Please sign if you feel I (Alanah) should have tuition waived at MICA for my one year Master in Social Design program.

To my Arts and Social Change Community:
Thank you for your donations, for your impending signatures and encouragement to keep moving, shining, and working on our behalf. This is for us. 

To the Maryland Institute College of Art:
I Alanah Nichole Davis on this eve of July 5th, 2020 just one day the morrow of July 4th, 2020 marking our 244th commemoration of the Declaration of Independence write this in a spirit of peace knowing this institution (MICA) recognizes the peril of this country, Black people, and their continued plight, loss and degradation. I write this knowing this institution has labored for the betterment of inclusion and I write this knowing I've applied and have been accepted to an always evolving institution that sees independence for its students, faculty, and extended community in Maryland. I plan to attend whether my petition is regarded or not.

I come to you most encouraged by the arts and social change community of Baltimore City, MICA Alum and current students included. I come with their trust and yours as I've recently been admitted to MICA's Social Design Graduate Program. I am honored to have been admitted on the merit of my work in Baltimore City and it's many sectors evoking change and using my voice and platform to bolster messages related to equity, race, womanhood, and art as a catalyst for change. I am emblazoned with the courage of my African and by slave trade the Caribbean and now American ancestors to ask for a necessary and well-deserved full discount on my estimated $24,860 tuition. To that, your question must be on what ground? To which first I'll honor the Piscataway land I type on and then elaborate on how I've occupied this land with kindness, fearlessness, and humanity in even recent weeks. In fearlessness, I've begun to raise money for my own tuition just after raising over $5,000 for my arts community due to the vast cancellations and postponements due to COVID-19. I raised and dispersed that full amount excluding myself to lift up others. This is my similar ask to you. In kindness can Maryland Institue College of Art go without $24,860 dollars? Can a single Black, mother, artist, and student go without $24,860? Can MICA and its decision-makers see that fear of crippling student loan debt should not be in the way of any person seeking educational advancement? I cannot call myself a changemaker if I do not ask for this discount. I cannot stand by and watch my community rally to put me through school and not ask that this longstanding institution pardon my tuition costs first. 

In the tradition of humanity at Maryland Institute College of Art can we start a fund every year in my name to help someone from a similar background go to MICA for a one-year graduate program using their experience and waiving their tuition costs? Let me be the first if there haven't been others, Let me change the narrative. Allow me the financial independence to truly make a change in my community. Please. With bravery, gratitude, hopefulness, and love.

Your Future Alumna,
Alanah Nichole Davis.