By Jeffery Kazembe Batts IG: @kazbatts “People just don’t understand the cultural differences, don’t understand who we are! The system is not set up to help our children build a strong identity so they know who they are, so when they get out there in the world, they are the boss, not the employee. They have a vision that is unlimited, and they can feel very powerful, knowing that there is nothing that can stop them and get in their way.
They can believe in themselves,” Mother Fela passionately expressed. She shared at the December 12th ribbon cutting ceremony that launched the Little Sun People after school and long-awaited kindergarten class. Little Sun People was originally founded for Mother Fela’s daughter, Aaliyah, who is now the Executive Director, with Fela assisting as the Deputy Director.
Founded 44 years ago by Fela Barcliff, the new expansion continues the vision of a holistic, 360-degree, African-centered program for the Black child. The Children in the new kindergarten class are called Nubians, and the children in the after-school program are called the Makondes. Little Sun People is located on the third and fourth floors of 352 Classon Ave, the Child Development Support Corporation building in Bed-Stuy.
Inside the environment of art, books, computers, drums, flags, maps, and photographs are neatly arranged in various rooms that can only stimulate and empower any parent or child who enters the school. Dozens of children and their parents briefly braved the cold weather to see the ribbon cutting on Classon Ave.
Archery instructor Dr. Brown working with student.
To celebrate, Fela reached back into the school’s history to have one of its earliest students, the highly acclaimed Dr. Uche Blackstock, cut the ribbon outside the building. She then shared how influential her time attending the school was in facilitating a foundation she built on later in life. Once back inside and upstairs, parents and children were allowed to do archery, an ancient African practice from Nubia and Tar-Seti. Activist, artist, and gifted archer Dr. Larry Brown patiently taught how to stand and shoot arrows at a bullseye target.
The incoming students will be taught this aspect of African history alongside the state standards for kindergarten. While celebrating, swag bags were given to attendees under 10 years old, and Watoto the clown entertained, bringing laughter and smiles to the room full of little African princesses and princes. Light refreshments were served as parents networked, children played, and everyone marveled at the layout of the new space.
Mother Fela shared her appreciation for Little Sun People’s past support from powerful Black elected officials over the years. She thanked the late Al Vann and former elected officials Annette Robinson, Charles, and Inez Barron. The founder said, “These are people that have always been in Little Sun People’s corner.”
Forming relationships with the newly elected officials is an ongoing process, she added. As she prepares to retire next year Mama Fela affirmed her purpose and the mindset she wants embedded in the children attending Little Sun People. “Every part of education with an African infusion. Our people did it. Your community does it. This is amazing. You got this!”
By Fern Gillespie The contentious national and local political landscape in New York City during 2024 has left many people mentally and emotionally exhausted. As we move through this holiday season into 2025, more people seek mindfulness and meditation. This year, the United Nations even declared December 21 as World Meditation Day.
Brooklyn Deputy Borough President Kim Council balances a life of politics and prayer. She’s also the assistant pastor and a lifelong member of Brooklyn’s Berean Baptist Church, where she served as the executive director of the Berean Community and Family Life Center. “The challenge is for us not to get weary,” she told Our Time Press. “As a people, we’ve been here before. We’ve dealt with challenges. We are resilient.”
This year, as part of Borough President Antonio Reynoso’s mission to develop more affordable housing in Brooklyn, she created a clergy roundtable to advise faith-based organizations on building housing. “A lot of our pastors want to develop their properties. Pastors are in a unique position because they have the property, but most of the congregations are mission-focused as opposed to profit-focused,” she said. “We wanted to make sure to create an environment to educate the pastors that were interested in developing their property so they would not be taken advantage of.”
As former vice chair of the Local Development Corporation of East New York and president of the East Brooklyn Housing Development Corporation, she spearheaded the construction of over one thousand units of affordable housing. At Berean, she helped develop 170 affordable housing and 67 units of senior housing in Crown Heights. “I came of age under Rev. Dr. Gus Roman at Berean. The church-built Horizon Village in Brownsville in the 1980s, and people were able to purchase that house for $30,000,” she said. “I watched how he navigated and how he brought so many pastors and churches together.”
