Movement of Youth Featured in The Durham News

DEMANDING EXCELLENCE

Durham program teaches students not to settle

BY VIRGINIA BRIDGES, Correspondent

Movement of Youth Inc. helps worlds collide.

Last weekend Durham high school students collided with UNC college life.

This weekend, wanna-be hip-hop artists and fans will collide with local masters at the Hayti Heritage Center.

Welcome to Atrayus Goode's vision. Goode is the executive director of the Durham nonprofit Movement of Youth, which gives promising high schools students college mentors and immerses them in activities to help them not just succeed in life, but excel.

"We are all about excellence," Goode, 24, said.

"It burns me up because somewhere along the line people started thinking mediocrity was OK," he said. "We want students to understand that if you want to excel you have to be excellent. It's being demanded every single day."

Goode, who also manages the Minority Executive Education Institute at the N.C. Institute of Minority Economic Development, founded Movement of Youth in 2006 when he was a junior at UNC. It's based on a program he had growing up in the Charlotte area.

The fourth annual Hip Hop Symposium's roster includes artists from the Triangle area, including Kooley High, The Beast, 88.1 FM WKNC radio personality DJ D-Cutta, and Apple Juice Kid, a producer and percussionist who has collaborated with Mos Def, Wale, Camp Lo, and 9th Wonder.

Morning sessions will include "an inside the studio recording session" and a discussion on hip-hop culture. Lunch will feature a panel discussion with the artists, followed by performances.

Symposium organizer Pierce Freelon, front man for the Durham hip-hop quartet The Beast, hopes students learn, network and take their own talents to another level.

"I hope they walk away feeling empowered and uplifted, inspired to go do some of the things that the people we are introducing them to are doing," he said.

Read more: Demanding Excellence