A recently awarded $100,000 Closing the Gap grant will aid Dr. Bridgett Clinton-Scott, an associate professor in UMES’ Department of Human Ecology, in her continuing effort to connect fashion merchandising students with alumni through a fashion entrepreneur mentorship program. The grant is part of half a million in funding allocated among nine HBCUs to “boost their fashion programs.”
“This is a semester-long program exposing students to fashion careers through firsthand experiential projects with alumni and other fashion mentors,” Clinton-Scott said. “The program also grooms students to enter into corporate positions with major fashion brands.”
Last year, Clinton-Scott said, five fashion merchandising students (Nathan Dance, Aleecia Joof, Tamber Jackson, Kassidy Langham and Vante Thomas) participated in a yearlong Gap, Inc. apprenticeship program as a direct result of the grant.
Funded by ICON 360 x Gap, Inc., students also apply their creative skills and knowledge in special projects exposing them to media production, product development and entrepreneurship.
The Closing the Gap initiative was launched last year as a means of “strengthening educational opportunities for the next generation of Black, indigenous and other people of color fashion leaders…to drive innovation within the fashion industry.”
Gail Stephens, agricultural communications and media associate, University of Maryland Eastern Shore, School of Agricultural and Natural Sciences, 410-621-3850, gcstephens@umes.edu.
Photos by Todd Dudek, agricultural communications, University of Maryland Eastern Shore, School of Agricultural and Natural Sciences, tdudek@umes.edu.
