Page 193 – Chattanooga News Chronicle

Black Educator Puts the Spotlight on the Next Generation of Youth Leaders During COVID-19 Pandemic

National

May 14, 2020

Nationwide — When Dr. Candice Lucas-Bledsoe realized that her annual Cutting Edge Youth Summit with over 300 students, parents, teachers, and community leaders would not take place this year because of the COVID-19 pandemic, she decided to pivot. She decided instead to put the spotlight on the next generation of youth leaders during a virtual summit that would continue to motivate and energize youth leaders.

“During these unprecedented times, innovative solutions can inspire students,” says Dr. Candice.

After years of community building, Dr. Bledsoe had joined in with the executive leadership team to create an educational series that includes innovation, entrepreneurship, leadership, and academic readiness. After completing a 12 month curriculum, students would present their innovative practices though the Cutting Edge Youth Summit during April 2020. When the coronavirus pandemic began, the executive leadership team quickly developed the Virtual Cutting Edge Youth Summit to continue to motivate and energize the students.

The Virtual Cutting Edge Youth Summit provides an opportunity for students, parents, and community leaders to connect during these unprecedented times. Special virtual addresses include scholars and leaders such as: Dr. Michelle Turner, Executive Director of the USC Black Alumni Association, The Honorable Tonya Parker of Dallas County, WFAA’s Ed Gray, Ana Rodriguez, Managing Director of the SMU Cox Latino Leadership Initiative, and many more.

Students are engaged in this unique virtual conference through programming and via social media: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram. The summit inspires youth leaders to execute leadership strategies, problem solving, and design. Dr. Candice Bledsoe, is founder of the summit and the executive director of the Action Research Center. She also holds appointments at SMU as faculty for the SMU Cox School of Business, Simmons School of Education, and Director of Research & Communications at the SMU Hunt Institute in the Lyle School of Engineering.

Unemployed African Americans Should Upload Their Resumes to BlackJobs.com

Business

CNC Staff

May 14, 2020

Nationwide — The global COVID-19 pandemic has all Americans feeling financially burdened, but more African Americans are being affected as there are currently more than 20 million unemployment claims across the country. Experts say that Black unemployment could eventually be as high as 30%, but one web site, BlackJobs.com, is helping to solve the problem.

The web site easily allows qualified job seekers to connect with employers who are committed to diversity hiring. The site allows users to easily upload the resumes for free, and even link their resume with their existing LinkedIn account.

But are there really jobs available?

Yes! Although there has been an exponential loss of jobs in the past month, there are still new job opportunities being created daily. In fact, the demand for work-from-home professionals has skyrocketed due to social distancing mandates. There are also many new customer support-related positions on the rise, as well as jobs in healthcare, higher education, off-site IT, delivery services, etc.

BlackJobs.com, which is free to use for those who are unemployed, is an immediate solution to the drastic loss of jobs and Black unemployment in general.

Other job boards for African Americans to consider using include HBCUConnect.com and Diversity Job Board

Ebony - American Sports Digest

CNC Staff

May 14, 2020

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PRINT EDITION

PRINT EDITION

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May 14, 2020

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Black Doctor Heads Organization that Named Virus COVID-19

National

CNC Staff

May 14, 2020

Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the man who is currently taking the lead as Director General at WHO (World Health Organization). Dr. Tedros is an Ethiopian health scholar and microbiologist with first-hand experience in research, operations, and leadership in emergency responses to epidemics.

He became Director General of WHO in July 2017 and is the first Black person to ever serve in this role. He has formally served as both the Minister of Health and Minister of Foreign Affairs in Ethiopia.

Immediately after taking office at WHO, Dr. Tedros outlined five key priorities for the agency: universal health coverage; health emergencies; women’s, children’s and adolescents’ health; health impacts of climate and environmental change; and a transformed WHO.

When the coronavirus global pandemic began in December 2019, Dr. Tedros and his team were the ones who named the virus COVID-19 and immediately began helping build countries’ capacity to prepare and respond. He has been credited with providing accurate information to fight the epidemic, training and mobilizing health workers, and accelerating research and development.

Dr. Tedros has also been credited with bringing together scientists, public health decision-makers, medical journalists, technology and social media platforms and civil society to help share reliable information, while reducing misinformation, rumors and myths about COVID-19.

