Teachers Mavis Yon (left) and Marilyn Brown (right) proudly hold their plaques beside City Council Deputy Speaker Nantasha Williams, who was given the Trailblazer Award.
Paying it forward and continuing to pave the way for others to succeed was a recurring theme expressed by the educators honored at the UFT African Heritage CommitteeAwards Dinner. Organized by committee co-Chairs Wendy Walker-Wilson and Latoya Lebby, the Feb. 6 event drew about 150 members and guests to a Queens catering hall amid a snowy Black History Month. Teacher Marilyn Brown of PS 194 in Harlem, awarded the Mary McLeod Bethune Award for Teacher Excellence, said Bethune’s abilities as a master collaborator were relevant to her work in special education. “It’s the ability to have those tough conversations with families, and to get everybody to lean into the uncomfortability so that the magic happens,” she said. Teacher Mavis Yon of PS 156 in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, took home the Frederick Douglass Award for Civil & Human Rights. Yon, espousing the importance of representation, said that in her, her students “can see themselves and know that they can make it.”