In addition to affordable housing, she is a well-known advocate for women’s healthcare, preventative healthcare, youth development programs, food insecurity, violence prevention programs, ending gun violence, minority business development, Business Improvement Districts, and merchant associations to help support local businesses. An AKA Soror, she holds a degree in political science from HBCU North Carolina Central University and a master’s degree in library science from Pratt Institute. Her mentors have included Sen. Velmanette Montgomery, Congresswoman Yvette Clarke, and Congressman Ed Towns.
Rev. Council grew up in HUD-subsidized housing as the oldest of five children. “My dad had maybe a fifth-grade education. He was typically the last one hired, and the first one fired. So, he was unemployed a lot,” she recalled. “We’ve faced eviction. I know what it’s like to be hungry.” Her mother worked at a daycare center and later at the post office.
“My mother was a proponent of education. She sacrificed to put us in Catholic school. It was a huge sacrifice.” “As a young person growing up in Brooklyn, depending on what you’re exposed to, you can have a very narrow worldview. I think as you grow and as you are exposed to different things, your perspectives begin to change. Your understanding of people who are different than you expands if you allow it.”
Working as a law librarian for 24 years at a law firm became beneficial in her work as a community advocate. “It was considered a white shoe law firm. My worldview was challenged a lot. The firm was very supportive of everything that I was doing externally,” she said. “The law library gave me the ability to understand the law. How do we research the law, understand legislative history, understand legislators’ intent, and put legislation together? The relationships that were built as a result of working with that firm were a lot of connections to Brooklyn and a huge amount of support for me professionally and personally.”
Borough President Antonio Reynoso has been impactful and inspirational in her life. “I feel so privileged to be in this position right now,” she said. “I’m incredibly thankful to Antonio for reaching out and seeing in me that I could be a partner. I’m really excited to be working with somebody who shares the same values that I do and who puts people first over politics.”
For Rev. Council, mindfulness extends to remaining engaged with our neighbors. “Taking care of each other and checking in on each other. Even in the midst of everything that we’re going through, we remember that we are our neighbors’ keeper,” she stressed. “I look at my relationship with God as one where he considers me a friend. In my conversations and communications with God, I try to take time and pull back to think about where I am, how blessed I’ve been, and how many doors he’s opened. And how many more people we have to help come through those doors.”
Nigeria Jones by Ibi Zoboi and Punching the Air by Ibi Zoboi and Yusef Salaam
Nigeria Jones by Ibi Zoboi Balzer & Bray, 384 pages Grand Central Publishing, Hatchette Book Group, Inc. 368 pp. Punching the Air by Ibi Zoboi and Yusef Salaam Balzer & Bray, 400 pages
Ibi Zoboi is the New York Times bestselling author of books for children and teens, including American Street, a National Book Award Finalist, and the Walter Award and LA Times Book Prize-winning Punching the Air, co-written with Yusef Salaam. Zoboi is also the 2024 Coretta Scott King Award winner for Nigeria Jones. Dr. Yusef Salaam is a politician, motivational speaker, and activist and is the author of the memoir, Better, Not Bitter.
He is currently serving as a member of the New York City Council. In 1989, Salaam was tried and convicted in the “Central Park Jogger” case and is one of the Exonerated Five who spent between seven to 13 years behind bars for crimes they did not commit. Over the past two decades, he has become a poet, activist and inspirational speaker.
Nigeria Jones (Balzer & Bray, 2023) and Punching the Air (Balzer and Bray, 2021) are Young Adult (YA) coming-of-age fiction books that share the common themes of resilience, hope, and the search for self in the face of grief and loss.
Nigeria, the protagonist in Nigeria Jones, is home-schooled and has been raised in an African-centered household in the city of Philadelphia. As the narrative develops, we witness Nigeria’s search for self as she tries to negotiate conflicts with her father and conflicts between her connection to the African-centered cultural education she is receiving and her desire to go to an integrated school that does not reflect these goals and values. Added to this dilemma is Nigeria’s deep longing for her mother who disappeared right after the birth of her little brother Freedom.
