One of the most successful playwrights in the United States. The first African-American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama (2002) and a pioneer of historically conscious and linguistically complex theater, her work is now taught at drama schools across the country.
Advocate for maternal, newborn, and child health around the world. A social entrepreneur, Kebede uses her clothing company lemlem to promote both economic opportunities and access to reproductive healthcare for women in Ethiopia.
Environmental health advocate Catherine Coleman Flowers is determined to battle “America’s Dirty Secret”: unequal sewage and sanitation access for rural communities and people of color. A MacArthur Genius, she works on multiple fronts to improve public health, economic development, and access to water and sanitation amidst the growing threat of climate change.
Andrea Jenkins made history in 2017 when she became the first African American, openly transgender woman elected to public office in the United States. As a politician, poet, activist, and community historian, Jenkins strives to bring “the notion of love into the public discourse.”
New York Times bestselling author Janet Mock continues to make history as a writer, director, and advocate. In 2018, Mock became the first transgender woman of color to write and direct an episode of television. Most recently, she signed a three-year multimillion-dollar contract with Netflix, making her the first openly transgender woman of color to sign a deal with a major content company.
A world-class fencer, Ibtihaj Muhammad made history as the first American to wear a hijab in Olympic competition at the 2016 games in Rio de Janeiro. An entrepreneur and advocate for Muslim and African American women in sports, Muhammad inspires others to defy the limits society places on them.
In 1973, Dr. Shirley Marks was the first Spelman College alumna, and only the second African American woman in twenty-three years to graduate from Harvard Medical School.
Pediatric ophthalmologist Terri L. Young, M.D., has researched the molecular genetics of myopia to help find better treatments for eye disorders.
Dr. Vanessa Northington Gamble is a physician and historian of medicine.
Dr Virginia Davis Floyd makes a difference by extending medical care to underserved populations around the world and integrating indigenous medical traditions with Western methods.