Student Makes History as Princeton University’s First Ever Black Valedictorian in 274 Years

National

CNC Staff

May 14, 2020

National – In April 2020, Nicholas Johnson, who belongs to the 2020 class of Princeton University, made history after he became the first African American student to ever be named valedictorian in the school’s history. According to the University’s School of Engineering and Applied Science, he is also the first valedictorian in the department’s 21-year history.

Johnson was a dedicated student that majored in operations research and financial engineering. He served as a writing fellow at Princeton’s Writing Center, a residential college adviser for Whitman College, and even worked as a software engineer at Google’s California headquarters during his senior year. Also his academic interests gave him the opportunity to take cultural —immersion trips to Peru, Hong Kong, and the UK.

His senior thesis, “Sequential Stochastic Network Structure Optimization with Applications to Addressing Canada’s Obesity Epidemic,” focuses on developing high-performance, efficient algorithms to solve a network-based optimization problem that models a community-based preventative health intervention designed to curb the prevalence of obesity in Canada.

“My favorite memories of my time at Princeton are memories of time spent with close friends and classmates engaging in stimulating discussions — often late at night — about our beliefs, the cultures and environments in which we were raised, the state of the world, and how we plan on contributing positively to it in our own unique way,” Johnson said.

He also announced that he plans to earn a Ph.D. at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), where he plans to pursue certificates in statistics and machine learning, applied and computational mathematics, and applications of computing.

Exercise may help reduce risk of deadly COVID-19 complication: ARDS

Health

CNC Staff

May 14, 2020

Zhen Yan
Professor of Cardiovascular Medicine,
University of Virginia

Scientists are constantly revealing newly discovered benefits of exercise. In experiments over the past 10 years, my research has found that exercise can help with a respiratory problem known as ARDS.

ARDS is a type of respiratory failure characterized by rapid onset of widespread inflammation in the lungs that prevents oxygen from reaching the organs. It has been reported in many COVID-19 patients.

I am an exercise physiologist with training in medicine. More than 30 years ago, I gave up my career in general surgery in China and came to the U.S. to pursue a basic research career in molecular exercise physiology, as I was intrigued by the superb health benefits of regular exercise.

Most recently I’ve been thinking about the potential impact of regular exercise in preventing this deadly complication of COVID-19. I have not done any experiments specifically around COVID-19, but my work with mice may inform other researchers exploring ways to protect people that suffer from ARDS.

What is ARDS?

A cause of death for 3%-17% of patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 is ARDS. COVID-19 patients with this dismal clinical complication have a mortality rate of greater than 50%.

Specifically, ARDS can occur when viral infection of the cells in the lungs activates the immune system and attracts white blood cells to travel through the bloodstream to the lung tissue to fight off the viral infection.

However, when too many white blood cells appear in the lung tissue at once, it can cause lung tissue damage. This is because they produce too much of damaging molecules called free radicals which break proteins, the cell membrane and DNA.

As a consequence, the blood vessels in the lung become leaky, causing accumulation of the fluid in the lung tissue, and the air sacs of the lung fill up with fluid. This prevents those same air sacs, called alveoli, from filling with air, blocking oxygen in the air from getting into the blood. Patients die of oxygen deprivation.

The cells that line our blood vessels are flat-shaped endothelial cells. One early step in this complicated ARDS disease process is the lining of the blood vessel becomes sticky to white blood cells by making sticky proteins on the cell surface, a phenomenon called endothelial cell activation.

This triggers a vicious cycle; the greater endothelial cell activation, the more free radicals the white blood cells release. This in turn destroys the endothelial cells, making the blood vessel leak more and damages lung tissue.

An exercise-induced antioxidant in our body
More than 10 years ago, I started to study the protective role of exercise-induced antioxidant enzymes against loss of muscle size. My research has shown that endurance exercise promotes production of an antioxidant called extracellular superoxide dismutase (EcSOD) that breaks down the free radical superoxide outside of the cells.

EcSOD is the only antioxidant enzyme that is secreted into the blood that reaches other vital organs and binds to the endothelial cells and other cells through a unique binding structure of the enzyme. This makes EcSOD unlike any supplemental antioxidant pill or food rich in antioxidants that we may consume. An oral antioxidant, once absorbed into the blood, does not target a given organ to provide protection, while EcSOD sticks to specific organs.

When I first saw the evidence of increased EcSOD in skeletal muscle by aerobic exercise training, I was inspired to do an experiment in which I tested whether just increasing the amount of this enzyme through genetic engineering, instead of naturally through exercise, would provide protection from various diseases in which free radicals are known to play important roles, such as muscle atrophy and heart failure.

