Sheryl Lee Ralph fulfils pledge to mother

Legendary Jamaican actress, singer, producer, and activist Sheryl Lee Ralph will assist over 40 students from the Chantilly Infant School to go back to school as a commitment to her late mother.

Ralph’s mother, Ivy ‘Miss Ivy’ Ralph OD, had one dying wish that she expressed to her daughter before her passing in October 2018. Her wish was for her daughter to never forget Jamaica, especially Chantilly, Manchester, the district where she (Miss Ivy) was born and raised. “Education and caring for people changed her life and our family,” Ralph said. Her mother’s passion for education, along with her father Dr Stanley Ralph’s experience as a lifelong educator, inspired the Miss Ivy’s Backpacks for Back-to-School initiative, which seeks to ensure that every child has the basics for going back to school. The initiative also aims to encourage parents to prepare their children for an educated future.

On Sunday, the DIVA Foundation headed by Ralph, will head to Chantilly to attend the St Stephen’s Anglican Church with women of the Jamaica chapter of the foundation and parents and children from the district. The parents and children who attend the church service will have access to backpacks filled with school supplies. Ralph explained that while the initiative focuses mainly on providing backpacks, some students will receive lunch bags, uniforms, and assistance with school fees.

The DIVA, Divinely Inspired Victoriously Aware – Foundation is a not-for-profit charitable organisation founded in 1990 as a memorial to the many friends she lost to HIV/AIDS as an original company member of Dreamgirls on Broadway. The foundation uses the transformational power of the arts as a vehicle to raise funds and awareness and to erase the stigma still connected to HIV/AIDS and other life-threatening diseases.