By Richmond Standard Staff

Seventeen California public school districts, including West Contra Costa Unified (WCCUSD), have joined a purchasing cooperative to pool their buying power and expand access to organic food in school meals.

The nonprofit Conscious Kitchen recently announced the launch of the Conscious Organic School Food Purchasing Cooperative. Its founding districts serve more than 300,000 students combined.

The cooperative partnered with food distributors UNFI and Sysco to expand the organic products available to participating districts. Combining schools’ purchasing demand helps distributors plan with suppliers while creating more dependable markets for organic farmers and food makers, according to Conscious Kitchen.

Other eligible California school districts can access the cooperative’s products and pricing through its existing contracts without conducting their own bids. Mt. Diablo Unified School District serves as the lead district for the cooperative’s grocery bid.

Other districts involved include: Alameda USD, Albany USD, Berkeley USD, Capistrano USD, Cupertino Union SD, Hayward USD, Laguna Beach USD, Lagunitas Elementary SD, Mt. Diablo USD, North Monterey County USD, Pajaro Valley USD, San Leandro USD, San Ramon Valley USD, Santa Clara USD, Sausalito Marin City SD, Tahoe-Truckee USD and West Contra Costa USD.

Barbara Jellison, WCCUSD’s executive director of food services, said the cooperative builds on years of work bringing fresh, organic food into school kitchens.

“The next challenge has always been how to make that possible for more districts,” Jellison said. “The Co-op gives schools a way to take what we have learned and move it to a completely different scale.”

HOUSTON — A new exhibition opening Sunday, Oct. 4, at The Health Museum is bringing Black maternal health into public view through art and personal storytelling.

The Call Me Mother Experience will be on display through Feb. 28, 2027. The museum lists a preview reception today from 3 to 5 p.m. at 1515 Hermann Drive, with tickets priced at $5 for members and $15 for nonmembers.

A personal story becomes a community conversation

According to the museum, founder, curator and lead artist Deborah D.E.E.P. Mouton developed the project from a poem she wrote during a miscarriage. The installation combines films, recorded interviews, visual artwork and contributions created with community members.

Mouton, Houston’s first Black poet laureate, discussed the exhibition and her connection to its subject in an Oct. 1 appearance on KPRC’s Houston Life. The station described the project as addressing the unequal burden of pregnancy-related illness and death faced by Black women in Harris County.

An announcement distributed by the Call Me Mother Experience says the initiative will also reach community locations and faith-based organizations across Greater Houston. Those additional settings are intended to extend the conversation beyond a museum visit.

What visitors can expect

The museum says reception guests can explore the exhibit, hear the curator and meet participating artists. Reception admission includes general museum entry; refreshments are available while supplies last.

The featured image accompanying this article is an original illustrative concept, not a photograph of the exhibition or its artwork.

Sources and visitor information:The Health Museum exhibition listing; preview reception details and tickets; KPRC Houston Life; organizer announcement.

The post Houston’s ‘Call Me Mother’ Exhibit Opens Today, Spotlighting Black Maternal Health appeared first on African American News and Issues.

Based on reporting by African-American News and Issues – Dallas.

This Saturday N.C. Central University will kick off its 89th Ultimate Homecoming Experience — a week-long celebration bringing thousands of students, family, friends and alumni to campus.

This year’s festivities include the Homecoming Countdown, parade, Miss and Mister NCCU Coronation, concerts and the football game.

The number of visitors to the football game on Saturday, Oct. 10 is expected to reach at least 10,000 — O’Kelly Riddick Stadium’s capacity, with NCCU’s recent enrollment increase of more than 10,000 students.

The Eagles will face William & Mary after playing against the Campbell University’s Fighting Camels on Oct 3.

Students are already expressing excitement for the upcoming festivities.

“I’m excited for homecoming because I can meet alumni and go outside and party with my fellow eagles,” Digital Filmmaking junior Rhese Gardner said. “I’m also really looking forward to the Greek Bowl because there’s a lot going on.”

He added that even though he’s disappointed this semester’s Oil Spill was canceled, he’s still excited for the other events like the parade and concerts.

Here is a list of the week’s on-campus events:

• Oct. 3 – Homecoming Countdown

• Oct. 4 – Gospel Concert

• Oct. 5 – Coronation of Miss and Mister NCCU

• Oct. 6 – 10:40 Break

• Oct. 6 – Homecoming Experience Showcase

• Oct. 7 – Fried Chicken Wednesday

• Oct. 7 – Festival Block Party

• Oct. 7 – Late Night Breakfast

• Oct. 8 – Back to the Nest Young Alumni Mixer

• Oct. 8 – Old School Greek Stroll Off

• Oct. 8 – Hip-Hop Concert

• Oct. 9 – Step Show

• Oct. 10 – Football Game

The post NCCU ramping up for the 89th Ultimate Homecoming Experience first appeared on Campus Echo Online.