EcSOD in protection against ARDS
I engineered a mouse that produced more EcSOD in skeletal muscle than would the typical mouse to mimic the effects of aerobic exercise training. We obtained clear evidence that these mice were protected from muscle atrophy and diabetes-induced heart failure.

I then artificially triggered ARDS in mice by injecting mice with a chemical produced by bacteria that are known to cause this condition. To my pleasant surprise, genetically engineered mice with higher concentrations of EcSOD in their blood were far more likely to survive the severe ARDS and multiple organ failure compared with a dismal mortality in the typical mice. This mimics the situation in intensive care where more than 80% of the patients die when they suffer from the failure of multiple organs, including ARDS.

I then confirmed that indeed it was the EcSOD in the genetically engineered mice that provided the protection. When I performed an experiment in which a genetically engineered mouse shared blood with a normal mouse following a surgical procedure called parabiosis, or I took blood from a mouse with high EcSOD and transfused it into a normal mouse suffering from ARDS, the normal mouse had reduced severity of ARDS and clinical blood markers of multiple organ failure. Using various biochemical and imaging technologies, we saw the evidence of reduced endothelial cell activation and reduced protein, cell membrane and DNA damage caused by free radicals in the lung tissue.

Learn from exercise
These studies have provided proof-of-principle evidence that delivery of the EcSOD gene or protein to elevate the amount of EcSOD in the blood and vital organs may be an effective intervention for protection of the lungs and other vital organs against damages caused by ARDS and multiple organ failure.

My findings in mice may inspire other researchers to come up with innovative ways to prevent and treat the deadly complication of COVID-19.

For example, future studies may identify the exercise type, intensity and duration to optimally increase EcSOD levels in the lungs and other vital organs in humans to build up the defense against deadly complications of COVID-19 or other disease conditions. Of course, the findings may inspire research to foster pharmacological, protein and or gene therapies to treat COVID-19 patients with ARDS.

The EcSOD antioxidant story is just one of many about the health benefits of exercise. I believe we can learn from exercise to develop effective therapies to treat ARDS caused by COVID-19 and other disease conditions. (Source: The Conversation)

The Potato Chip Was Invented by a Black Man Named George Crum

African American History

CNC Staff

May 14, 2020

There are a few stories about the invention of the potato chip, but the most reliable ones all center around George Crum, a famous Black chef in the 19th century who served the wealthiest Americans and eventually opened his own wildly successful restaurant.

Born George Speck around the year 1824 to a Native-American mother and A African American father, he worked as a hunter and guide in upper New York state. During this time, his reputation as a cook earned him a position at Moon’s Lake House Restaurant on Saratoga Lake, where wealthy New England patrons built their summer camps. He became famous for his unique specialties with venison and wild game, and he was encouraged to continue experimenting in the kitchen.

The Potato Chip

No one is certain about exactly how the potato chip was invented; some claim it was Crum’s sister, working at the same restaurant. Either way, Crum’s experimentation led to the refinement and popularization of chips, which became a local and eventually a regional draw from all New England.

His Own Restaurant

His wealthy customers included the ultra-rich Cornelius Vanderbilt, who mistakenly called him “Crum” instead of Speck, which George strategically embraced. He used his success there to open his own restaurant in 1860 called Crum’s, with very high-demand – and high-priced – cuisine.
Despite his wealthy clientele, he played no favorites and was expressly egalitarian with his food, making the rich wait their turn behind anyone in front of them. Crum served as an inspiration for numerous young Black men and women to explore their skills and creativity.

Jogging in America with my Black son!

Commentary

CNC Staff

May 14, 2020

My son’s an avid jogger. For him, circling the track in a nearby park enough times to reach his 4-5-mile daily goal is no big deal. Shucks, his jogging regimen was enough motivation for me to join him on that track; not as a jogger but, okay, as a 2 mile “fast walker.” Thus, I’d not given more than a passing thought on the inherent dangers of “jogging while Black” until the Ahmaud Arbery story went viral.

“That could have been my son,” was the disconcerting thought – and rage – that unsettled my mind as I watched that sickening video and heard those gunshots that snuffed out that young man’s life.

So in search for the proverbial “shoulder to cry on,” I called my friend Troy in Texas, an unabashed free thinker, writer and doting father of two; a daughter who is an outstanding track performer and an adolescent son who is gradually coming into his own as a budding athlete.