Zoboi packs many themes into this novel: mother/daughter relationships, the search for self, identity politics, African-centered spirituality and traditions, and grief. Nigeria ultimately asks herself, what can she do to reconcile the emotional, social, and cultural conflicts in her life and how will she gain the freedom that will give her agency over her life choices.
Readers are guided through the novel by Zoboi’s use of epigraphs that set the tone and provide a message at the beginning of each chapter. Her chapter titled, “Article IV: Black to Freedom School,” for example, begins with a quote attributed to Mary McLeod Bethune. “A woman is free if she lives by her own standards and creates her own destiny if she prizes her individuality and puts no boundaries on her hopes for tomorrow.”
Zoboi and Salaam met while attending Hunter College; they were in a course with Marimba Ani, the African American Studies scholar. That meeting resulted in their discussion over the course work which was revealing to both of them and their eventual collaboration on Punching the Air, a fictionalized and autobiographical representation of a young man who is caught up in the criminal justice system. In narrating his story, the protagonist, Amal Shadid provides an insider’s perspective on the effects of institutionalized racism and mass incarceration on Black young men and women.
Readers learn that Amal Shahid is an artist and poet who is viewed as disruptive and unmotivated while in public school. He has a teacher who recognizes his artistic and poetic talents and recommends him for art school. However, Amal finds himself at the wrong place and time and is accused of beating a White boy into unconsciousness.
He is subsequently arrested and when the victim fails to gain consciousness before his trial, Amal is sent to prison. Punching the Air intertwines Amal’s personal reflections on his incarceration with powerful poetic images that include “punching the air.” While in prison, he dreams words: But there’s no future in these four walls four walls boxing me in boxing me in so I punch the air . . . shadowbox with God spar with all four of these corners as if they are all different versions of me.
Amal’s survival in prison is the result of multiple factors that include his mother, Umi, who believes in his innocence and refuses to give up on him, his uncle who gives him books, and his writing and art. Although he views the cell as a tomb, he is resilient. Down here in the dungeon I write anyway I draw anyway The pen and pencil Are my thoughts and memories The paper is my soul. The impact of the criminal justice system on the psyche of Amal and young men in the system is epitomized in these words. Their words and what they thought to be their truth were like a scalpel shaping me into the monster they want me to be.
Although the target audience for Young Adult Literature (YA) is typically 12 to 18, both Nigeria Jones and Punching the Air address topics that appeal to adult and YA readers. Ibi Zoboi will be a speaker at the 2025 National Black Writers Conference on Young Adult and Middle School Literature at Medgar Evers College on March 29, 2025. For more information about conference visit www.centerforblackliterature.org
Dr. Brenda M. Greene is Professor of English, Founder and Executive Director of the Center for Black Literature, and Senior Special Assistant to the Provost at Medgar Evers College, CUNY.
According to TRBusiness, six small, women-owned businesses based in New York will now have a new home at Terminal 8 (T8) due to a $125 million redevelopment program. They were selected through an accelerator program launched by Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield (URW) Airports.
The chosen entrepreneurs were also offered adaptable deal structures and smaller storefront spaces to minimize entry hurdles and lower design expenses. “Helping local businesses access concessions opportunities at Terminal 8 is an asset for our passengers, who will enjoy products unique to New York that are made and sold by local artisans and vendors,” said Dominic Lowe, US chief operating officer of Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, per TRBusiness. “These six local women bring the energy and enthusiasm of a small business owner to Terminal 8 while offering one-of-a-kind products, which are made right here in New York.”
Lowe added, “Working with the Port Authority, the Institute of Concessions, and American Airlines, we designed these opportunities with a support system to help businesses thrive.” Among the six new businesses launching at JFK, three are led by Black women, as highlighted below. Several Black women-owned businesses are making their way to JFK airport. According to TRBusiness, six small, women-owned businesses based in New York will now have a new home at Terminal 8 (T8) due to a $125 million redevelopment program.
