Brooklyn Alumni on VP Kamala Harris

By Fern Gillespie
Kamala Harris didn’t win the presidency. However, she made history again as the first Black and Asian woman to run for president. She was defiant and truthful and showed the power of positive possibilities.

That duty to community empowerment is ingrained in Howard University’s philosophy. Harris brought her historic presidential election night to her Howard University alma mater. Her landmark vice presidency and presidential candidacy is an important piece in Howard’s role in changing American political history. Thurgood Marshall, Governor L. Douglas Wilder, Senator Edward Brooke, Mayor David Dinkins, Andrew Young, and Ralph Bunche are a few political changemakers who attended Howard. Our Time Press spoke to some Howard grads, who are Brooklyn residents, about the impact of Howard University on their lives.

Howard University was a life-changer for Monique Greenwood, owner of Brooklyn’s Akwaaba Bed & Breakfast Inn and former Essence magazine editor-in-chief. “As a native Washingtonian and a first-generation college student, the last place I wanted to go was down the street to Howard University. Howard’s rich legacy, excellent educational programs, and serious social scene was lost on me because it was in my backyard,” she recalled. “It was clear my professors cared about developing the whole person, and I was challenged by the curriculum, motivated by the can-do spirit of my classmates, and inspired by the success of the illustrious alumni.” Greenwood, a self-described “master multi-tasker on a mission,” is one of Howard’s illustrious alumni.

She has authored two books and designed a home goods collection Macy’s. She created a chain of African American B&B inns in Cape May, NJ; New Orleans, LA (sold after Hurricane Katrina); Washington, DC; and Philadelphia, PA. The Mansion at Noble Lane, a former Woolworth estate in Pennsylvania’s Pocono Mountains, is the site of OWN’s Checked Inn series starring Monique. “Because of Howard, I’ve been able to self-actualize and realize my wildest dreams,” she said.

Greenwood, who graduated magna cum laude in journalism in the early 1980s, was best friends with Benilde Little (author of novel Good Hair) and communications guru Lynne Scott Jackson, “We called ourselves “three the hard way,” taking on leadership positions in student government and on The Hilltop, the student paper,” she recalled. “My passion for fashion was also heightened by the stylish students at Howard. I used to coordinate and commentate the big fashion shows on campus and in the city.” After Howard, she had a stellar career as an editor and publisher in the fashion industry’s Fairchild Publishing.”

In 2016, Greenwood returned to Howard as the John H. Johnson Endowed Chair of Entrepreneurship, for three years. “I was helping to nurture the next generation of leaders, communications innovators, and business owners,” she said

Educator and Brooklyn resident Lynne Scott Jackson is the Director of Industry Relations, Internships & Professional Development and a Distinguished Lecturer in ad/PR Programs at CCNY. She calls herself an “HBCU kid” and grew up in Hampton, Virginia, where her father was a Hampton University official. She opted for Howard. In the early 1980s, she became the editor-in-chief of Howard’s The Hilltop newspaper, with Monique and Benilde having editorial roles. The Hilltop, named by Howard student Zora Neal Hurston, is one the country’s leading college newspapers and is celebrating its 100th anniversary.

One of Scott Jackson’s Hilltop writers was acclaimed Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Isabel Wilkerson, author of The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration and Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents. “Isabel was features editor when I was editor-in-chief. She is perhaps one of the most talented writers who has graduated from Howard. She was molded in the tradition of another HU alumna, Toni Morrison,” she said. “During my time at Howard, there were a few professors who had taught Morrison as a student. They were blown away by Isabel. While exhibiting quiet elegance and excellence as a writer, her stories always received top billing.”

Like Vice President Kamala Harris, who was active in Howard student government, Scott Jackson was a student leader at Howard. As The Hilltop editor and President of the Communications Student Government, she was exposed to networking with students, faculty, and staff. “Howard remains at the pinnacle of social justice movements. In the late 70s and early 80s, during my time on campus, students were at the forefront of the international South African movement to eradicate apartheid,” she said. “I also had the good fortune of having classmates and professors who were front and center in the Civil Rights movement.”
For April R. Silver, Chief Communications Strategist, Founder/CEO, AKILA WORKSONGS, Howard University was pivotal in her work as a community activist. “Being trained there as an organizer and learning how to nurture life-long relationships are some of the best choices I’ve made in my life,” she said. “My maturation as a woman, a life-long student, a successful businesswoman, a published writer, a cultural worker is irretractably tied to Howard University.”

Silver, who graduated in 1991 with an English major and an African American Literature minor, first learned about Howard University at a college fair. “I had no idea such a school existed. Being introduced to the rich legacy of the institution and the fact that it was all Black was all I needed to get motivated. It was the only school I applied to and I got accepted in 1986. I cried.”

Black Nia F.O.R.C.E., (Freedom Organization for Racial and Cultural Enlightenment), the student/community organization that Ras J. Baraka (now Mayor of Newark, NJ) co-founded and where she eventually became one of the leaders, played a critical role in re-igniting student activism on campus. In 1989, Howard University students took over the Administration Building. “I was a co-leader and spokesperson of that internationally recognized event. On the 30th anniversary of The Protest, as we call it, NYU Press published: We Are Worth Fighting For: A History of the Howard University Student Protest of 1989 by Joshua M. Myers,” she said, “My fellow student leaders and I all stood on the principle that Howard U. should not have Lee Atwater on the Board of Trustees and we fought the University to reverse their decision.”

Silver was elected as Howard University’s Student Body President, the second female student body president in Howard’s history, and Baraka was vice president. “Our slogan was “Leadership for the Masses,” she said. Regarding Harris’ election day at Howard, she explained. “I’m happy that she’s thoughtful enough to bring this historic energy to the sacred grounds of Howard University—a haven that helped shaped her in so many ways.”

Attending Howard University has been a revelation for veteran journalist and scholar Milton Allimadi. The publisher of the New York-based newspaper, Black Star News, is a former Adjunct Professor at the Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia University and an Adjunct Professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in the Africana Studies Department. This year, he decided to become a graduate student in Howard University’s Black History doctorate program. “I really love history and believe that it will also better inform my journalism, especially when I focus more on exploratory journalism,” he said. “The PhD will broaden my options and give me the opportunity to teach full-time at the location of my choice. I also think journalism is a sacred responsibility, and it’s hard to imagine how one can be a serious journalist without a solid grounding in history.”

Howard has a 157-year history as the educational base for Black politicians, scientists, authors, artists, actors, authors, historians, physicians, lawyers, architects, dentists, educators, social workers, broadcasters, journalists, scholars, activists and others.

“Eric Williams who wrote the seminal classic Capitalism and Slavery taught at Howard. The late Kwame Ture, a.k.a. Stokely Carmichael, attended Howard, as did many who went on to great achievements in various fields. Great scholars such as Nikole Hannah-Jones of the 1619 Project fame and Ta-Nehisi Coates, whose new book The Message has generated much debate, are teaching here, and I hope to benefit by intellectual interactions with them and many others,” he said. “To be honest with you, just walking across the Howard campus and sitting in a classroom feels like a spiritual experience.”
Journalist Fern Gillespie is a graduate of Howard University.