Thomas Breen photo
Claudine Wilkins-Chambers, Robyn Porter, and Delphine Clyburn honored by “Pearls For My Girls” Lincoln Basset 5th grade students.
From Mayor Toni Harp to State Rep. Robyn Porter to Florida women’s health advocate Byllye Avery to Chicago television phenom Oprah Winfrey, local and national female icons alike were lauded as part of a Newhallville student-led celebration of Women’s History Month.
That happened at Tuesday night’s regular monthly meeting of the Newhallville Community Management Team in the cafeteria of Lincoln-Basset Community School on Bassett Street. Girls from three different neighborhood youth organizations singled out women, in particular black women, for praise for their accomplishments in politics, education, health care, sports, and entertainment.
Jeanette Sykes.
“What we want our kids to see is that this is a community,” said Jeanette Sykes, president and founder of The Perfect Blend and the organizer of Tuesday’s Women’s History Month tribute. “And we need to hear their voices.”
Tuesday night’s Newhallville management team meeting.
More than 50 people filled the school’s cafeteria to listen and cheer as the young students from Pearls For My Girls, Precious Angels & Jewels Youth Program, and The Perfect Blend honored their female role models.
“Women’s history is not just about famous women,” said Jyahni Lathrop, a fifth-grade student at Lincoln-Basset. “But about all women. Women like you who make a difference.”
Stephanie Salters.
Fellow Lincoln-Bassett fifth-grader Stephanie Salters honored New Haven and Hamden State Rep. Robyn Porter, who was elected to her seat in the General Assembly in 2014 and is the chair of the state legislature’s Labor and Public Employees Committee.
“She is a true activist in our community,” Salters said. “She has done a number of wonderful things to uplift everyday society.”
Nahfisaah Testman.
Nahfisaah Testman, another fifth grader at Lincoln Bassett, honored Newhallville Alder Delphine Clyburn.
“The Honorable Delphine Clyburn is a 30-year resident in the City of New Haven’s Newhallville neighborhood,” she said. “Alder Clyburn said the love for her community is what inspired her to run for office.”
Aaron Joyner and Mayor Toni Harp.
Aaron Joyner, a 10th-grade student at Engineering and Science University Magnet School, dedicated her Women’s History Month tribute to Mayor Toni Harp. Joyner praised the mayor for paving the way for generations of political aspiring New Haven women and girls through her decades of service in the Board of Alders, the state Senate, and now as the city’s first African American female mayor.
“As mayor of the city of New Haven, Toni Harp’s leadership has opened many doors,” she said.
Ahkyla Hopkins.
Broadening their celebration from the hyperlocal to the national, some of the students who presented on Tuesday night honored national female figures whom they look to as role models in their own lives and budding careers.
Ahkyla Hopkins, a ninth-grader at Metropolitan Business Academy, cited the Chicago-based television superstar and philanthropist Oprah Winfrey in her Women’s History Month tribute.
“She has overcome so many obstacles,” she said, citing the sexual abuse that Winfrey survived as a child. “She did not let that impact her future.” Instead, she has gone on to craft an incredibly successful career and to donate tens of millions of dollars towards charities geared towards improving the lives of women and girls around the world.
“She has inspired me to overcome what people say,” Hopkins said, “and not acknowledge what negative situations from the past affect my future. She has bettered me as a person emotionally and I have learned to accept myself for who I am, flaws and all.”
Taniyah Walker.
And Taniyah Walker, a junior at Metropolitan Business Academy, chose not a national pop culture celebrity, but a women’s health pioneer in Byllye Avery for her tribute. Avery is the founder of the Gainesville Women’s Health Center which provides reproductive health services to primarily low-income black women in Gainesville, Florida.
“She is a woman of strength and power, a woman with a voice,” Walker said. “She believed that institutionalized racism prevents us from getting the proper access to healthcare services that we all need.”
She said Avery has inspired her to become a neurosurgeon, to use her intellect and compassion to help black women get quality healthcare.
Newhallville Community Management Team Chair Kim Harris.
Kim Harris, the chair of the neighborhood’s community management team, praised the girls and the women they were honoring for motivating her to get up and do the work of community building and organizing and teaching everyday.
“I do it now because of them,” she said.
Wonderful event! Great collaboration. It's marvelous to see yong girls learning and interacting with our leaders. The positive energy is contagious! Thanks to Mayor Harp and Rep. Porter for making time for the constituent events. Jeanette Sykes-Perfect Blend always seeks to do excellent work in community as do the other leaders involved. Thanks for keeping our 'sheroes' before us!
Dorothy Height, in 'Open Wide The Freedom Gates: A Memoir' said: "You never teach a subject, you always teach a child. You teach children in a way that they will learn, and then things will fall in place for them."
Dorothy Height was long time president of the National Council of Negro Women (NCNW) founded by Mary mcCleod Bethune in 1935.