UH alumni and community, you're invited to celebrate “Black Grad” with the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa Black Student Association, next Friday May 10, at Keoni Auditorium at the East-West Center. We're proud that the chair of the Pōpolo Project Board of Directors, Jamila Jarmon, a UH alum, will be delivering the keynote address.

This ceremony is named for Alice Ball, the first African American woman to earn a master’s degree from the University of Hawaiʻi, formerly College of Hawaiʻi in 1915. Ball developed an injectable form of the active agents in chaulmoogra oil, which was used for 20 years to treat Hansen’s disease. In 2007, Ball was posthumously awarded the University of Hawaiʻi Regents Medal of Distinction. Given Ball’s untimely death due to illness, her accomplishments were hidden for over eight decades. Renaming the Black graduation ceremony in her honor furthers her legacy while connecting students to one of our most distinguished Black alumna.

The event is free and open to the public. RSVP to lshelly@hawaii.edu.