The 11th annual Brandon Jackson Memorial Scholarship and Basketball Classic will aid scholars and help the community. The classic will take place at John Muir High School on May 3 from 8:00 A.M. to 8:00 P.M., tickets are $15.
Boys and girls teams from 10-17 are eligible to participate. Scholarship recipients will be announced at 2:00 P.M. during the classic.
The scholarship and classic founder David Williams will work under the non-profit Empower U, allowing him to apply for grants to supply more scholarships.
“All of the money that we’ve raised have come through personal relationships, knocking on doors, reaching out to folks in the community,” Williams said. “This is just small to medium-sized contributions that we’ve been getting over the years.”
During the classic, Empower U will award checks to three families who were impacted by the Eaton Canyon Fire.
“Our target is the underserved, under-resourced, low-income students of color in our community,” Williams said. “We just had our interviewing process this past Saturday. I get enlightened and encouraged, and more motivated every time we go through these interviews.”
Although Williams is helping wildfire victims, he was also impacted by the fires.
“I want to still be a solution to the problem and support to the community,” he said. “We got to help each other.”
Williams volunteered as a basketball coach for the Brotherhood Crusade and coached AAU basketball. His former players will also battle in the Alumni game.
“Some of these kids that I’ve coached have gone to play in college, so they’re very talented,” Williams said. “They kind of joke with each other because some of them maybe haven’t seen each other in a number of years, now they’re reconnecting and having fun.”
The scholarship was named after a student athlete who was gunned down in 2011. Jackson was a senior at John Muir High School.
“[Jackson] was going to be the first in his family to go to college, he worked so hard,” Williams said. “He’s the model of who we’re looking for, someone that didn’t have the family support like he needed but still, he persevered.”
Since the start of the Brandon Jackson Memorial Scholarship and Basketball Classic, $156,000 has been awarded to 79 students. Past scholarship recipients have attended community colleges and universities, including Morehouse, UC Riverside, Pepperdine, UCLA, Cal State Dominguez Hills, Cal State L.A., and Tuskegee.
“We basically provide scholarships, education and mentorship and sports and we’re just empowering students,” Williams said. “We’re empowering these students to do what we know they can do and to let them know through the support that we give them that we’re empowering them to be our next leaders.”
With Empower U, Williams aims to partner and share resources with other organizations that have the same goals to help underprivileged youth. He also wants the scholarship and basketball classic to happen in different communities.
“I’d love to see this kind of model be everywhere, there’s a lot of organizations out here doing the work,” Williams said. “We do want to create and have partnerships … a good network of organizations that can help these students.”
To sign up your team for the basketball classic or to donate, visit https://www.bjscholarship.org/.