Young, gifted, and Black, with their futures ahead, Jada Daniel’23 urged her fellow classmates to rise unapologetically with heads and eyes pointed up to the stars and the sky because there is nothing that they can not achieve.
Hosted by the Office for Student Success, Equity, and Community, the 2023 Black Excellence ceremony celebrated the Black graduates’ tremendous accomplishments and invaluable contributions to the Beloit community. Commencement is Sunday, May 14.
Jada Daniel honored “a village of Black communities at Beloit, who planted seeds of support, radical Black love, and encouragement that carried Black students through moments so dark we couldn’t see the light of the future.” Black students faced challenges being at a predominantly white college, but it was a community that brought them through, she reminded her classmates.
Daniel, a triple major who achieved many honors as an undergraduate, said the college’s Black students “chased dreams and grasped accomplishment after accomplishment that we couldn’t even fathom because there was no seat at the table, but we took a chair and demanded our seats because our gifts and talents made room for us.”
“Being Black at Beloit is a lot of things, but we’ve come across a gold mine filled with an abundance of Black joy and radical Black love that could not be shaken or taken away from us no matter how hard they tried,” she said.
She urged seniors to rise unapologetically from the ground, that their ancestors worked to build, with heads and eyes pointed up to the stars and the sky because there is nothing that can not achieve.
“Graduating and entering the next chapter of our lives means unlearning all the experiences that taught us to hate ourselves and question our gifts and talents,” Jada Daniel said. “While closing this chapter and leaving and as we look ahead to the future, we can’t help but express gratitude for all of the lessons learned and the people that entered our lives to build community and offer spaces in their hearts and lives to support us through the shared experiences.
“I congratulate your bravery for taking a risk, the effort you put in to obtain your degree, and your unending spirit to never give up, and because of that unending spirit you are here today,” Camper said. “Treasure the experiences you have here and learn from them as you push forward to the uncertainty that lies ahead.”
The Black candidates for graduation had invited Erica Daniels, the college’s chief of staff and secretary of the college, the first Black woman to hold that position, to deliver the keynote speech. Daniels encouraged the soon-to-be graduates with the lyrics of Nina Simone’s To Be Young, Gifted and Black: “There’s a world waiting for you, Yours is the quest that’s just begun.”
She told seniors that, as they go through the stages of discovering their Blackness, to strive to make an impact in the struggle for equity and justice, acknowledge their rare and precious gifts, and protect their intellectual property. Erica Daniels advised them that they should never compromise who they are for the sake of professionalism, in a world dominated by people who are white, male, patriarchal, cis-gendered, and able-bodied.
“When you are unapologetically Black, you understand your connection to the creator; you understand the magic you possess; and you understand your knowledge of self and how all its brilliance walks before you and leads you every day,” Erica Daniels said.
May 15, 2023
