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When Candice Ogbu was a peer health advocate at Planned Parenthood, she developed a free city-wide resource list to fulfill needs she saw in the Syracuse area. Two years later, Syracuse University recognized Ogbu for her work in the local community as a recipient of the 2023 Unsung Heroes award.

The awards recognize Ogbu and five other Syracuse community members who made a positive difference in others’ lives but didn’t receive wide recognition for their contributions. SU presents the Unsung Hero awards, which it announced last week, each year at the university’s annual Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. celebration as a way to honor his impact, according to SU’s website.

The six winners for 2023 include Ogbu, an SU senior studying psychology and neuroscience; Thomas Wilson, an SU senior studying broadcast and digital journalism and political science; Nichole Henry, the manager of Student Recruitment at SU; Trinity Brumfield and Camille Ogden, both juniors at West Genesee High School; and Oceanna Fair, a Syracuse native working to address lead poisoning via Families for Lead Freedom Now.

The awards recognize contributions to SU’s campus — like Wilson’s involvement with university media organizations and Henry’s efforts to include non-traditional students in the SU campus environment — as well as community members’ efforts, like Brumfield and Ogden’s work to increase discussion of racial equity in local schools and Fair’s dedication to combat toxic lead levels in local drinking water supplies.

Ogbu said she plans to use her recognition as an Unsung Hero as a means of advancing causes and initiatives she’s already working on.

“I am very grateful to have been nominated, let alone selected to be a recipient,” Ogbu wrote in an email statement. “It is not only a huge honor, but will also have a positive impact on the initiatives I have wanted to get off the ground.”

Ogbu said the new organization she’s working to establish, PP Generation, will focus on student leaders looking to advocate for sexual, reproductive and gender rights. Ogbu has also previously served as the diversity, equity and inclusion chair of SU’s Student Association and as a COVID-19 impact analyst for the city of Syracuse.

This year’s celebration is the first to be held in person since 2020, with both the 2021 and 2022 events being held via Zoom in adherence to social distancing policies during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In addition to recognizing the 2023 winners, this year’s ceremony, which took place Sunday evening in the JMA Wireless Dome, also commemorated the 2021 and 2022 winners who were previously honored only through online celebrations.

Although this year marks the 38th King Jr. celebration, it is only the 29th year that SU had held a celebration for the Unsung Hero awards. The awards started in 1994, nine years after the first Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. celebration in 1985, Associate Director of SU Media Relations Keith Kobland said.

Nominees for the award “embody the spirit of Dr. King” through selfless dedication to their community, according to an SU press release. Marissa Willingham, the manager of the SU Intercultural Collective and an Unsung Hero Award selection team member, said the team prioritizes how candidates show up for their cause and for the community.

“We look for individuals who are passionate about the work that they’re doing and really committed towards advocacy, and making sure they are speaking truth to what that became really stood for,” Willingham said.

The committee accepted nominations for this year’s awards starting in late October and up until mid-December. Willingham said the number of applicants varies each year, but normally falls between 25 to 100 people. From that pool, she said the committee selects between five and eight people as Unsung Heroes.

Arthur Maiorellar | Staff Photographer

Nominees based on their community and demographic fall in one of four categories: a youth or teen from Onondaga, Madison, Oswego, Cayuga or Cortland counties; an adult in Onondaga or its surrounding counties; a student at SU or SUNY ESF; or a faculty member at SU or ESF.

After it receives nominations, Willingham said the committee goes through a “detailed” rubric to determine the extent to which the nominee embodies what King Jr. stood for, as well as investigate whether they’ve been recognized before in any way.

The committee asks nominees to submit items that could reflect some kind of recognition for their achievements, such as a Linkedin profile, portfolio or links to their social media accounts, Willingham said. By doing this, the committee is able to see which nominees have received acknowledgement and which fit the “unsung” characteristic.

Willingham explained that the goal of the Unsung Hero awards is to shine a spotlight on members of the community who haven’t been or aren’t normally commended for their contributions, rather than on those who have already been widely recognized.

“Because they’ve been ‘sung’, that’s not what the ‘Unsung Hero’ is,” Willingham said. “We’re looking for those people who fall through those cracks and doing the work, but are not being recognized.”

Although Ogbu said the Unsung Hero award was meant to honor her own work and role in the campus community, she said she hopes it leaves other people inspired.

“I would hope that people come to associate the Unsung Hero award and its recipients as a representation of the communities and cause they serve,” Ogbu said.

Published on January 22, 2023 at 11:31 pm