Amerrah Danielson, center, Beautiful Amore Skincare
Amerrah Danielson (Beautiful Amore Skincare) Queens, NY native and Institute of Concessions graduate Amerrah Danielson wants her plant-based skincare brand, Beautiful Amore Skincare, to become a household name. She is now one step closer. “This achievement is a testament to the strength of small businesses, especially Black-owned and woman-owned ventures, and the impact we can make when given the chance to thrive…and to my family, my team, and my community—this moment is ours. Thank you for standing by me, for believing in me, and for being the reason I can turn this dream into reality. Together, we are building a legacy of love, resilience, and natural wellness that will inspire generations to come,” Danielson wrote on Instagram.
Gracia Clery-Leonce ,Bevo’s Kitchen
Gracia Clery-Leonce (Bevo’s Kitchen) Next on the lineup is another native of Queens, NY. Gracia Clery-Leonce is a clinical laboratory scientist turned entrepreneur who developed a variety of food options that reflect her commitment to promoting healthier living. “With JFK in my backyard, I always wanted to get my products into the airport, so this is a dream come true,” she explained to TRBusiness. “Eating healthy while traveling is challenging, especially for plant-based travelers, and I want to change that. I want to teach the world the importance of a healthy lifestyle via good healthy eating habits, and what better way than to interact with passengers from around the globe.”
Dr. Roxanne Lord Marcelle (Mother Earth Juice Bar) Dr. Lord-Marcelle views her role at JFK Airport as a tremendous opportunity. In 2017, she founded Mother Earth Juice Bar, which also incorporates a wellness center to promote health and well-being.
Dr. Roxanne-Marcelle, Mother Earth Juice Bar
Reflecting on her latest achievement, she expressed, “Opening up my business in the airport is a tremendous opportunity for me as an African-American woman from the Caribbean. “To be able to have a presence in T8 is an exciting milestone for my business especially, as a community leader who is dedicated to helping people get certified to operate in airports.” Marcelle’s mission is to eradicate health and wealth disparities within the Black, Indigenous, and POC communities, according to a statement shared on Instagram. Her products include pain oil, detox tea, and a power shot for sinus infections. This article first appeared in AfroTech.
On November 13, 2024, Ms. Salina Coleman, a former resident of Cornerstone Nursing Facility for Seniors, passed at 50 as a result of complications related to Lupus, a condition she experienced for more than 25 years. The former educator and athlete, spent most of her life disseminating information and news about the disease tapping into her interests in crafting, decorating, event planning, performing, and hosting workshops.
Just before her passing, she developed and produced a breast cancer workshop for seniors. Our Time Press contributor Selma Jackson introduced the publisher and editor to Ms. Coleman during spring 2023. A few weeks later, we interviewed her for the May National Lupus Awareness Month observance. Her story ran in two parts: Salina Coleman: Warrior for Wellness Leads Brooklyn’s Lupus Awareness Effort and “I Have Lupus But It Does Not Have Me.” Following are excerpts of those stories and a selection of photos she chose to frame her story. -Bernice Elizabeth Green
Salina Coleman: Warrior for Wellness Leads Brooklyn’s Lupus Awareness Effort
Yesterday, May 10 (2023), was World Lupus Day, a day observed for increasing awareness about the disease. For Salina Coleman, 49, of the Tompkins Park Senior Citizens Center in Bedford-Stuyvesant, bringing awareness to the plight is an everyday occurrence. Lupus occurs when the immune system, which normally helps protect the body from infection and disease, attacks its own tissues. She says her mission is to get information into the community about the rise of Lupus among African American communities everywhere.
“Women between the ages of 1544 make up 90% of Lupus cases, and African American women and women of color are the most likely to be diagnosed with some form of lupus.” For Black women, lupus starts developing at a young age — as it did for her when she was 15 and the future was hers: she could have been a professional athlete, a professional singer or a dancer. Now she is developing her skills as a writer.
“Officially” considered disabled, and partially confined to a wheelchair because of the insidious disease’s invasion and destruction of her right limb from the knee area to the foot, Salina is abler and more giving of her time to the cause of wellness than the so called abled. Ms. Coleman has designed, organized, and hosted more than 225 Lupus awareness workshops and health & wellness learning sessions, reaching thousands of people, at her own expense for over 15 years.
