It was just two years ago that Philadelphia’s own Rocky 50k run made its debut. What started as a joke by Philadelphia Magazine writer Dan McQuade has quickly evolved into a yearly tradition for hundreds of runners from across the country. (There was even a baby named in its honor!) Created by ultra-runner Rebecca Barber, the serpentine…
When Zakiya James attended Woodrow Wilson High School in her native city of Washington D.C., she quickly exhausted the curriculum that was being offered to her there. Zakiya, 14 at the time, was not being challenged and her mother, Shawna Malone, could see that. Malone attempted to enroll her daughter into higher-level courses at Woodrow,…
Hilary Sedgwick created Hip Hop Illies with a core concept in mind; she wanted the personal project to be about Hip Hop but to also focus on different themes down the line. Manifesting from another project, Sedgwick first started Illies with an illustration of Biggie Smalls. She liked the drawing so much that she…
Kevin Wilkins remembers the summer day long ago when he stared down a member of The Valley, a notorious gang that inhabited the streets of North Philadelphia in the ’60s and ’70s. He was around 16 at the time. The gang tested him and his peers from his North Philly neighborhood by beating them. It…
Visiting a barber shop or a hair salon may seem like a luxury, but an artist who visits shelters for homeless Americans sees it as a matter of identity. “Hair care is kind of seen as a non-essential need for people that are homeless,” says Jody Wood, creator of mobile hair salon Beauty in Transition….
I have never experienced the plight of homelessness, but I’ve seen many people throughout the streets of downtown Philadelphia who have. For the last six years, I have worked as a barista part time at the Philadelphia Free Library. I get homeless customers as well as the regular patrons of the library. Sometimes they arrive…
It happened earlier this month when Shawn Jorden, 25, was handed his degrees in Psychology and Liberal Arts from the Community College of Philadelphia, a goal that he had initially thought was out of reach. Jorden attended Indiana University before attending CCP but because of the university’s tuition and cost of living, he was forced…
I remember when walking across the stage on graduation day, just last May, and how uncertain I was about entering the “real world” with a bachelors in journalism. Would I be accepted in the field? Would I be able to obtain a job? What challenges would I be facing next? I never expected to obtain…
I never imagined that I could have so much in common with a pineapple or banana before sitting down with twins Rachel and Sarah Stanton, business partners and recent graduates of Temple University. Sitting in the Fox School of Business, Sarah Stanton laid out a few of their brightly colored shirts in front of me,…
The closest that I ever came to becoming a professional tap dancers was watching television in the late 1990s. On the “The Jamie Foxx Show” or “Saturday Night Live,” I would occasionally catch a dancer performing something fantastic. I was captivated by their fluid movement, as if their art were just second nature to them….