Editor’s Note: This story is published in collaboration with the Moody Writing Support Program.
After Texas Senate Bill 17 shut down their student organization in January, Black female students at UT created a new space for themselves through Black Ambitious Women Supporting Excellence.
“BAWSE will now be a place where Black women don’t feel like they have to fight for a spot, where they feel welcomed and embraced and loved,” Miabella Edwards, BAWSE co-director, said.
Black Ambitious Women Supporting Excellence (BAWSE) was born in August. Fearless Leadership Institute (FLI), the precursor to BAWSE that empowered Black women for 11 years, was one of the organizations forced to shut down after SB 17’s implementation. Amari Tarver, BAWSE co-director, said the disbanding of FLI felt like a “divorce” between the staff that guided the women and the institution that funded them.
“To know this community that I had started to become a part of, and the friends and the people and the resources that I found in FLI, to find out that that was all being taken away—devastated,” sociology senior Edwards said.
Although their community was disbanded by the University, the women were not deterred. They resolved to make a new space for themselves where Black women would be celebrated and empowered on their campus, Edwards said.
“We’re still keeping the brilliance, ambition, wisdom, support, excellence, but those are the core values that Black ambitious women supporting excellence will use,” Edwards said.
Since its founding, Tarver said the organization has seen impressive growth. At the first meeting, over 200 Black women showed up and biweekly meetings have consistent attendance of 40 to 50 women. Tarver said at each meeting, the directors keep a strong focus on fostering community.
Edwards said the co-directors created a three-pronged structure to best meet the needs of their members. “Sister, Sister” emphasizes peer-to-peer bonding and conversations. The “Ships” segment discusses all things relationships and how to foster healthy ones. Lastly, “BAWSE Beyond Boundaries” provides professional networking opportunities and resources.
“BAWSE makes you feel like a boss,” marketing senior Tarver said. “But being a boss is also (about) vulnerability. Being a boss is trust. Being a boss is love. Being a boss is joy. Being a boss you can be sad, too. Being a boss is everything. It’s everything and more.”
Keandrea Miller, an ambassador of the organization in charge of welcoming women at events, said the organization’s kind of community is even more important in a predominantly white institution.
“To come to an organization that surrounds us with ourselves and people that look like us, I was like, ‘This is something I want to join to just connect with my people,’” management senior Miller said.
Despite the physical and emotional setback that the bill caused, the women of BAWSE were determined to create space for themselves. Their mentors and funding were gone, but they pivoted to a peer-to-peer organization that can officially operate under UT’s guidelines.
“We’ve been working and hustling since the summer to fill a gap that had 11 years of legacy (from FLI),” said Edwards. “To see all the Black women that we were impacting…that we knew we get to touch their hearts, (and) carry a piece of their soul with their presence in the room with us by far is one of my proudest achievements in my entire life.”
The community that the organization created empowers its members to take up space even after their space was taken from them.
“To my Black women, you’re not alone, and there’s a place for us, and that place is wherever we feel most comfortable,” said Edwards. “We are all deserving of a safe space.”
