Whitney Houston once said, “I believe the children are our future.” Well, today we’re going to prove her right by highlighting the three Black queens who achieved exceptional things over the pandemic:
This North Carolina teen decided to meet her peers where they were at: online. Growing up, Alyssa Rambert felt as though the conversations surrounding Black history at school were redundant, the same figures continuously being mentioned without any new information. She was already moved by the efforts of trailblazers like Claudette Colvin, who became a civil rights advocate at 15, but in 2019 when Alyssa lost her cousin to police brutality, her passion for justice and advocacy was ignited even more. Rambert was a senior at D.H. Conley High School in Greenville, North Carolina when she decided to create her own curriculum. The WE STAND web series is an online initiative aimed to discuss local, Black historical figures like C.M. Eppes, Lucille Gorham, and Ledonia Wright. Her initiative was so successful that her high school introduced an African-American history class, and she received the inspiration spotlight at the George H.W. Bush Points of Light Awards. Rambert’s goal after the WE STAND launch was to expand her efforts to more communities and go off to college to pursue African-American studies with a dual major in political science. Alyssa definitely became the change she wanted to see, and we’re happy her dreams came into fruition! Photo: Alyssa Rambert/Reflector
What started as a small patio garden soon turned into a full-fledged farm in the backyard, causing Kendall Rae to make history. Last year, she became Georgia’s youngest certified farmer! At 6 years old, she’s reaping what she sows through her own business, aGrowKulture. Rae’s farm joined many other agricultural organizations in the state, including Georgia Grown and the Georgia Farm Bureau. She got a chance to meet Georgia state Rep. Mandisha Thomas who helped her raise nearly $85,000 and was a huge advocate for her and other young farmers in the South Fulton area. Rae’s ultimate goal is to become a billion-dollar agriculture business owner, but for now, her main goal is to continue farming and focus on raising funds for an outdoor agricultural science lab. She currently participates in festivals and has her own garden club. Her green thumb grew early, and we can’t wait to see what else she produces! Photo:Kendall Rae Johnson/Twitter
Bellen Woodard is another kid making big moves in the world! We’ve been reporting on her since 2020 when she first started her “More Than A Peach” project, an initiative that uses crayon colors as a way to tackle perceptions about skin colors among young children. The Virginia kid started this project in the fourth grade when she overheard classmates asking for the “skin-color” crayon, but referring to the peach color. She wanted more children to know Black people come in a range of shades. With the help of her mother, she created art supply kits that she then donated to classrooms and children who may not be able to afford them. The kits included a personal postcard from Bellen, and a special box of Crayola’s Multicultural crayons or colored pencils. Each multicultural box of crayons included a variety of skin tones including apricot, burnt sienna, mahogany, and of course, peach. Her initiative took off quickly; less than a year later, the crayon activist had been named Time Magazine’s “Kid of The Year,” placing top 5 and winning $5,000. By 10-years-old, Woodard had gained recognition by Scholastic Magazine, the Virginia General Assembly, and had her “Bellen’s Palette Packet” included in the permanent collection at the Virginia Museum of History and Culture. She’d also donated over $40,000 in art supplies! Now, in 2022, Bellen Woodard just did another big partnership with her More Than A Peach crayon bundles finding a home in the big retailer Target. She also published her first children’s book titled, “More than Peach, Changing the World…One Crayon At a Time.” Woodard is a young mogul that’s continuing to show that the sky’s the limit!
Photo:Target/MoreThanPeachProject/Instagram
We’re super proud of all our young stars paving the way for even younger generations.