This year, various student organizations and the Office of Pluralism and Leadership are celebrating Black Legacy Month with a theme of “Afro-Requiem: Reclaiming Our Culture,” according to the OPAL website. Campus organizers currently have 15 events planned throughout February, including a karaoke party, a field day with children of the Upper Valley and a Black hair care event. A committee of 11 students began event planning in the fall term, according to Black and Pan African student advisor Ashley Audu.
Programming materials feature a logo of an afro pick designed by Tyler Brown ’26, a design choice intended to serve as a form of “resistance,” according to planning committee co-chair Isaiah Golonka ’26.
“In the past, an afro has been seen as a form of resistance because within the workplace you can’t wear your hair like that — that’s seen as unkempt and uncivilized,” Golonka said. “It’s a reclamation of a stance against those biases in the workforce.”
The celebrations began with an opening ceremony on Feb. 1, during which attendees discussed the month’s importance and celebrated their existence as part of the Black student body at Dartmouth, according to the event’s poster. On Feb. 4, the housing communities and Black Girls are Magic, an organization for Black women on campus, held a karaoke night party in One Wheelock, according to the OPAL website.
According to Afro-American Society president Kourtney Bobb ’25, Black Legacy Month and Collis After Dark held a lock-in event on Feb. 2, 2024 with karaoke. She said last year’s event had a large turnout.
“Everyone came and showed out,” Bobb said. “We were there for hours … beyond when we’re supposed to.”
Celebrations continued on Feb. 8, when the Dartmouth Black Student-Athlete Association and the Dartmouth Alliance for Children of Color held their fourth-annual field day at the Leverone Field House. DACC co-president Elyjah McRae ’25 said the event — which was attended by around 30 kids in the Upper Valley — provides an opportunity for children to see young adults who look like themselves, allowing them to become “comfortable in their own skin.”
“I think it’s just definitely a good time for us to come together and connect with the broader Black community in the Upper Valley,” DACC vice president Tiana Davis ’25 said.
Bobb, a former member of the lacrosse team, said last year’s field day was one of her “favorite” events of Black Legacy Month. Last year, she and other members of the DBSAA executive board collaborated with DACC for the field day, she said.
“We saw how much it meant for [the kids] to be at a college facility, to work with Division I athletes and to just see the potential that they had,” Bobb said.
According to the OPAL website, over 30 Division I athletes have participated in the field day event. DBSAA executive board member Jenna Brown ’25 clarified that
DACC co-president Cameron Moore ’25 said the organization reached out to many participating community members through a “people of color network” in the Upper Valley.
“We definitely pushed it to way more families than we normally have access to,” Moore said.
This month’s programming has involved several organizations including Collis After Dark and OPAL’s LGBTQIA+ and Latin and Caribbean advising areas, according to Audu.
“It’s nice to be able to kind of create programs that reach out to the intersecting identities within our advising areas,” Audu said.
Events like Unfiltered and Untucked Black Drag Panel Discussion with New England drag performers give students the opportunity to connect with people who they might not have otherwise had the chance to meet, Audu added.
“This month allows those students who are a part of that heritage, to feel seen [and] celebrated in this campus as well,” Audu said.
Black Legacy Month programming will continue in force through the second half of February. On Feb. 16, Black Girls are Magic will hold a Black hair care event where they will showcase and give out hair products, according to committee member Jose Girona ’28.
“We’re really trying to focus on the cultural importance behind hair care … [and] why hair care is so special,”Girona said. “On top of that, how to take care of hair in this type of weather.”
Women and gender advising program coordinator Foluso Akinbode will also deliver a presentation on maintaining different hairstyles at the event, Pena said.
“[The presentation explains] how to take care of your hair, porosity, different products to use, and Akinbode even goes through her own journey with her hair and what she learned through taking care of her hair,” Pena said.
Another event this month highlighting identity and culture is the Overlapping Identities event on Feb. 27. The event will discuss the relationships between Black and Latin-Caribbean identities to “debunk myths” about the coexistence of Latino-Caribbean and Black cultures, according to the OPAL website.
“One of the events I’m most excited for is the overlapping identities [event] talking about Blackness in different aspects,” Afro-American Society vice president Esther Ojuolape ’26 said. “No matter what scale you are in terms of Blackness, your Black identity matters and your Black voice matters.”
Update Appended (Feb. 14, 1:16 p.m.): The article has been updated to clarify that Kourtney Bobb ’25 was commenting on the 2024, not 2025, field day.
Correction Appended (Feb. 27, 3:20 p.m.): A previous version of this article stated that Bobb and members of the lacrosse team collaborated with DACC for the 2024 field day. Bobb and other members of the DBSAA executive board collaborated with DACC for the event. The article has been corrected. The article also included information from Bobb about an event with karaoke. The article has been updated to clarify that Bobb was commenting on a 2024, not 2025, event.
