Jessica Simmons

Carrboro provides $150,000 to group that works to empower and support youth

April 19, 2024 Jessica Simmons

Grow Your World, a non-profit and youth-centered organization, celebrated receiving a $150,000 grant from the Town of Carrboro. The group’s goal is to empower youth and establish inclusive relationships across generations.

Saint Augustine’s students consider options as university battles financial, academic troubles

April 12, 2024 Jessica Simmons

The Raleigh HBCU has lost its accreditation and suspended in-person classes amid charges of serious financial mismanagement.

CarolinaCast: 126 years later, the Town of Carrboro has erected a historical marker to mark the site of a lynching

April 10, 2024 Jessica Simmons

In 1898, an 18-year-old Black man was killed by a mob of white men near the present day intersection of Old Greensboro Road and Hatch Road. Now, 126 years later, the Town of Carrboro has unveiled a historical marker in honor of his life.

In this edition of the Carolina Connection podcast, Jessica Simmons talks with Lorelai Sykes about the lynching of Manly McCauley, the reaction from the community, and the importance of memorializing negative parts of our past.

‘A moment of grace’: Campus power outage causes UNC student’s special blackout performance

April 8, 2024 Jessica Simmons

UNC senior Sydney Van Buren’s one-woman show faced an unexpected twist as a power outage darkened her performance. But audience members showed their support in an unforgettable way.

Chapel Hill Public Library – one of N.C.’s busiest – nominated for national award

April 5, 2024 Jessica Simmons

The Institute of Museum and Library Services, a federal agency supporting and advancing museums and libraries, announced that the Chapel Hill Public Library will be a finalist for its 2024 national medal.

‘It’s 2024, not 1860’: Group petitions to change street named after slaveholder

March 22, 2024 Jessica Simmons

The groups wants the Town of Chapel Hill to rename Cameron Ave. for Pauli Murray, a civil rights pioneer.

Student group sets goal of providing 10,000 meals to the community this semester

March 3, 2024 Jessica Simmons

A new UNC student non-profit organization, Stomp Out Hunger At NC, strives to combat local hunger by providing meals one step at a time with donations from campus fraternities and sororities.

‘A horrific part of our past’: Carrboro remembers an 1898 lynching

February 23, 2024 Jessica Simmons

Manly McCauley was lynched by a mob of white men in 1898 after they accused him of eloping with a white woman.

Blackfuturism: A full color spectrum of Blackness

February 2, 2024 Jessica Simmons

In an exhibition that coincides with Black History Month, thirty Black artists across the Triangle have come together to show off over 100 canvases. They express what the future of Blackness holds in their creations and for their communities.