“So, what is Lupus?” is usually the first question asked of her. Lupus is “an inflammatory disease caused when the immune system attacks its own healthy tissues”, is her response. Then she “illustrates” the numbers by showing and explaining what has happened to her. According to the Living with Lupus booklet, Ms. Coleman distributed, “Your body’s immune system is like an army with hundreds of soldiers. The immune system’s job is to fight foreign substances in the body, like germs and viruses.
But in autoimmune diseases, the immune system is out of control, it suppresses the immune system.” It should be noted that Lupus affects different people in different ways, attacking different parts of the body, from patient to patient. For Ms. Coleman, mostly all parts of her body have been under attack for three decades. It should be noted: Lupus is not contagious. * * *
Salina Coleman: “I Have Lupus, but it Does Not Have Me”
Producer Ava Duvernay has it. Singer Selina Gomez has it. Entertainer Nick Cannon has it. But there is one difference in the case of Brooklyn’s Salina Coleman who also has Lupus. She is not a celebrity, but she is using every muscle; personal funds; and a heavy dose of compassion to inform her Bedford-Stuyvesant homebase about the disease, which attacks and disrupts the immune system. Following is the OTP Q&A with Ms. Coleman.
Bernice Elizabeth Green/OTP: Last week, you informed our readers about the impact of Lupus, an autoimmune condition that attacks normal, healthy tissue in many parts of the body causing inflammation for which there is no cure? Can you share some of the medical challenges, including symptoms you have experienced? Salina Coleman: I am considered a critical case because I am experiencing every form of Lupus. The case is so significant because to my knowledge there’s never been a case like mine where the patient is still living. The list goes on and on. I’ve gone through dialysis, chemotherapy, plasma freeze, loss of my right lower leg, loss of the use of seven fingers, constant sleeplessness, and inflammation in many parts of the body. All basic symptoms are ascribed to all forms of Lupus I’ve experienced. Pain, shortness of breath, Lupus Fog.
All parts of my body have been under attack: joints, lungs, kidneys, skin, spine, and more. I have anemia and contracted thyroid, and digestive problems, including gout and Gerd. Heart disease, high blood pressure levels. Yet, you find the time and energy to inform others through events and health workshops, plan, design, promote, do all of the work, and even gather and pack gift bags?
Multi-tasker Salina Coleman, left, a self-motivated Lupus awareness spokesperson, says her family — biological and extended, living and ancestral, helped her find her way through storms. She is seen here with her friend Tayumika Zurita, formerly of the Brooklyn Lupus Center.
After discovering the extent of my condition, I incorporated health workshops into my work at various centers, Metropolitan, Lakeside, and here at the Tompkins Park Center. It is natural for me because basically, I have been doing this for most of my life, starting as early as age 16-17. Organizing events, games and doing something special with people. I’ve formed Christmas caroling groups, Easter basket giveaways, and organized fashion shows. Also, organized, all varieties of health care workshops: breast cancer, heart disease, breathing, slips, and falls, Last week, on May 10 Lupus Awareness Day you hosted an initiative for the seniors here at Tompkins Park.
In 2019, a Men’s Health Initiative was launched, and we may do it again next month. There was also a successful Woman to Woman conference, launched last year, which is coming back. We discussed topics related to women’s health concerns, lifestyles, and stress relief. I hosted a breast cancer workshop, a workshop on diabetes and so many more. On average, about 12 to 15 a year for about 12 to 15 years. As I mentioned, my interest in sharing information came very early, around the time I had Lupus, but it was not pronounced and I did not know what it was.
As a teenager, I worked with children in the Junior Knicks League at the YMCA across the street from where we lived on Humboldt. The directors observed how I worked with kids and hired me. I was a student at Eastern District High School at the time. I was charged with 100 kids all by myself and I would make up fun group sports games to hold their interest. We did drills, danced, and cheerleading. I was a cheerleader and I taught them all that I knew. Of course, we made sure they did their homework first. I was attending school at the same time I worked in this evening after-school program.
Your niece Kaliyah told us you are a whiz at not only playing but creating your own games for young people and seniors. I created a Celebrity Lupus game, and a New Year’s Bingo game. There’s also Hot Cocoa Conversation where we have conversations exploring history over hot chocolate. Just like a good game, every workshop is a learning experience. Seniors learn something from each workshop and they, then, take something they’ve learned and share it with someone they know.”
