Black History speaker: use what you learn at CC to ‘be who you are'

Dancers perform at the Black History Month Convocation.

Be who you are.

That was the advice of Catherine "Cay" Young '75, keynote speaker at the campus convocation honoring Black History Month on Feb. 6.

Young, manager of the Groton-New London Airport, urged her listeners -- most of them students -- to use the skills they are gaining at Connecticut College to discover who they are. The discovery is a process, she said, that should continue through their life.

Young's theme was persistence and perseverance, especially through doubts. "Persevere and follow your dreams," Young said.

Earlier in the program, Metika Ngbokoli '15 and Tonesha Hunt '12 told their stories. "Today, I am a strong, independent woman who will knock down any barriers that get in my way," said Hunt, a psychology and human development major from Bloomfield, Conn. "My life illuminates my black history. I have and will be 'black history' in the making."

A few weeks earlier, the College named this year's recipients of the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Service Awards. The ceremony also included performances by the Unity Gospel Choir, the spoken word poetry group Reflexions and the Camelbacks step group.

Recipients of the King Awards were Mab Segrest, the Fuller- Maathai Professor of Gender and Women's Studies at Connecticut College; Kiesha HEnry, staff assistant for the Office of Volunteers for Community Service (OVCS) and the Holleran Center for Community Action and Public Policy; and Connecticut College senior Jazmin Long.

February 14, 2012