The African American Faculty and Staff Association, whose primary function is to raise scholarship money and honor recipients, gave $1,200 in scholarships to 10 CSU East Bay students last Friday night at their annual scholarship dinner celebration.

All who were in attendance for the dinner celebration, which was located at CSUEB’s New University Union, were welcomed by the sounds of a live jazz ensemble playing cover songs like Duke Ellington’s 1936 smooth jazz hit  “Caravan.”

The soulful music set the mood for scholarship winners and their supporters to meet and greet with members of the association as well as faculty, staff and other students who came to support.

“On a large and small scale, I think it’s really important to acknowledge  all student’s accomplishments as well as their field of study,” said Valena  Mann, an alumni and current graduate student in the Kinesiology Department at CSUEB who recently attended a similar dinner celebration for one of her peers.

“I think when we acknowledge these types of students word gets out on campus that we value what they do and we hold these types of students in high esteem,” she added.

This year the theme was “Celebrating 10 Years of Paying it Forward,” which recipients and members strongly represented the association’s promise to increase complex, multicultural and multiracial societies.

For their personal statements, scholarship recipients were told to identify the challenges they have overcome in pursuit of their goals and their commitment to their community.

Dr. Terry Jones, one of the founders of the association, says paying it forward to students is very important, and that one has to look back to the legendary figures that paved the way.

Jones noted that students do not have to be African American to receive the scholarship, and that the emphasis on African American transpired when he started teaching thirty years ago, a time when the university “lacked black presence,” the former CSUEB social work professor said.

After, Jones spoke to fellow faculty members, who also saw a need to recognize the black presence on campus, they began the organization.

“There has been an increase in the number of students who receive the awards as well as an increase in the number of contributors,” said Stan Hebert, AVP of Student Affairs at CSUEB.

Currently, the association has given out $160,000 in scholarships to 100 students through private donations, according to the flyer. Eligible candidates for the scholarship are current undergraduate CSUEB students with a minimum GPA of 2.5 and graduate students with a minimum 3.0 GPA.