Spelman College students have been reigning undefeated for the Goldman Sachs Market Madness Competition through the HBCU Possibilities Program. In April 2024, Victoria Cain, Makhi Frempong, Olivia Rivera-Spann, and Symone Thompson won the pitch competition and its $1 million top prize, according to a news release. The victory marks the HBCU’s third win in four years. “Emerging victorious in the Goldman Sachs Market Madness competition is a genuine reflection of our unwavering perseverance, meticulousness and the goodness of God,” said Frempong, who is an economics major, according to the news release. “This exceptional contest provided us with a platform to hone our abilities and visualize our forthcoming roles as analysts in the industry. It is a remarkable feat to be part of Spelman’s enduring heritage by virtue of our hard work. This journey has been truly extraordinary, demonstrating our growth as professionals in an astonishing manner.” The win came after Frempong, Cain,...

Joe Budden is getting candid about his career podcast earnings. According to Vibe, the rapper-turned-podcast-host recently shared that he has earned at least $7 million since he made the career transition, pocketing a reported $4 million from that after taxes. “Off podcasting, off of this?” Budden said during an episode of “The Joe Budden Podcast.” “All together in the whole 10 years? About $4 million… Gross is $7 million.” He also opened up about how he and his team managed to get to those numbers, noting that inking partnerships with various brands along the way has been beneficial. “Early on we were doing it for free,” Budden recalled. “Then we hit a little lick, Spotify. Then n—as left, the building crumbled a little bit, and my friends came and saved the day.” As previously reported by AFROTECH™, he shared the real reason that he walked away from Spotify’s initial offer. “In business, there are signs, for me, that show faith in a relationship,” Budden said at the time. “And me...

A bright future in education awaits the students of Benjamin E. Mays High School in southwest Atlanta, GA. WABE, a local PBS station, reports that on Friday, April 19, 2024, the class of 2024, made up of 272 seniors, gathered for assembly and were surprised with a visit by Kevin James, the 19th president of Morris Brown College in Atlanta. James, who has maintained the post since 2020, per 11Alive, had good news for them. He began by giving a brief history lesson on the college, which had lost its accreditation in 2002 due to challenges stemming from debt and financial mismanagement, as AFROTECH™ previously reported. Nearly two decades following the defeat, it had announced in 2021 that the college had regained its accreditation, becoming the first Historically Black College and University (HBCU) to do so. “It’s so many HBCUs that have lost their accreditation that are still closed today,” James told the class of 2024, according to WABE. “That usually is a death sentence for an...

From the time he was a kid, McKinley Thompson Jr. was never afraid to chase his dreams, and now everyone has him to thank for the Ford Bronco that the culture grew to know and love. Thanks to Thompson’s imagination and skill, he made history as the first Black designer to be hired by Ford Motor Co., and his first assignment consisted of working at Ford’s advanced design studio in Dearborn, MI, per the Ford media website. His love for cars first began around age 12 when he spotted a silver-gray DeSoto Airflow in Queens, NY, the neighborhood where he was raised. “It just so happened that the clouds opened up for the sunshine to come through,” Thompson recalled in a 2001 interview that was documented by The Henry Ford. “It lit that car up like a searchlight. I was never so impressed with anything in all my life. I knew that’s what I wanted to do – I wanted to be an automobile designer.” While serving as an Army Signal Corps in World War II, Thompson learned drafting and began work as...

While a high IQ is often touted as a status symbol — a sign that the person who has it is amongst the most intelligent in the world — there’s actually a disparity, rooted in racism and white supremacy, in who earns a “genius-level” IQ ranking. In 1998, Brookings released a report that explained how Black people — especially Black Americans — consistently score lower than white Americans on standardized IQ tests. While the gap has narrowed since 1970, “the typical American black still scores below 75 percent of American whites on almost every standardized test. This statistic does not imply, of course, that all blacks score below all whites. There is a lot of overlap between the two groups. Nonetheless, the test score gap is large enough to have significant social and economic consequences.” So, when someone is certified as having a “high IQ,” it’s a good thing. But it’s even better if that “someone” is a Black man or woman, especially — according to Forbes — when a perceived low IQ...

Amber Goodwin will be graduating from the Mitchell Hamline School of Law in Saint Paul, Minnesota on June 6, 2021. She will be 41 years old when she graduates. But don’t think that this is some standard “ non-traditional graduation story. ” In fact, there’s nothing “standard” about Amber Goodwin at all. Twenty years prior to her graduation day, Goodwin graduated from college but didn’t get accepted into any of her chosen law schools. But she didn’t let this rejection get her down. “My mentality was: I’m going to keep applying places and they have to tell me no,” Amber Goodwin said to Good Morning America (GMA). “I’m not going to call the question on myself. If people tell me no, then that’s on them, and I’ll just keep trying.” If someone had told me when I was rejected from many law schools 20 yrs ago that at 41 yrs old I would be in a magazine spread from a Bar Association while still in law school I would have said you were crazy. I only hope my ancestors are proud. tnx to...

Our nation’s approach to celebrating Black culture over the last year has been viewed as a performative trend that’s just catching up with us, but for founder Trell Thomas he’s also been ahead of the curve. Last year in April, Thomas — an entertainment entrepreneur and founder of the Black Excellence Brunch — was gearing up to launch his collection of Black Excellence Boxes as a means to honor the Black-owned businesses he’s long since admired. “I had been thinking about this [idea] for awhile, before supporting Black businesses became trendy,” he told AfroTech. “I remember being at ESSENCE Fest walking past all those booths and I was so inspired by all these Black entrepreneurs that I was seeing.” As an extension of his mainstay brand, Thomas came up with a plan at the start of the pandemic to send out curated-boxes filled with products from Black-owned brands similar to other subscription box companies like Birchbox. The purpose of the special-made boxes was to both celebrate...

Black people are continuing to raise the bar in education, and University of Florida graduate Jasmine Bowers is no exception as she’s the first Black person to obtain a doctorate in computer science from the university, Black News reports . Despite living through a global pandemic and social upheaval in America, Bowers powered through her final semester making history in the process. https://twitter.com/JasmineDBowers/status/1284714065785499648?s=20 According to Bowers, the motivation for her latest accomplishment started at a young age when her mother taught her how to use [Microsoft] Excel to create a “wish list.” “I grew up in a household where I was encouraged to embrace technology,” Bowers told Because of Them We Can . “I also had the freedom to utilize technologies that included computers and other equipment that my mother, a [self-taught] engineer, had.” “The Ph.D. was and is the pinnacle of the seed planted years ago, deposits from teachers, internship experiences, amazing...