Earl Graves  Sr -  Morgan State University

Earl Graves is is an American entrepreneur, publisher, businessman, and philanthropist. A graduate of Morgan State University, he is the founder of Black Enterprise magazine and chairman of the media company Earl G. Graves, Ltd

Ed Bradley  -  Cheyney State University

Ed Bradley was a journalist best known for his work on the 60 Minutes news program.   He also covered the fall of Saigon, the White House; and anchored his own news broadcast, CBS Sunday Night News with Ed Bradley.

Spike Lee  -  Morehouse College

Spike Lee is an American film director, producer, writer, and actor. His production company, 40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks, has produced over 35 films; and he's received an Emmy as well as  Academy Award nominations.

Jerry Rice  -  Mississippi Valley State University

Jerry Lee Rice is a wide receiver who is widely considered the greatest receiver in NFL history.  As of 2014, Rice held over 100 NFL records--the most of any player by a wide margin.

Deborrah Kaye "Debbie" Allen  -  Howard University

Debbie Allen is an actress, dancer, choreographer, television director, television producer, and a member of the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities.  She's well-known for role in 1982 television hit series Fame.

Will Packer  -  Florida A&M University

Will Packer is an American film maker and producer. With college alumnus, Rob Packer, he founded the successful and renown production company Rainforest Films, in 1994.

Lonnie "Common" Lynn  Jr  -  Florida A&M University

Lonnie Rashid Lynn, Jr., better known as Common, is a hip hop recording artist and actor.  In 2011, Common launched Think Common Entertainment, his own record label imprint.

Yolande Cornelia "Nikki" Giovanni  Jr -  Fisk University

Nikki Giovanni is an writer, commentator, activist, and educator.  She is one of the world's most well-known African American, and was nominated for a Grammy Award for her Nikki Giovanni Poetry Collection.

Reginald Lewis  -  Virginia State

Reginald Lewis was a businessman who built the billion dollar company Beatrice International (Foods).  In 1992, Forbes listed Lewis among the 400 richest Americans, with a net worth estimated at $400 million.

Keshia Knight Pulliam  -  Spelman College

Keshia Pulliam is an American actress who, in 1986, at the age of six was the youngest actress to be nominated for an Emmy Award for her role as Rudy Huxtable on the Cosby Show.

Sean "P.Diddy" Combs  -  Howard University

Sean John Combs, aka Diddy\P.Diddy\Puffy, is a rapper, record producer, actor, and entrepreneur.  Combs has won three Grammy Awards and two MTV Video Music Awards, and is the producer of MTV's Making the Band.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr  -  Morehouse College

Dr. Martin Luther King was a Baptist minister, humanitarian, activist, and leader in the Civil Rights Movement.  On October 14, 1964, King received the Nobel Peace Prize for combating racial inequality through nonviolence.

Toni Morrison  - Howard University

Toni Morrison is a novelist, editor, and professor. Her novels include The Bluest Eye, Sula, Song of Solomon and Beloved.  She won the Pulitzer Prize and the American Book Award in 1988 for Beloved and the Nobel Prize in 1993.

Broderick Steven "Steve" Harvey  -  West Virginia State University

Steve Harvey is an actor, comedian, mentor, television/radio personality and author.  He is a two-time Daytime Emmy Award winner, and an 11-time NAACP Image Award winner in various categories.

Rob Hardy  -  Florida A&M University

Rob Hardy is a film producer, screenwriter, and television and film director. With college alumnus, Will Packer, he founded the successful and renown production company Rainforest Films, in 1994.2

Oprah Winfrey  -  Tennessee State University

Oprah Winfrey is a media proprietor, talk show host, actress, producer and philanthropist.  She is currently North America's only black billionaire, and has been ranked  greatest black philanthropist in American history.

Wanda Sykes  -  Hampton University

Wanda Sykes is a writer, comedian, actress, and voice artist. She earned a Emmy Award in 1999.  n 2004, Entertainment Weekly named Sykes as one of the 25 funniest people in America.

Colbert I King  -  Howard University

Colbert King is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for the Washington Post.  He also is television panelist, business executive, and a army officer and veteran.

Herman Cain  -  Morehouse College

Herman Cain is an American author, business executive, radio host, syndicated columnist, and Tea Party activist. He also ran for the 2012 U.S. Republican Party presidential nomination.

Jesse Jackson  -  North Carolina A&T University

Jesse Jackson is an American civil rights activist, Baptist minister, and shadow US Senator for the District of Columbia.  In 1984, he ran for the US Democratic presidential nomination in 1984.

Yolanda Adams  -  Tennessee State University

Yolanda Adams is a gospel singer, record producer, actress and radio host.  Adams has won two Grammy Awards--one for her album Mountain High...  Valley Low  and for her album The Experience.

Samuel Jackson  -  Morehouse College

Samuel Jackson is an American actor, film producer and a little known history of social activism.  He also has critical and commercial acclaim as the actor with the highest grossing film total in 2011.

Thomas Dexter "TD" Jakes, Sr -  West Virginia State University

TD Jakes is Bishop of The Potter's House, a non-denominational mega church.   He is also an author, gospel recorder; and promotes the  MegaFest revival and the Woman Thou Art Loosed convention.

Tom Joyner  -  Tuskegee University

Tom Joyner is a radio host; and founder of REACH Media Inc., the Tom Joyner Foundation, and BlackAmericaWeb.com.  The Joyner Foundation has partnered with numerous organization to provide educational scholarships.

Taraji Henson  -  Howard University

Taraji Henson is an actress and singer  who, in 2009, was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in Benjamin Button.  She also plays a starring role in the television hit series The Empire.

Pam Oliver  -  Florida A&M University

Pam Oliver is an American sportscaster known for her work covering NBA, NFL and other sports events.  Oliver has worked with the major networks including ESPN, FOX Sports and TNT.

Thurgood Marshall  -  Lincoln University & Howard College of Law

Thurgood Marshall was the US Supreme Court's 96th justice and its first African American justice.  As a lawyer, Marshall was  best known for his high success rate in arguing before the Supreme Court and for his victory in Brown v. Board of Education, a decision that desegregated public schools.

Samuel Yette  -  Tennessee State University

Samuel Yette  was a reporter, teacher, author and photojournalist.  He was the first Black reporter hired for Newsweek's Washington Bureau and published the book "The Choice: The Issue of Black Survival in America"

Erykah Badu -  Grambling State University

Erykah Badu is a singer, song writer, record producer, activist and actress.  Badu has received four Grammy Awards, two BET Awards, an American Music Award as well as awards from the NAACP, Soul Train and MTV.

Marian Wright Edelman -  Spelman College

Marian Edelman best known as an activist for childrens' rights.  She is president emerita and founder of the Children's Defense Fund.  She also is the first Black woman admitted to the Mississippi Bar, worked for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, and helped organized Poor People's Campaign and the Head Start Program.

James Mercer Langston Hughes -  Lincoln University

Langston Hughes was a poet, social activist, novelist, playwright and columnist.  He was a leader of the Harlem Renaissance and during the civil rights movement wrote an in-depth column about racial injustice in The Chicago Defender.  He emphasized Black pride in his works and tried avoid racial chauvinism.

Evelynn Hammonds - Spelman College

Evelynn Hammonds is a feminist and renown scholar.   She has bachelor's degrees in physics and engineering -- Spelman and Georgia Tech; and a master's in physics from MIT.  Hammonds research focuses on the intersection of science, medicine and race including analysis of gender and race with science and medicine.