Hip-hop artist offers motivation to county children
By Bonnie Edwards
Published in News on July 27, 2008 10:34 AM
A hip-hop artist and motivational speaker told more than 70 children at the Boys & Girls Club this past week that they have great mental powers.
And to capitalize on them, they just need to stop selling themselves short.
"If you do one to two hours of homework per day, you are guaranteed to be a B-student," said the artist known as "Nubian Scholar, HIP HOP Guru of Self-help & Personal Development."
"There's far more good than bad in the world. If it was not true, we would all be killing each other right now," he said.
Nubian Scholar came to the Paylee Unit of the Boys & Girls Club from Washington, D.C. at the request of Eastpointe's System of Care Director Phyllis Greene. She found out about him when he did a presentation in Rocky Mount. She looked him up on the Internet and was impressed with his message. She invited about 30 children from Wayne and surrounding counties to join the Boys & Girls Club members as they gathered in the Learning Center to hear Nubian Scholar.
It is Mrs. Greene's job to collaborate with other agencies to help make sure children are safe and successful at home, in school and in the community. She said what she likes about the speaker is that his message empowers the young people and shows them they can be victorious over violence.
"And the way he is presenting it is really keeping their attention," she said during the presentation. "He started at 2 p.m., and it's almost 3:30. I don't know what it is, but they have really paid attention."
The speaker held the youngsters ages 12 and up spellbound and had them participating in the discussion throughout the two-hour presentation.
"We started in the hulls of slave ships, and now, we're talking about running for president. We're talking about changing the world," Nubian Scholar told his audience.
He talked about the importance of education, self-worth and respect and becoming a successful community citizen.
The scholar plans to return to Wayne County in the coming months.
Having started when he was about 11 years old, Nubian Scholar has been publicly speaking for more than two decades. He was responsible for founding one of the first hip-hop groups to make the national music and record charts coming out of Howard University, where he earned his bachelor's degree in communications.
He says that rapping, rhyming and the entire hip-hop culture have always been motivational and inspirational to him. He calls what he does "saving lives one rhyme at a time."