by intern David Longo
Photo credit: intern Haley Schiffer
“Thurgood Marshall, that’s my hero man! I love Thurgood, I mean he did ground breaking *bleep* stuff. I love this event, I mean look at the people, the energy!” said Ski Johnson enthusiastically at Thurgood Marshall College Fund’s Gala at the Washington Hilton.
Ski Johnson
“This organization is a representative of so much that is important about this nation and this world. While most people usually think of Thurgood Marshall being associated with his race, he is really associated with equality for human rights. So being associated with this in anyway as a benefactor is really important to me,” Janice Howard stated as she strutted down the red carpet. This year it included A-list celebrity guests Bill Cosby, Jennifer Holliday, and Lil Mama.
Jennifer Holliday
Advocates for the Thurgood Marshall College Fund all joined together to help spread Marshall’s mission and vision: Identify students with leadership potential, increase graduation rates, and help to fund highly-qualified school students.
Miss America 2014 Nina Davuluri
“What got me interested in the foundation was definitely the scholarship money. I knew that I had to pay for half of my education, so through this organization I gained $50,000 scholarship money, and an additional $10,000 when I won Miss New York, so I’m putting that towards medical school.” Miss America 2014 Nina Davuluri
Germaine Crawford
“Well this foundation has been doing something very phenomenal for people of my color for such a long time; providing higher education for my demographic for 25 years!” Jermaine Crawford of HBO’s The Wire said.
“We’ve been apart of this organization for over 10 years. The people we help, they are the future stars and we definitely want to become a part of that.” Susan Clifton, wife of Jim Clifton
Lil Mama
“I joined this event most definitely to give back to my community. It is very hard to pay for college, and I talked to a friend who is in a debt of over $100,000 just for loans from books and tuition. So what Thurgood Marshall is doing to give back and to help young people is inspirational.” Lil Mama
Bill Cosby
The annual gala was hosted by Emmy and Grammy Award-winning actor Bill Cosby. Alongside Cosby was an unforgettable performance by previous ‘Dreamgirl’ Jennifer Holliday. Cosby released last week that he will be developing a new family sitcom, similar to The Cosby Show, with one of his former cast-mates Tom Werner. Cosby never said whether he’d appear on the big screen again, though, but we’re sure we’d all love his return to our home television screens.
