Veritas College Preparatory Charter School

A big shout out to all scholars and families who attended today’s orientation. We are so excited to start the year with you all. Missed it? Here is an overview of some of the information given today. Check out our “VCP Day 1 Ready Guide” to ensure that you are ready to have a strong start next Monday!

Attention Lion 🦁 Family! We can hardly believe that the start of the school year is upon us! After a year and a half of not being back at 100% capacity, we are looking forward to a safe and strong return on ✨Monday, August 9, 2021✨.

The first step is our Family Orientation:
Join us this Thursday, August 5th between the hours of 12pm and 6pm for our back-to-school fair designed to allow families to:

🐾 Learn more about VCP
🐾 Finalize registration paperwork
🐾 Purchase and pick up uniforms
🐾 Receive important scholar and family information for the school year
🐾 And more!

While families may come and go as they please, we ask that you:
1. Make plans to attend for at least an hour
2. Visit and complete the steps at each table
3. Wear a mask

We look forward to seeing our Lion Family soon!

Attention Lion 🦁 Family! We can hardly believe that the start of the school year is upon us! After a year and a half of not being back at 100% capacity, we are looking forward to a safe and strong return on ✨Monday, August 9, 2021✨.

The first step is our Family Orientation:
Join us this Thursday, August 5th between the hours of 12pm and 6pm for our back-to-school fair designed to allow families to:

🐾 Learn more about VCP
🐾 Finalize registration paperwork
🐾 Purchase and pick up uniforms
🐾 Receive important scholar and family information for the school year
🐾 And more!

While families may come and go as they please, we ask that you:
1. Make plans to attend for at least an hour
2. Visit and complete the steps at each table
3. Wear a mask

We look forward to seeing our Lion Family soon!

20-21 TNReady Parent Orientation Video

Couldn't make it to one of the parent orientation sessions last week? Take a few minutes to watch the presentation here! We'll discuss the testing calendar, the health & safety precautions being taken, testing systems & procedures, and what scholars will be doing when they are not in the building testing. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach out and let us know.

20-21 TNReady Parent Orientation Video The following presentation details Veritas College Prep's plan for TNReady testing during the Spring of 2021. If you were unable to attend our in-person pare...

Tonight we celebrate our youth! Amariyanna Copeny AKA as “Mari” or “Little Miss Flint” is a youth activist from Flint, Michigan who is known for raising awareness about the Flint Water Crisis. Amaryanna was just 8 years old when she wrote a letter to President Obama asking him or First Lady Michelle Obama to meet with her and other Flint residents who were preparing to watch their governor Rick Snyder testify before congress on why 100,000 Flint residents had been consuming contaminated drinking water. The water was brown, with dangerous levels of bacteria and lead. This resulted in residents developing Legionnaires' disease that killed 12 people. Another 6,000-12,000 children may face health complications in the future from the amount of lead they were exposed to.

Her selfless letter earned her a meeting with President Obama that went viral and President Obama authorized $100 million to repair Flint’s water system.

Together with the non-profit org Pack Your Back, Amaryianna has handed out over $700,000 bottles of water to Flint residents.

She is living proof that you can make a change at any age.

#blackhistorymonth #bhm #blackgirlmagic #blackgirlsrock #flint #flintwatercrisis

Attention scholars! As we prepare to close out Black History Month in the next couple of days, we invite you all to an exciting opportunity to show us what you know! Join us for the Black History Month trivia challenge this Friday at 3:30 PM! Information will be going out to your email this week about how to sign up and participate. We will have some awesome prizes for our top finishers! Hope to see you there!

Attention scholars! As we prepare to close out Black History Month in the next couple of days, we invite you all to an exciting opportunity to show us what you know! Join us for the Black History Month trivia challenge this Friday at 3:30 PM! Information will be going out to your email this week about how to sign up and participate. We will have some awesome prizes for our top finishers! Hope to see you there!

Tonight we recognize Mr. X! Malcolm X was an African American leader in the civil rights movement, minister and supporter of Black nationalism. He urged his fellow Black Americans to protect themselves against white aggression “by any means necessary,” a stance that often put him at odds with the nonviolent teachings of Martin Luther King, Jr.

