Highlights...

Presentation of Hadiya Pendleton photo poster to her mom, Cleopatra Cowley–Pendleton

November 20, 2013

Jemell Moore, an alumnus of the MWAH! Performing Arts Troupe, on November 20, 2013, presented to Cleopatra Cowley on behalf of the troupe a photo poster of Mrs. Cowley's daughter, Hadiya Pendleton.

Hadiya, who was a 15–year–old honor student and majorette at Chicago's King College Prep High School, on January 29, 2013, became the city's 42nd homicide victim in the new year – Chicago's deadliest January in 10 years. An 18–year–old gang member, thinking Hadiya and her friends were members of a rival gang, fatally shot her as she sought shelter from rain under a canopy in a small park less than a mile from President Obama's family home.

The tragic loss of another innocent and gifted Chicago teenager became part of the anti–violence focus by the issues–oriented MWAH! troupe, which also has focused on the mass shooting six weeks earlier at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, where 27 people died, including 20 first grade students.

While attending a MWAH! presentation at Brooks Middle School in Bolingbrook, Illinois, on November 4, 2013, Jemell hastily took a photo of the poster pf Hadiya as it was being displayed and later posted the photo on his personal Facebook page. Within hours, Mrs. Cowley saw the Facebook photo, expressed interest in how it was being used, and contacted Jemell, who then arranged with the troupe to have a duplicate poster made for her.