They made a simple statement that they could not provide any details of the reports, including the chapters involved, because the investigation is ongoing.
 read more…

Jackson State at Alabama State

Joseph LeBeau doesn’t need to glance at the SWAC standings to know the importance of Jackson State’s Saturday game at Alabama State.

And he also warns anyone who might be judging the Tigers (2-4, 2-2 SWAC) solely by their record could be in for a rude awakening. Throughout the highs and lows JSU’s 2-4 start have provided, LeBeau and the Tigers know a win on Saturday at Alabama State (4-2, 4-1 SWAC) in their first Eastern Division game of the season would go a long way towards curing what has ailed them.

So that’s just what they plan on doing.

“Our record shows we’re 2-4, but ain’t no 2-4 team,” LeBeau said. “That first (Eastern Division) game … we have to have this one. Our coaches are stressing it to us … we just got to go get it, plain and simple.”

Saturday’s game has long been circled on the Jackson State schedule. read more…