Rosa Parks Scholarship Foundation celebrates 45 years with gala at the Henry Ford Museum – The Detroit News
Dearborn — The Rosa Parks Scholarship Foundation celebrated 45 years on Saturday of helping students attend college, in the spirit of social justice and community service that defined the legacy of the “mother of the Civil Rights Movement.”
The nonprofit marked four-and-a-half decades with an anniversary event at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, with a VIP reception in front of Parks’ historic bus, followed by dinner and dancing. The Rosa Parks Scholarship Foundation gives $2,500 scholarships to high school seniors. Scholarship recipients are also eligible to apply for two paid summer internships at The Detroit News.
Detroit native and Emmy Award-winning actor Courtney B. Vance gave a keynote address that didn’t shy away from the current hostile political climate and other seismic issues facing the country, such as opioid addiction and the rapid evolution of artificial intelligence.
And he urged attendees, even in the midst of times that feel frightening, to fight for all people to be treated as human beings, and to never accept the status quo if old ways of doing things are wrong. He called back to Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech, reminding attendees that the country’s founders meant for everyone to be guaranteed life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, which civil rights leaders have given their dignity and sometimes their lives for.
“The old adage, ‘That’s the way things have always been done here,’ should not sit well with this generation,” Vance said. “Rosa Parks’ generation is dead and gone, and in order to continue their work, we must come together and work toward making things the way we see them in today’s world.”
Foundation president Jim Rosenfeld said the weekend’s celebration shows the legacy of the scholarship nonprofit, which has a mission as important as ever as the cost of higher education increases.
“Our scholarship can be that last piece, really, that gets them over the top to achieve what they want to do academically,” he said.
“The other thing that’s really beautiful is the interaction with having the internships with The Detroit News. So we’re trying to make sure that we have who are scholars interested in journalism, so that way when the opportunity comes to take advantage of that internship, we’ve got people in the pipeline to do so.”
The foundation was started in 1980 by Parks — who lived more than half her life in Detroit — in partnership with The Detroit News and Detroit’s school district. It has awarded more than $3 million in scholarships to at least 1,600 high school seniors across the state.
The nonprofit awarded 33 scholarships for 2025.
Cheryl McCauley, one of Parks’ nieces, said she grew up hearing many versions of the story of her aunt refusing to give up her seat on a bus to a White man in 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama. She remembers first learning the story as an elementary schooler — not from her “Auntie Rosa,” but as a surprise in a history book.
Sitting on the bus housed in the Henry Ford Museum, and motioning toward the back rows behind a metal pole that marked where Black people were forced to sit, 65-year-old McCauley said she wants people to understand that Rosa Parks’ situation was in no way uncommon at the time. Black people were routinely made to give up their seats to White people, and often got arrested for their activism, she said.
“This wasn’t a one-time thing, and that’s why they wanted to do something about it. You can’t keep treating people like this,” McCauley said. “You’re going to get tired of it happening.”
Vance told The News he grew up celebrating Black history. He said he wants young people to appreciate the power of mass organizing — which defined the Civil Rights Movement — born out of people doing whatever is necessary to effect social change.
“At a certain point, we’ll get sick and tired of being sick and tired, and we’ll stand up and do something. This is what this foundation is built on: Her spirit of saying, ‘That’s enough. I’m going to sit here.'”
Jamal Simmons, a CNN political commentator and podcast co-host, spoke as the gala’s featured alumni guest.
McCauley said the power of the Montgomery bus boycott, which was sparked by Parks’ 1955 protest, still resonates today. The boycott lasted about a year and culminated in a U.S. Supreme Court decision that declared segregation on buses unconstitutional.
“You can see that boycotts still work today. If people don’t treat you right within a company, then you don’t give them your money, and see how fast they rethink their behavior.”
jcardi@detroitnews.com
