Hear this interview with Sonya Hollins and the Merze Tate Travel Club students on the Michael Eric Dyson Show: http://dysonshow.org/?s=merze+tate+travel
See past radio interview on NPR with the Merze Tate Travel Club at: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128443452
By Sonya Hollins, editor
editor@comvoicesonline.com
KALAMAZOO (Mich.)-The students of the Merze Tate Travel Club had their second opportunity to share of their experiences with the nation. Tori Zackery and Natasha Mahonie were interviewed recently on the Michael Eric Dyson Show. Dyson, whose show is produced in Baltimore, MD, interviewed the girls via sister-station at WMUK on the campus of Western Michigan University.
The students were joined by Merze Tate Travel Club founder, Sonya Hollins. Hollins shared of the future plans of a project to help the Kalamazoo Promise, and Zackery and Mahonie shared of experiences with the club and future projects.
“It was fun,” said Mahonie, a six-grader at Parkwood-Upjohn Elementary School. When Mahonie was asked by Dyson about being in a club with students of various backgrounds, she said, “It helps me learn about different people and learn different languages.”
Zackery, a ninth grader at Kalamazoo Central High School said to Dyson that she enjoyed being in the club for the past three years. As a charter member of the club she has met newsworthy women and have traveled to various places within the community and state.
“I joined the club because my teacher told me about it and I love to travel. I wanted to know more about Merze Tate,” said Zackery to Dyson.
The Merze Tate Travel Club began in 2008 with a Good Neighbor Grant from the Kalamazoo Community Foundation. The clubs offers a unique opportunity to girls in grades 5-12 to explore their community through multi-media projects.
This year the club will focus on creating a documentary of Merze Tate. The native of Michigan and graduate of WMU (1927) went on to become the first African American to graduate from Oxford University, traveled the world as a reporter, lecturer and author and served with they U.S. State Department among many other historical feats. She retired from Howard University where she was one of the first women hired in its history department. Tate left more than $1 million to WMU upon her death in addition to millions to schools such as Howard and Harvard Universities where she worked or studied.
For more information regarding the Merze Tate Travel Club, email: merzettravel@sbcglobal.net, or call 269-365-4019.