Based on reporting by North Carolina Central University – Campus Echo.

Morehouse School of Medicine held its 42nd Fall Convocation and White Coat and Pinning Ceremony on September 18, and it featured strong ties to Nashville. Dr. Valerie Montgomery Rice is completing her 12th year as president and CEO of Morehouse School of Medicine (MSM). The school boasts 355 students seeking degrees and certificates in the medical field.

“This entering class represents the future of medicine, science, public health and health care leadership,” said Valerie Montgomery Rice, MD, and FACOG. “As these students begin their journeys at Morehouse School of Medicine, they join a community grounded in excellence, service and our shared commitment to advancing health equity. We look forward to supporting their development as leaders who will transform the health and well-being of the communities they serve.”

Infectious diseases physician and scientist Dr. Barney S. Graham, MD, and PhD, served as the keynote speaker. He serves as the director of the David Satcher Global Health Equity Institute, professor of Medicine and Microbiology, Biochemistry and Immunology at Morehouse School of Medicine. He is an inventor of vaccines and monoclonal antibodies approved for human use to prevent or treat RSV, COVID-19 and Ebola. He joined MSM in 2022. He served in various positions at Vanderbilt University for 21 years.

Dr. Graham told the audience to “Embrace the Unseen” and focused on three points: Do the Best You can with what’s in front of you, Do what makes you come alive and Do the right thing even when no one is looking. He added, “Anything you do to improve mental and physical wellness and promote disease prevention will reduce health disparity by reducing the resources needed for treatment.”

His remarks commanded a roaring applause from the audience, which included his wife, Dr. Cynthia Turner Graham, and the former First Lady of Tennessee State University, Mrs. Edwina Hefner, a close friend to the family.

Based on reporting by Tennessee Tribune.

By Jennifer Fernandez

About a week after finishing the Early Childhood Workforce Ready Academy in Wayne County, North Carolina, Dominque McBride walked into Little Bulldogs Academy in Goldsboro.

She carried a packet filled with certifications — such as CPR, first aid, playground safety — that she earned while undergoing intensive training during the two-week academy in February 2024.

At the end of the interview, McBride walked out with a job.

Typically, that type of training can take months to a year to complete, said Shelly Willis, director of program coordination and evaluation with Partnership for Children of Wayne County, which offers the academy.

On top of that, students would have had to pay for the various certifications and classes and squeeze them in between jobs and their lives at home.

But McBride and more than 100 other people got the training for free over the past two years, thanks to grants from the Camber Foundation, according to Valerie Wallace, executive director of the Partnership for Children of Wayne County. She said the organization, which supports community projects in 41 eastern North Carolina counties, has pumped $145,000 into the childcare academies in Wayne and Johnston counties.

McBride said the academy prepared her for her first job in childcare, and made it easy to get all the required certifications and training in one place, in a short time.

“If I had to do it on my own, I think I would have been overwhelmed,” McBride told NC Health News.

Now, state legislators want to take that model and expand it across the state. They included $1.5 million in one-time funding in the state budget passed in July. The training support is part of a slate of efforts added to this year’s budget to tackle staffing shortages and long waitlists for childcare in North Carolina. 

From March 2018 to June 2026, North Carolina has lost a net 1,072 childcare sites, according to the NC Early Care and Learning dashboard. Enrollment dropped by 28,183 children — or 11.5% — during that same time.

The NC Chamber touted such academies as a way to address chronic staffing shortages driving those closures in a February 2025 report.

“If North Carolina is going to produce the qualified workforce necessary to meet the demand for high-quality childcare services in a timely manner, the state must lean less heavily on higher education to train and prepare early childhood professionals and more heavily on strategies that are more accessible, affordable, flexible, and expeditious,” the report’s authors wrote.

‘At a crossroads’

The National Conference of State Legislatures also recently highlighted such academies for quick training to alleviate workforce shortages.

The recommendation is included in the report “Childcare at a Crossroads: A State Legislative Framework for Strengthening Childcare Systems,” released on July 27. The report was developed by a bipartisan work group of 13 state legislators from across the country that included North Carolina state Sen. Jim Burgin, R-Harnett.

The legislators wrote that childcare has become “one of the most urgent and complex challenges facing states.”

“It affects children’s development and well-being, parents’ ability to work, employers’ access to a stable workforce and the economic vitality of communities large and small,” they said in the report. “Rural and urban. Red and blue. No state is unaffected, and no ideology holds all the answers. 