His charisma and oratory skills helped him achieve national prominence in the Nation of Islam, a belief system that merged Islam with Black nationalism. After Malcolm X’s assassination in 1965, his bestselling book, The Autobiography of Malcolm X, popularized his ideas and inspired the Black Power movement.

Malcolm X was born Malcolm Little on May 19, 1925 in Omaha, Nebraska. His mother was the National recording secretary for the Marcus Garvey Movement which commanded millions of followers in the 1920s and 30s. His father was a Baptist minister and chapter president of The Universal Negro Improvement Association.

#blackhistorymonth #bhm #malcomx #freedom #civilrights #equality

Hey lion family! We want to be sure to share information and resources to help you all stay safe during this time. Check out these three graphics about the Memphis Boil Water Advisory currently in effect and bottled water distribution locations!

Tonight we reflect on sacrifices made for the freedom and ascension of African Americans. Harriet Tubman was an American abolitionist and political activist. She escaped and subsequently made some 13 mission to rescue approximately 70 enslaved people including friends and family. Harriet Tubman used what is known as the underground railroad to help free these slaves.​She was the first woman to lead a combat assault.

#blackhistorymonth #bhm #harriettubman #freedom #blackgirlmagic

Tonight we reflect on sacrifices made for the freedom and ascension of African Americans. Harriet Tubman was an American abolitionist and political activist. She escaped and subsequently made some 13 mission to rescue approximately 70 enslaved people including friends and family. Harriet Tubman used what is known as the underground railroad to help free these slaves.​She was the first woman to lead a combat assault.

#blackhistorymonth #bhm #harriettubman #freedom #blackgirlmagic

The Black feminist, writer, activist, poet, mother, warrior Audre Lorde (1934-1992) was a native New Yorker and daughter of immigrants. Both her activism and her published work speak to the importance of struggle for liberation among oppressed peoples and of organizing in coalition across differences of race, gender, sexual orientation, class, age and ability. An internationally recognized activist and artist, Audre Lorde was the recipient of many honors and awards, including the Walt Whitman Citation of Merit, which conferred the mantle of New York State poet for 1991-93. In designating her New York State’s Poet Laureate, Governor Mario Cuomo observed: “Her imagination is charged by a sharp sense of racial injustice and cruelty, of sexual prejudice…She cries out against it as the voice of indignant humanity. Audre Lorde is the voice of the eloquent outsider who speaks in a language that can reach and touch people everywhere.” Her works include:

A Burst Of Light
The Black Unicorn
Between Ourselves
Cables To Rage
The Cancer Journals
The First Cities
From A Land Where Other People Live
I Am Your Sister: Black Women Organizing Across Sexualities
Le***an Party: An Anthology
Need: A Chorale For Black Women Voices
The New York Head Shop And Museum
Our Dead Behind Us: Poems
Sister Outsider: Essays And Speeches
The Marvelous Arithmetics Of Distance: Poems
Undersong: Chosen Poems Old And New
Uses Of The Erotic: The Erotic As Power
Woman Poet—The East
Zami: A New Spelling of My Name

#blackhistorymonth #bhm #audrelorde #poet #blacklivesmatter #blackgirlmagic

“A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives,” Jackie Robinson once said.

The impact Robinson made on Major League Baseball is one that will be forever remembered. On April 15 each season, every team in the majors celebrates Jackie Robinson Day in honor of when he broke the color barrier in baseball, becoming the first African-American player in the 20th century to take the field in the big leagues. He opened the door for many others and will forever be honored for his contribution to the game.

Robinson stood up for equal rights even before he did so in baseball. He was arrested and court martialed during while he was serving in the Army for refusing to move to the back of a segregated bus. He was eventually acquitted of the charges and received an honorable discharge. He then started his professional baseball career.

Originally a shortstop[, Robinson played for the Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro Leagues until Brooklyn Dodgers general manager Branch Rickey tabbed him as the player who would integrate the big leagues. Rickey wanted Robinson not only for his talent and style of play, but also because of his demeanor. He knew Robinson would have to endure mental and physical abuse, and Rickey wanted him to handle it without fighting back. Robinson endured teammates and crowds who opposed his presence, and threats to himself and his family, with honor and grace.

