Hey Hey! TeeJ Mercer here (World's Greatest Hugger). Bi-weekly, I send out the wins, the answered prayers, the unexpected YESes and the straight-up miracles happening in the lives of our Move-In Day Mafia scholars. Come get them.
We've helped 127 Scholars across 32 HBCUs
Cars packed to the roof. Parents carrying boxes. Aunties making up beds. Cousins hauling mini fridges. Somebody's mama crying. Somebody's daddy pretending he's not.
There's excitement everywhere. It's the beginning of something BIG.
But imagine standing in the middle of all that excitement...
No car packed with everything you need.
No family hauling boxes.
No somebody fussing over whether you remembered towels.
No one saying:
"Don't worry. We got you."
That's the moment Move-In Day Mafia was created for.
Our scholars are not your average college students.
So the scholars we take care of every month are odds-beaters and generational curse-breakers.
Sometimes a hug looks like Hope, when somebody can't see what's possible yet.
Boxes carried. Beds made. A decked-out room waiting. The same loud, joyful arrival everybody else on that campus gets, so nobody starts college watching other people's families do it for them.
Most help arrives as sheets, towels and whatever somebody found on clearance. Nobody asks the student what they actually want.
What's your favorite color? What's your style? What snacks do you love? What would make this space feel like yours? Then the Mafia gets to work, so walking into college doesn't feel like one more reminder of everything they don't have.
Support usually disappears once the Move-In Day pictures hit Instagram.
Monthly care packages. Emergency support. Laptops. Mentorship. Career preparation. Celebrations. Somebody to call, somebody who will answer, somebody who will show up when life starts LIFE-ing.
Hope, Understanding and Generosity. Give somebody all three and you help create Stability.
We ask our scholars questions some of them haven't been asked nearly enough, starting with: what do you want?
This is what happens when you give determined students the support and the stability to go do what they came to college to do. THRIVE!
L.I. is the 45th Student Government Association President in Prairie View A&M's history, and only the 5th woman ever to hold that seat.
When she needed flyers and campaign materials, Mafia Miracle Makers donated $1,200 so she could run the right way. THAT is what your yes made possible.
Decked-out dorm rooms, surprise reveals, and a whole lot of hugs.
The Mafia Miracles Report. Bi-weekly, straight from me.
For more than 25 years I worked behind the scenes in Hollywood, telling stories through television and film. I became a multiple-award-winning television editor and producer and worked on everything from reality television to campaigns for blockbuster movies.
Somewhere in all of that I ended up on the set of Shaft, face to face with Samuel L. Jackson, who declared I was an "MFing Cheerleader." The man wasn't wrong.
I'm a loud, proud, insufferable and sometimes obnoxious graduate of THEE Howard University, so I know firsthand how powerful the HBCU experience can be. In 2022 I rounded up a Mafia to make sure our scholars get to have it too.
Bi-weekly, the wins, the answered prayers, the unexpected YESes. I don't just ask you to help make miracles happen. We make sure you get to celebrate them with us.