“As costs rise, workforce shortages persist and demand remains strong, state policymakers face important decisions,” the report’s authors continued. “The childcare system is at a crossroads, and decisions made now will shape how well systems meet the needs of families and economies in the years ahead.”

North Carolina has struggled to meet the need. Lack of childcare costs the state $5.65 billion every year in economic activity, according to a 2024 report from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation, the NC Chamber Foundation, and advocacy organization NC Child.  

Since 2018, childcare employment in the state rose by just 1%, or 419 people, even as the state’s population grew by around a million people. 

Where that growth has occurred has been uneven.

Small centers and family childcare homes make up most of the closures, according to research shared July 9 by Afton Partners, an Illinois-based consultant firm that specializes in several areas, including early education. The group presented the findings earlier in the year to members of the North Carolina Task Force on Child Care and Early Education. 

Meanwhile, more large centers have opened, mainly in urban areas, according to the Afton research.

Many counties, including Wayne, have lost workers and childcare slots from 2018 to 2026. 

In Wayne County, state data shows there are nine fewer childcare facilities than in 2018. Average monthly enrollment dropped by more than 1,000 kids during that same time. And average monthly employment is down by 420 workers.

The state faces a double whammy: demand for more childcare slots and a lack of workers.

The biggest problem in childcare is having qualified teachers, Burgin said as part of a panel discussion on the “Childcare at a Crossroads” report at the National Conference of State Legislatures conference in Chicago last month.

“We’ve made the restrictions so high that by the time that they get enough qualified people on board, those people will go find other jobs, usually in the school system,” he said.

He told the audience that North Carolina directed millions of dollars to tackling the childcare workforce issue in the state’s latest budget.

The bipartisan work group’s report highlighted North Carolina’s childcare academies, like the program in Wayne County.

Other efforts in the report included a high school student training program in South Dakota, scholarships and stipends for people pursuing childcare degrees in Delaware, and a pilot program in New Mexico that gives stipends to people in workforce training for childcare. 

In West Virginia and Rhode Island, there are also apprenticeships that target the childcare work force. 

Like some other states, North Carolina included in its recent budget stipends for graduates who stay with an employer for at least a year.

‘A huge step forward’

The N.C. Child Fatality Task Force has been recommending since 2024 that North Carolina support efforts to improve the childcare system, including increasing subsidies to childcare centers, especially in the wake of additional federal childcare stabilization grants that sunsetted as the COVID pandemic wound down. 

Childcare funding was one of the four task force recommendations for this year.

In July, the General Assembly passed a budget with $97 million in federal funding to increase reimbursement rates to providers of subsidized childcare and to create a much-welcomed floor rate. The budget also transfers $16.8 million from the federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families block grant to the state’s childcare subsidy program. 

Creating a rate floor means that, for the first time, all facilities will get at least the statewide average for subsidized care. Without that base rate, subsidies have ranged widely across the state, which has made it difficult for some facilities to survive.

The state’s childcare subsidy program uses state and federal money to help pay for childcare for low- to moderate-income families who qualify. Families still have to cover a co-pay. The subsidy can be used for children through age 12, or up to age 18 for children with special needs.

While the state doesn’t set salaries for childcare workers, increasing the subsidy gives providers the flexibility to pay workers more. 

Low pay has been an issue in attracting and maintaining childcare workers. Starting median hourly wages for childcare teachers in 2023 was $14 per hour, according to the 2023 North Carolina Child Care Workforce Study by Early Years (formerly Child Care Services Association.)  That’s the same or less than entry-level jobs at retail stores such as Target and Walmart and fast food restaurants such as Five Guys and Whataburger.

“With our current economic situation and the prices of everything increasing, it is very difficult to stay in the field of childcare and make ends meet with the average pay offered,” McBride said in an email.  

“It’s not only about attracting people to the field, but encouraging them to stay,” she added. 

To quickly train childcare workers, legislators funneled $1.5 million in one-time funding to replicate childcare academies modeled after the program in Wayne County across the state. Two-thirds of that funding will cover tuition costs. The remaining $500,000 will pay for stipends of $500 for every student hired within three months of graduating and who stays employed for at least one year at the same childcare program.

“This funding for child care is a huge step forward in helping to stabilize North Carolina’s child care system,” Kella Hatcher, executive director of the Child Fatality Task Force, said in an email.

A model program

In Wayne County, Wallace and Willis with the Partnership for Children are hoping the increased subsidy rate, along with a new rate floor, will ease high turnover while the academies help train new childcare workers more quickly. 

