News — female empowering

Black women are made of gold and Jennifer King is made of that and more. She is a football history and a shining example to all the little Black girls who dare to dream. King is now the first-ever Black woman to get a full-time coaching job in the NFL. The Washington Football Team on Tuesday added King to their roster as assistant running backs coach.

This announcement comes off the back of her internship during the 2020 off-season at the Washington Football Team under head coach Ron Rivera and running backs coach Randy Jordan.

According to Rivera, nobody is more deserving of this promotion than King because aside from her experience playing football for 12 years, she always puts in the hard work and can connect well with everyone on the team with her excellent communication skills.

“She demonstrated all of the qualities that are needed to work full-time on my staff. She is a hard worker, a great communicator, and a quality person. Coach King is always eager to learn and has shown tremendous growth since starting here last season.”

“Coach King is well deserving of the promotion,” Rivera added. “She earned this opportunity with her hard work. The sky is truly the limit for her.”

Aside from spending time interning in the offseason with the Carolina Panthers in 2018 and 2019, King also worked with the Arizona Hotshots of the AAF in 2019 as an assistant WRs coach and was an offensive assistant at Dartmouth that same year. “I am very pleased to have Coach King back to assist me full-time in the running backs room,” RBs coach Jordan said.

He also reiterated what head coach Rivers said and went on to praise King’s work ethic. “She was extremely helpful last year in seeing the game from a different perspective, and she was a tremendous communicator in our room. I look forward to continuing to collaborate as we move forward in our program and as she moves forward in her coaching career,” he added.

During her 12 years as a player, from 2006-17, King, 36, was a seven-time All-American quarterback, receiver, and safety and with two national championships under her belt with the Carolina Phoenix and New York Sharks, according to NFL.com.

There is a new movement in NFL for women coaching and King is at the helm of this wave together with the first woman to be appointed assistant coach, Lori Locust, who was made the assistant defensive line coach for Tampa Bay in March 2019.

King, Locust and assistant strength and conditioning coach Maral Javadifar made history as the first female coaches to face off during a playoff game. The three were among a record six female coaches on teams to play in the post-season, BBC said.

In a statement on the Washington Football Team website, King said: “It’s a direct testament to those coaches who are forward thinking and opening up the entire pool when they’re looking for people, to hire people to make their programmes better.

“I don’t think it’s an oddity that those play-off teams had so many female coaches involved because those coaches created cultures of growth and inclusion, and those things generally create wins,” King, who also has experience coaching basketball, added.

Seenah Mischel was in awe the first time she saw a Black female firefighter as a child. Today, she is the first and only Black female firefighter and officer in Erie, Pennsylvania.

The power of representation cannot be overemphasized because seeing someone with who you share cultural and physical features doing great things works incredibly on the human psyche, especially that of children.

Mischel said seeing the Black woman firefighter in her hometown Buffalo was an eye-opener and from that point, she knew she wanted to be just like the firefighter. Interestingly, she did not get into the profession after college. She worked briefly with the US Army and relocated to Erie before the stars began to align.

A recruitment commercial was all it took to rekindle the childhood dream of fighting fires and saving lives. The advertisement specifically stated that they were in need of women and minority firefighters. Mischel said, “It was perfect” and she registered applied immediately.

According to Democrat & Chronicle, Mischel made history in 2010 as Erie’s first Black female firefighter after successfully completing her testing. Admittedly with no knowledge of what it entails to be a firefighter, she was helped by her teammates with hours of training.

Joe Walko, her former teammate, and the current Erie fire chief attest to Mischel’s dedication and willpower.

“She was always a go-getter,” he said. “We taught her the ins and outs and had a great time. I think we broke her in well.”

Mischel tested for a lieutenant position and after returning an overseas deployment with the U.S. Air Force Reserves, she was greeted with the news of her confirmation, making her the first Black female officer on the Erie Bureau of Fire, stationed out of Engine Co. 8.

“It’s very exciting. I swear it feels like the best job in the world,” said Mischel.

“I feel like I wasted time not going for it sooner. I can kick myself now, I guess, for wasting time. Because once I got into it I was so happy and fulfilled I can’t imagine myself doing anything else.”

Out of 134 crew members at the Erie Bureau of Fire, there are only four female firefighters now at the station and the 42-year-old is the only Black female fighter at her station. Just as she was inspired by a Black woman firefighter as a child, she admits to seeing the same light in the eyes of young Black girls who see her.

Although she has never met the woman in Buffalo, that glimpse of a future she could have has stayed with her and she considers her to be a role model, Mischel aspires to be the reason someone will join the bureau one day.

“Sometimes I do see those looks I gave [the Black woman firefighter in my hometown] when I was a kid. I see it in the eyes of kids when they stop and look at me, never realizing that firefighters on the job are someone who looks like them,” Mischel said. 

This job to the new officer was not to make a statement or a challenge. According to her, it was not in a bid to prove herself or anything she went for it because she is up for the task plus the added benefit of saving lives and supporting others along the way. She says “it’s rewarding.”

The Mayor of Pennsylvania is on a mission to increase diversity in public safety forces. The Erie fire chief Walko has plans of liaising with Mischel to recruit more minorities to enable the Mayor’s vision to become a reality because there may be more females and minorities in the city with the hopes of becoming firefighters who just need the motivation they intend to offer.

Kampala, Uganda is serving a healthy dose of Girl Power amid a covid-19 pandemic that sees several women — who found themselves in months-long lockdown and unemployed, take on both new careers and self-defence training by way of Diva Taxi, a new female taxi driver service in the city..

Company founder, Gillian Kobusingye, is proud of her employees, "Our ladies are extremely hard working, very motivated and I like their sense of pride when they are doing this work they are doing it with one heart compared to other people. And that's the difference we have to the competitors."

Diva Taxi now boasts over 70 drivers and claims an industry-low fare commission rate of 25% in order to see the women thrive.

Donna Ochen, a Diva Taxi driver, is happy with the means the professional opportunity financially affords her, "When I saw the Diva Taxi company reaching out to all females who could be interested I decided to take it up because it would be an opportunity for me to serve and earn and support my family with the earnings that I'd get from driving."

Diva Taxi has a fleet of around 100 cars that serve as taxis, special school pick-ups and drop-offs and even functions like weddings. An unexpected and resounding successful start for the company that almost wasn't.

Rebecca Makyeli, the manager and self-defence trainer at Diva Taxi, shares the very early days of the company's journey, "They thought of the idea of why would we have our cars just parked in a compound and yet we can transport people and services from one place to another. So, coming up with this idea it started off as a joke, supported by friends, close friends and family, but eventually, the idea picked up and in June 2020 the company was registered and officially came into being."

With its 72 drivers averaging 30 rides a week, Diva Taxi expects its service app — downloaded around 500 times to reach 2000 active users this year in the city of three million inhabitants.