#blackhistorymonth #bhm #jackierobinson #baseball

Tonight we are back at it, celebrating the incomparable talkshow and media legend Ms. Oprah Winfrey!

Born in the rural town of Kosciusko, Mississippi, Winfrey moved to Baltimore in 1976, where she hosted People Are Talking. Afterward, she was recruited by a Chicago TV station to host her own morning show.

In 1971, Winfrey entered Tennessee State University. She began working in radio and television broadcasting in Nashville. In 1976, Winfrey moved to Baltimore, Maryland, where she hosted the TV chat show People Are Talking. The show became a hit and Winfrey stayed with it for eight years, after which she was recruited by a Chicago TV station to host her own morning show, A.M. Chicago.

Winfrey launched The Oprah Winfrey Show in 1986 as a nationally syndicated program that ran for 25 years, until 2011. With its placement on 120 channels and an audience of 10 million people, the show grossed $125 million by the end of its first year, of which Winfrey received $30 million. Soon after The Oprah Winfrey Show ended in 2011, Winfrey moved to her own network, the Oprah Winfrey Network, a joint venture with Discovery Communications.

#blackhistory #blackhistorymonth #oprahwinfrey #blm #blacklivesmatter #blackgirlmagic

On this Friday night we take a look at an important historical organization. The Black Panther Party was a political organization founded by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale in1966. The organization was founded on the ideologies of Anti-facsim, Anti-racism, Revolutionary Socialism, and Black Pride, just to name a few. Most notably, the organization instituted the Free Breakfast for Children program to address food insecurity. They also implemented policies and programs that addressed the health and wellness of the black community.

Although the Black Panther Party ceased to exist, many of their survival programs lived on. A few programs continued in their originally established forms. For example, the Carolyn Downs Family Medical Center, a Seattle-based community clinic, was originally founded by the local Black Panther Party.

Other survival programs indirectly influenced the development of community services. For example, the free breakfast program for school-children is likely what inspired the development of today’s mandate that public schools provide free breakfast to students, Ewing said. And the Black Panther Party's Sickle Cell Anemia Research Foundation inspired the federal government's initial funding of sickle cell research, Ewing said.

#blackhistorymonth #bhm #blackpanther #blackpantherparty

Tonight we celebrate this day in history. Nelson Mandela, leader of the movement to end South African apartheid, is released from prison after 27 years on February 11, 1990.

In 1944, Mandela, a lawyer, joined the African National Congress (ANC) where he became a leader of Johannesburg’s youth wing of the ANC. He advocated nonviolent resistance to apartheid—South Africa’s institutionalized system of white supremacy and racial segregation. In 1961, he was arrested for treason after going against his unjust government, and although acquitted he was arrested again in 1962 for illegally leaving the country. Convicted and sentenced to five years in prison, he was put on trial again in 1964 on charges of sabotage. In June 1964, he was convicted along with several other ANC leaders and sentenced to life in prison.

Mandela spent the first 18 of his 27 years in jail confined to a small cell without a bed or plumbing. He was forced to do hard labor in a quarry. He could write and receive a letter once every six months, and once a year he was allowed to meet with a visitor for 30 minutes. However, Mandela’s resolve remained unbroken, and while remaining the symbolic leader of the anti-apartheid movement, he led a movement of civil disobedience at the prison that coerced South African officials into drastically improving conditions on Robben Island. He was later moved to another location, where he lived under house arrest.

In 1989, F.W. de Klerk became South African president and set about dismantling apartheid. De Klerk lifted the ban on the ANC, suspended executions, and in February 1990 ordered the release of Nelson Mandela Mandela subsequently led the ANC in its negotiations with the minority government for an end to apartheid and the establishment of a multiracial government. In 1993, Mandela and de Klerk were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. One year later, the ANC won an electoral majority in the country’s first free elections, and Mandela was elected South Africa’s president.

Mandela retired from politics in 1999, but remained a global advocate for peace and social justice until his death in December 2013.

Hey VCP scholars! Have you checked your email? We have sent out some exciting scholar engagement opportunities for Black History Month. From now until February 23rd we are excepting submissions for our Black History Month contests. More information can be found in your email and on the flyers above. We cannot wait to see your submissions!!