They’ve had about a dozen people sign up for each session, the most recent of which ran from Aug. 3 through Aug. 14. It was the first of three planned for this year under the Camber grant.

“Those may not seem like high numbers, but if you can put that many people to work, it makes a huge difference in a childcare,” said Wallace. “Our numbers are going to be fewer, but they’re mighty if we give these folks the necessary training that they need.”

Wallace said they’ve tweaked their academy a little bit every year to make it stronger and attract more people.

“We’ve learned with each academy that we’ve done, and last year we worked with the North Carolina Partnership for Children to try to get this to be aligned,” in anticipation of the state creating a pilot program, Wallace said. “So if people were doing it across the state, everybody was doing the same curriculum, and it was going to be consistent with what people were coming out of the academies with.”

They’re not sure if they’ll add more academy classes this year based on what was passed in the state budget. It depends on whether their program is considered aligned with the state plan. They could add up to three more sessions later in the fiscal year based on that state plan, Wallace said.

The training allows students like McBride to be hired immediately.

McBride, 29, was working for the Wayne County Department of Social Services when her mother saw a notice in 2024 about the free training to become a childcare worker. It came at a perfect time for McBride, who was disillusioned with the paperwork involved in her DSS job.

And she always wanted to teach and work with children, she said. In her now-former job at Little Bulldogs, she worked with the 2-year-olds.

“It can be very chaotic,” she said, describing children that age as wanting to be more autonomous but not quite ready for that. “But I enjoyed every bit of it.”

Every day, she saw the need for more childcare workers.

“We weren’t getting enough childcare teachers as much as we were getting kids,” McBride said. “We couldn’t keep up.”

Her work at Little Bulldogs inspired McBride to go back to school for a degree in early childhood education with a focus on special education. She now works with children on the autism spectrum at Action Behavior Center in Clayton.

She’s grateful for Wayne County’s childcare academy.

“It definitely helps you prepare,” she said. “The one thing that can deter you is feeling like you’re not equipped to do it.”

This article first appeared on North Carolina Health News and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

On September 22, U.S. News released its annual HBCU rankings for 2027. Southern University was ranked No. 48, tying with Bethune-Cookman University, Philander Smith College, Savannah State University, Stillman College, and West Virginia State University. When I first saw the ranking, I had mixed feelings about where Southern was ranked. Did I feel like Southern needed to be ranked No. 48? Yes and no. On one hand, I understand how the university received that ranking based on the factors U.S. News uses for their rankings. On the other hand, when I look at some of the other schools that ranked higher than Southern, in my humble opinion, we should have been ranked higher.

To understand why Southern was ranked No. 48, it is important to look at the factors U.S. News uses for their rankings. The rankings consider graduation rates, freshman retention rates, financial resources, faculty information, peer assessments, and student outcomes after graduation. I understand why these factors matter because they can indicate how well a university supports its students, prepares them for life after college, and how students can benefit from attending that institution.

One of the biggest factors affecting our ranking is our graduation rate. The graduation rate measures how many first-time, full-time, degree-seeking students complete their degree within four years. Based on my research, the newest official data available from Southern lists the four-year graduation rate at about 10%. Even though that number is concerning, I believe that number needs more context. Some of Southern’s major programs, including Engineering, can take students five years to complete because of their demanding requirements and how their degree flowcharts are set up. So, while the four-year graduation rate is something Southern needs to improve, I don’t think it tells the whole story of how long it takes every Southern student to graduate.

Another issue is admissions. Southern University talks frequently about the “Southern Standard,” but I think there needs to be more consistency between the standard we expect and the students we admit. Southern should continue providing the opportunities it already provides, but I also believe the university should try to recruit more students who have already shown that they can uphold a certain academic, personal, and professional standard. Additionally, students who are admitted should receive the support and resources they need to succeed.

Overall, I understand why Southern was ranked No. 48, but in my opinion, we could and should be higher. The ranking shows areas where Southern needs to improve, but it should not define the university as a whole. Instead, it should encourage Southern to look at admissions, student support, graduation rates, career opportunities, and whether every major receives the attention it deserves. Southern is more than just a number, but if we want that number to change, we have to be willing to look honestly at what is behind it, including making sure that strong programs like Nursing and Engineering continue to provide opportunities while majors such as Agriculture, Criminal Justice, Education, and Social Sciences receive the same attention and opportunities for their students. At the end of the day, the goal should not only be to move up in the rankings, but to ensure every student at Southern has the support, accessibility to opportunities, and resources they need to succeed, not only while attending Southern, but in their future post graduation careers.

Based on reporting by Southern University – SouthernDIGEST.