“The killing of the jogger in Georgia had quite an emotional impact on my daughter,” Troy began. “You see, my son was jogging behind her the other day when he fell way behind. It took a while for her to locate him and when she finally got home, she broke down in tears when she thought about her brother being gunned down while jogging like that young man in Georgia.”

Now before I could call others to commiserate with, a national publication came out with a riveting piece, “Running while Black.” It begins, “For many black runners, the killing and its aftermath have shed light on simmering fears of being attacked or racially profiled while running, an anxiety largely undiscussed in the wider running community, but one that is now causing runners of color to think even harder about the decisions they have to make when they go out for a jog.”

“A runner who lives in Atlanta said he feels safe on running trails and paths of his city, but if he runs through more residential and predominantly white neighborhoods, he makes sure to wear brightly colored clothing and sneakers so people can easily identify him as a runner. He intentionally makes additional noise if he sees someone approaching, yelling “hello” or “excuse me” long before it would be necessary, or laughing loudly if he is running with someone else to signal that he is a friendly presence.”

“The killing brought to life what another runner said she faces during a split second of pause — “Is it worth it?” — when she steps outside to go running. The Olympic gold medalist said the activity that has brought her immense joy and professional success is paired with fear. She expressed a similar subconscious protocol, one that’s long been routine. She flashes a smile to passers-by; asks how they are doing and says something about the weather. “I go out of my way to make sure they know I come in peace,” she said.

Further complicating matters is the strong recommendation to don masks.
“What if I catch somebody off guard?” said a Washington D.C. runner where residents have been asked to wear masks when in public. “What are they going to think? It’s not uncommon for black and brown bodies to be looked at as dangerous, and now you see a figure coming at you quickly and they are wearing a face mask.”

Now my burning question to America is this: We African Americans represent 33% of the total US population, yet 60% of COVID-19 related deaths. We’re still the last hired, first fired and vastly overrepresented in the prison system. We still at the bottom of the totem pole in housing, medical care and education.

And before the ink is dried on this piece, more Black lives will likely be snuffed out because they just happen to be in the “wrong place at the wrong time!”

As you finish reading this narrative, understand that we’re weary and running out of answers. So please tell us what are we to do Georgia… what are we to do America?

“Alabama’s gotten me so upset.
Tennessee made me lose my rest.
And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam.
Alabama’s gotten me so upset.
Tennessee made me lose my rest.
And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam.”

”Mississippi Goddam,” Nina Simon

© Terry Howard is an award-winning writer and storyteller. He is also a contributing writer with the Chattanooga News Chronicle, The American Diversity Report, The Douglas County Sentinel The Atlanta Business Journal, The Echo World, co-founder of the “26 Tiny Paint Brushes” writers’ guild, and recipient of the 2019 Dr. Martin Luther King Leadership Award. He can be reached at wwhoward3@gmail.com

Tennessee Black Caucus calls for end to providing Covid-19 status to law enforcement

Featured

CNC Staff

May 13, 2020

NASHVILLE—The Tennessee Black Caucus of State Legislators called on the Lee Administration and the Department of Health to end the practice of sharing the names and addresses of Tennesseans who have tested positive for COVID-19 with law enforcement officials.

In response, the Governor has promised to work with the caucus and look into how the process could be altered. The practice was first reported Friday by the Tennessee Lookout news organization and was later picked up by media across the state. Last month, the Lee Administration sent letters to Tennessee law enforcement officials to provide the personal information to their departments once they have entered into a MOU (Memorandum of Understanding) with the state.

The Administration said the data is being made available so first responders would have the opportunity to protect themselves if they were called to an address where an infected person resides. However, Chairman Hardaway of Memphis says the information could actually have a “chilling effect” that keeps those already distrustful of the government from taking the COVID-19 test and possibly accelerate the spread of the disease: “Our membership has heard from many in the African-American community who are concerned by this release of personal data without their knowledge, as well as many in the Hispanic community who fear possible other uses of the information.

People feel their constitutional right to privacy is being violated without any warning. There are better ways to protect our first responders while, at the same time, giving proper notification to the citizens involved.”

TBCSL Vice-Chair Rick Staples of Knoxville added: “More thought needs to be given to the effect these practices could have on the many varied communities across Tennessee. That’s why it’s so important to have diverse representation at the table when these issues are being discussed so decisions aren’t being made that could possibly do more harm than good and possibly set us back in terms of much needed testing.”

Chairman Hardaway said the Governor has promised to work with the Black Caucus this week to find solutions to the issues and that he is “encouraged” by the quick response from the Lee Administration.

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