What else can you share about your journey? It’s been a rough road. There was a time I had no real income, and I paid out of pocket for expensive medications like Prednisone. In 2004, nearly 20 years ago, there was one medication that cost about $800. I was backed up on rent and bills. I just kept going although it was not easy. Trying to deal with personal issues was an uphill battle: I lost my Faith. I asked: ‘why is God punishing me if He loves me?’ I knew that we all endure hardships in our lives, but I thought I was abandoned. Then my church family stepped in to help me. I found the strength through a deeper relationship with Him to make it through the storm.
That is what gave me hope to live, and that is where Faith comes in. I think it may be difficult for those who do not have a relationship with God to understand what I mean. I give them my favorite scripture for reference: All things through Christ who strengthens me. Philippians 4, 310. With regards to my limbs: on my left hand, I lost three fingertips; four, on the right, but I still do crafts, for showers and weddings. I write. Although I can’t pick up certain things off the floor, I like to try to challenge myself to do it. Sometimes the skin peels on my fingers. The feeling is like a thousand papercuts. In wintertime, I hibernate. Sometimes, I wear gloves inside my home. Summertime, too, can be difficult. Extreme cold and extreme heat are unbearable.
Who are some others who have supported you and your efforts? My rheumatologist of 27 years, Dr. Mona Pervil-Ulysses, and my mother. I would not be here if it were not for them. They were the platform to help me get good health. I was on life’s deathbed several times. But God sent a woman from rheumatology school to help my case, a critical one. Before meeting Dr. Pervil, I did not know what was going on with me.
I was getting blood transfusions, anemia was so low, my iron was almost nonexistent. My whole immune system was tearing down, and rheumatoid arthritis, affecting the lining of my joints and painful swelling, was out of control. I was being given different antibiotics, and all that medication was poisoning my system. No one knew what I had so they did not know how to treat it. When it seemed like I was about to die, Interfaith called in my whole family.
I didn’t feel anything, didn’t know what was being done. But people started praying, and my mom told my family, “My daughter’s not going anywhere!” She called the police, signed a waiver, and had an ambulance take me to Downstate. As soon as I got to the emergency door, they knew they had a critical case. I was lifeless. My mom had gotten me out in the nick of time. God was with me the whole way.
They were praying in Intensive care. Even the nurses were praying. There were eight or nine machines around me, and there were calls for pressure, bags of medication, and big sacks of blood. I was in and out of conscience until I saw… and I heard them yelling … yellow code. Then I blacked out. I wasn’t awake when I went to OR. I lay in a comatose state from that night on for several months. I met Dr. Pervil when they gave her my case.
God blessed her to save my life. She told me what it was and told me she had never seen a case like mine. She went beyond the call of duty. She made sure I was getting proper medications. When I opened my eyes, the nurses clapped and laughed. I lifted my head up to look out the window at the sky.
When did it finally hit you that Lupus would be with you forever? When they said there was no cure for it, no medicines to keep it under control. I take 20 pills per day.
Anything you miss doing? I love winter. Snowball fights. I would dress and lay in the snow. I can’t go out into the snow now. After five minutes, I get frostbite. Sometimes I go to the lobby and look out the big windows at the snow. The best for me is fall. I do autumn.
But what’s the most important thing to you now? Knowledge is the most important thing of all. If I didn’t get educated about the disease I would not know about it or the medications to take, the blood clots, the procedures…I would be lost. The first key is to learn, and then learn how to cope …
How has your outlook on life changed since you were a point guard in high school looking forward to a career in basketball with the WNBA? I give myself birthday parties every Dec. 4. I look forward to them. In 2022, it was a dinner party for 20 people. I do it to celebrate my life. The theme that I created centered around The Queen Within. I looked at the history of different Black queens of the past, Nefertiti, Amina, and others.
I created a game called “Queendom.” I always try to give a little education, and a little knowledge to my guests so they can take with them something to remember. I’ve been from the hospital to rehabilitation nearly every year for many years. Every holiday. Every birthday. For years. Every day you are alive is a chance to celebrate your life. After all I’ve been through, heck yeah!
