Current Events –
Black Men Cheer First Day Of School

Last week was the first day of school for much of the country, but for a community of mostly minority students and 100 black men in Hartford, CT, it was an incredible moment in time.

Current Events
DeVaughn Ward and Pastor AJ Johnson are far too familiar with the typical stereotypes that frequently follow men of color. The notion that they’re deadbeats, thugs or simply not very involved in their community is erroneously prevalent. Well, these men were hell-bent on changing that.

“In an urban community, people say that black men aren’t valued or there aren’t enough black men doing something,” Johnson said. “I wanted to prove everyone wrong.”

After seeing a group of men in Georgia greet kids on their first day of school, Ward and Johnson knew they had to bring the idea to their hometown of Hartford.  So, the 2 men created a call-out group on their social media pages entitled “Calling All Brothers.” Their goal was to form a group of black men large enough to greet the children of Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary School on their first day — and to do so wearing suits.

On the morning of August 25th, 50 black men gathered and formed a greeting line for the arriving school kids. Soon after, the group grew to 100 black men. The men cheered and high-fived the kids as they passed through, encouraging them to go get that education and to become the best they could be. The kids had a blast!

“They were running through like they were at the Super Bowl,” Johnson recalled with a laugh. “For a group of well-dressed men to be there meant a lot.”

Current Events
The event was particularly special because most of the kids are from the inner city area and are children of single mothers. Johnson wanted his fellow black men to be there not just to break stigmas, but to show the kids themselves that the men in their neighborhood really do care. With a graduation rate of 47% for black men and less than 1% of fortune 500 companies led by black CEOs, the visible support from the men in the community was necessary and very welcomed.

After witnessing the ecstatic moment of 100 black men cheering the kids on, as they grinned from ear to ear while racing toward the school entrance, a mother of one of the little girls was move to tears.

“This is beautiful,” the mother said.

“The way the media portrays us is that we’re thugs. We don’t know how to dress, we don’t have anything. If you leave it up to Fox [News], we’d just be viewed as nothing,” Johnson said. “For this image to get out of well-dressed men coming together, it’s what the country needs at the moment.”

It was an incredible moment in time.  However, some of the black men in the group were so moved by the event, that they went to another school later that same day to greet the kids as they finished their first day of school.

Well done, black men…well done!

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OK WASSUP! covers current events. Today’s article:
100 Black Men cheer and encourage minority kids
on their first day back to school.