For those naysayers who gave up on L. Boogie, it’s time to switch gears. Lauryn Hill started the New Year with a sold-out performance at the Blue Note in New York City. The Village Voice reports that the show was listed to begin at 8 p.m., but Ms. Hill walked onstage at 11:57. Despite Lauren’s…

Cee-Lo’s Grammy nomination for his song “F—- You”(video NSFW) has caused a ruckus in the blogosphere. MTV has called it the greatest Grammy nomination ever, but not everyone agrees. In a rather passionate op-ed for the National Review, conservative talk-radio host Dennis Prager writes that Cee-Lo’s song “has little, if any, redeeming moral, social or…

School systems across the nation are still trying to figure out how to organize school calendars around holy days for diverse student bodies. For instance, the school board in Acton-Boxborough, a Boston suburb, recently voted to close schools on Good Friday, Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah, while a neighboring school district just decided to ignore…

Pop sensation Willow Smith made headlines recently when she told U.K. newspaper the Telegraph, “I never really get to go to school because I am always on tour or with my father. There is a tutor most of the time, but usually I am working, so I never get to do the lessons.” Though 10-year-old…

Navigating financial waters is only half the battle in keeping our nation’s HBCUs operating,  In January, President Sidney Ribeau of Howard University will release his final academic-renewal plan, which proposes to trim its 171 programs, such as African Studies, Classics, and Philosophy. “Any serious university ought to have a philosophy department,” says Kwame Anthony Appiah, chairman…

In South Africa, the African National Congress (ANC), representing 60 percent of the vote, has dominated as the “populist” political party since Nelson Mandela’s election. Recently the Democratic Alliance (DA), widely regarded as the “white” party and led by Helen Zille, a former journalist and anti-apartheid activist, is growing, indicating that the racial politics that informed…

More often than not, student-athletes, particularly those in high-profile football programs, are recruited by colleges because of their athletic prowess, not their academic talent. But why do black football players have a lower graduation rate? The graduation gap between white and black collegiate athletes has widened from 19 percent last year to 20 percent this…

Vanessa Williams, who gave up her Miss America crown more than 25 years ago after unauthorized nude photos of her appeared in Penthouse, has put her foot down about baring all in a new book. In an interview in Ebony’s December/January issue, Williams said she recently turned down $600,000 for a tell-all book about her life. The…

At the young age of 32, playwright Marcus Gardley has racked up several awards for his plays and is already drawing comparisons to the legendary August Wilson. A sought-after playwright in the regional theater circuit, the Oakland, Calif., native was named one of Dramatists magazine’s 50 playwrights to watch. Gardley’s latest foray onto the regional…