True Star recently held its annual fundraiser celebrating 19 years of Connecting Young Creators! The event was held at the Black owned art gallery, Gallery Guichard, located in the Bronzeville community.
The evening was filled with music by Sam Thousand, valuable knowledge from media icons Louis Carr, President of Sales for BET, and Danielle Austen, CEO of Fluent360, and of course celebration. The fundraiser provided an excellent opportunity to network and celebrate the success True Star has made in the lives of Chicago youth. Scholarships and recognitions were awarded to True Star alumni Kayla Sullers (The Distinguished Alumni Award,) Christopher “Lock” Lockridge (The All-Star Award sponsored by Allstate Insurance), Gary Langfield Jr. (The Rising Star Award), and Jakyla Hester (The Appreciation Award).
During the event, True Star journalist Jada Strong had the pleasure of interviewing Carr, one of the night’s guest speakers. When asked, why did you choose to come support True Star, he responded by saying, “Because when I think about True Star, I think about opportunities. I think about the future. I think about Hope. I think the organization is the energy that Black youth needs today.”
Thompson was pleased with the way the evening turned out. “I am elated with the celebration of True Stars 19th year of service,” she said. “The room was full of love and support from all generations! Thank you to everyone for believing in us and the youth.”
True Star was founded in 2004 by DeAnna Sherman and Na-Tae’ Thompson with the intention to help empower underserved youth to forge their own paths by providing jobs, training, and real world work experiences that teaches them to create, develop, and market digital content on platforms that celebrate their perspectives and identity. True Star builds an entrepreneurial mindset that inspires dreams so that young people can find their voice, discover their path, and prepare for life. True star has helped to create over 15,000 jobs for youth, and last year accumulated over 3 million viewers on our digital platform.
If you’d like to support True Star it’s not too late. You can click this link and give a donation today and you can also become a regular donor as well. To see more coverage of the True Star fundraiser, visit our Instagram page @true.chi.
By Amariyah Mallory, Freshman, Whitney Young
Instagram: Dancemari_
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