Last week hundreds of students from the country converged on Cincinnati, Ohio to participate in the annual National Association of the Advancement of Color People (NAACP) Afro-Academic Cultural Technological – Scientific Olympics (ACT-SO) competition. The competition, now in its 38th year, included nine students from Jacksonville. ACT-SO precludes the historic civil rights organization’s annual convention.
ACT-SO is a yearlong youth achievement program sponsored by the NAACP designed to recruit stimulate and encourage high academic and cultural achievement among high school students of African descent in grades 9-12. ACT-SO has 32 categories of competition ranging from science and humanities to business and culinary competitions. ACT-SO was founded in 1978 by journalist Vernon Jarrett to promote and award academic achievement. Competition winners receive medals and scholarships.
The Jacksonville NAACP ACT-SO students were winners (bronze and silver) in the local competition of dance, performance arts, visual arts and short-story category. All placing students received laptops and tablets in addition to monetary awards ranging from $1,000 – $2,000.The students received all expense paid trips to compete after placing in local competitions.
Be the first to comment