Related
•
CoSIDA Goodwill & Wellness Committee
•
Communicators Outside the Lines Feature Series
This is the next profile in a series entitled
Communicators Outside the Lines: Better Yourself, Better Your Community produced by the CoSIDA Goodwill & Wellness Committee. Read past profiles at
CoSIDA.com/CommunicatorsOTL.
WE NEED YOUR IDEAS!
If you have any ideas for this series, which will revolve around CoSIDA member volunteerism and health and wellness, please contact Goodwill and Wellness Committee chair
Chris Mitchell, Washington University in St. Louis Assistant AD for Communications, at (618) 560-9280 or
mitchell@wustl.edu.
Q&A with Kenisha Rhone
Belmont, Director of Digital Media & Social Strategy
by Denise Thompson – Big Sky Conference, Assistant Commissioner/Communications and External Affairs
CoSIDA Board Member & Goodwill and Wellness Committee liaison
Kenisha Rhone is entering her 15th year at Belmont University, and second as Director of Digital Media & Social Strategy.
In that capacity, Rhone serves as the primary media contacts and sports information director for volleyball, softball, and women's tennis. She also oversees the athletic department's social media and digital endeavors.
Rhone is a member of the CoSIDA, where she has been a member of the national programming committee for four years, Black College and Black Sports Information Directors of America (BC-SIDA), where she now serves as the chair, Women Sports Information Directors of America (WoSIDA), the National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) and NABJ-Nashville, where she now serves as vice president.
Heavily involved in community service throughout the Nashville community, she is a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc., serves on the race committee for the Greater Nashville Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure, volunteers frequently to speak to various youth groups including the Girls Scouts of Greater Nashville and at local high schools, and serves as a mentor to young people through a variety of agencies. Rhone is a member of the Young Leaders Council, Class 68. Most recently, she was named the 2018 National Volunteer of the Year by Play Like a Girl, a national non-profit organization focused on impacting girls ages 9-15 through STEM and sport.
Kenisha was named the 2018 National Volunteer of the Year by Play Like a Girl, a national non-profit organization focused on impacting girls ages 9-15 through STEM and sport.
Q. What exactly is “Play Like a Girl” and how did you become involved?
Rhone: PLAG is a national non-profit, based here in Nashville, that focuses on ensuring that every girl reaches her full potential by providing girls ages 9-13 an opportunity to participate in sport and physical activity. We marry sports with STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) to help propel young women into competitive, male-dominated careers and beyond.
I was selected for The Young Leaders Council, a program that focuses on broadening and strengthen Nashville’s volunteer leadership base by training each cohort to serve on non-profit boards. I went on to select Play Like a Girl for my board internship experience and was quickly elevated to a full member.
Q. What were some of the initiatives that you helped come to fruition?
Rhone: A large part of my internship required me to take ownership of a project as a member of the board. The charge opened the door for me to host the organization’s annual Play Like a Girl Summit here at Belmont University, which I could not have done without the support our of director of athletics Scott Corley, Renee Schultz, our Associate Athletics Director for Student Services/SWA and our women’s basketball head coach Bart Brooks. Over the two days, we welcomed Olympian and Hall of Famer Chamique Holdsclaw, A.J. Andrews, the first woman to win the Rawlings Gold Glove and a host of other women in sport in Nashville to encourage these young girls to stay involved.
Ironically, I also helped with the planning of the Honors Gala – even going so far as to nominate the other candidates to be honored. Never in a million years would I have expected the Founder and CEO Dr. Kimberly Clay to turn to me and say ‘oh, by the way, you’re our volunteer of the year’ in the middle of a planning meeting for the event.
Q. This past November, you were an honoree at the “Play Like a Girl “Honors Gala. How did that feel?
Rhone: Overwhelming. Still. Even looking back at the photos or the award on my fireplace mantle, it is still surreal. I didn’t serve PLAG to get an award. I wanted to do what I was charged with in the spirit of excellence and make a lasting impact on those girls attending any PLAG event I was involved with.
Q. The 2018 Play Like a Girl Summit was held at Belmont University. Hundreds of girls were afforded the opportunity to engage in personalized programming, health and wellness initiatives, and female empowerment and advancement. How did this impact you to as a female in the sports world?
Rhone: I remember what it was like to hear that doing anything “like a girl” as a pejorative and not being able to play because of my disability. I also know and appreciate the power of a life-changing moment. For these young girls, to hear someone they admire and aspire to be like an AJ or a Chamique, say they struggled just like them but to see where they are now is one of those powerful moments. Even being in that high-five line as the women’s basketball team came onto the floor during warmups and then reconnecting in the postgame autograph session with a hug was impactful. Who knows how those moments will manifest later in those young women’s lives.
Q. You also spend time giving back to the Greater Nashville Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure, Young Leaders Council and NABJ. How have these had an impact on your life?
Rhone: I had a serious health scare 11 years ago and wanted to channel all that energy into something. I reached out to our local Susan G. Komen office and they immediately plugged me in on the Race Day Steering Committee. Back then, I also started pushing our women’s basketball team to host a THINK PINK game which in turn grew to the team volunteering on Race Day for many years. We even had one year where nearly every athletics team had a representative volunteering at the Race. This year, our women’s team raised nearly $2000 for the Kay Yow Fund but it all started with me buying pink shoelaces and headbands out of my own pocket because I believed in the mission of SGK.
My mother is a former journalist, so I’ve been around NABJ forever it seems. Serving as vice president of our local chapter is an honor and I am grateful to have yet another avenue to advocate for people.
Q. You were recently named the CoSIDA Kenworthy Community Service Award honoree to be received in June at the convention. What was your reaction when hearing that?
Rhone: Speechless. You never know who is watching you.
For me, the Kenworthy Award is even more special because I know that it is coming from my CoSIDA friends (who are more like family).
Q. Why should people take time out of their schedule to volunteer?
Rhone: Volunteering allows us to give the best parts of ourselves to others freely. In an industry where we can sometimes feel invisible with no by-lines, sometimes little to no credit and the sheer magnitude of our workloads, giving to others can help alleviate that.
It may be the 50
th time you’ve stopped with a team to eat a Golden Corral but serving that ONE plate to someone who may be having their only meal of the day can really put things in perspective. Your phone may be blowing up with media requests but manning a suicide prevention or domestic abuse hotline can help you see how much one call could really mean. You may miss your own family because you are out on the road traveling to cover a team but serving as the advocate for a child who is an abandoned ward of the state can help you hug your own kids/nieces/nephews/godchildren/grandchildren that much tighter. You could be beating yourself up over that press release for the next two hours or you could be spending that same time helping someone learn to read and write English.
We have so many choices, so many liberties that we take for granted but we are often reminded that to whom much is given, much is required. Time is the one resource we cannot get back. We aren’t ‘taking time out to volunteer.’ We are learning how to put time IN for those who need our help. I’m not saying it’s always easy but it’s always worth it.
Click here to learn more about CoSIDA's Goodwill and Wellness initiatives and find out how YOU can get involved.