How Xceleader’s Vote HBCU program sent off the HBCU Class of 2030 — and turned a college send-off into a civic movement
When a Chicago student packs their trunk for an HBCU down South, they aren’t just moving to a new campus. They’re crossing into a place where the laws, the local issues, and the culture can look nothing like home. This summer, Xceleader decided that the journey deserved a send-off with real substance behind it — and Chicago answered.
On July 31, 2026, from 4 to 7 p.m. at Kenwood Academy High School, the Chicago HBCU Trunk Party brought together more than 120 incoming HBCU students representing over 30 different HBCUs for a night that celebrated where they’re going and grounded them in where they’re from. Co-hosted by Xceleader’s Vote HBCU program and Onyx Impact, it was the first event Xceleader has ever hosted in Chicago, and the inaugural year for the Trunk Party itself.
The “why” behind the trunk
The Trunk Party didn’t start as a party. It started as a response.
After the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its April 29 decision in Louisiana v. Callais — a ruling that gutted a core protection of the Voting Rights Act and reshaped the political map across the South — Xceleader’s Vote HBCU program saw a gap. In the scramble that followed, young people were being seen but rarely heard: wanted for the photo, left out of the strategy sessions.
So Vote HBCU launched Build The Bloc, a campaign built on a simple idea: HBCU students shouldn’t just be a photo op in a civic moment — they should be building community with one another and deciding, for themselves, how they want to lead.
That’s where the trunk comes in. Chicago students heading to HBCUs overwhelmingly travel South, into states where the laws change, the local issues change, and a new environment brings new opportunities for young people to lead. As Xceleader celebrated the incoming HBCU Class of 2030, the night did double duty: celebrate these students, and educate them on what it means to be from Chicago and headed to the South for college.
Chicago was one of four July activations Xceleader ran across the country under the Build The Bloc banner:
- New Orleans, LA — ESSENCE Festival Activation
- Washington, D.C. — HBCU DMV Social Hour
- Atlanta, GA — HBCU on the Beltline
- Chicago, IL — Chicago HBCU Trunk Party
Who’s behind it
This wasn’t a one-off from a first-timer. Xceleader is a community of HBCU alumni building leadership pathways for students across civic engagement, women’s equity, and entrepreneurship. Its Vote HBCU program — a nationally recognized, non-partisan civic engagement effort — has worked with students across 32 HBCU campuses since 2020 and registered more than 4,000 students to vote through its ‘Say It Louder’ Tour. In 2025 it launched The Union, a national, student-led leadership council of Fellows and Campus Ambassadors. The program’s work has been featured in ESSENCE, The Washington Post, Inside Higher Ed, and on MSNBC.
The Trunk Party was Vote HBCU planting that flag in Chicago — and it carried the program’s core belief with it: to be an HBCU student is to be a civically engaged one. Beyond the dorm essentials, the night was designed to welcome the Class of 2030 into long-term community, teach them what civic engagement looks like, and encourage them to register to vote where they’ll be living and learning.
A send-off the whole community showed up for
Demand said everything. Xceleader capped RSVPs at 200 — students, parents, and alumni included — and more than 300 students expressed interest in coming. In the end, over 120 incoming students filled Kenwood Academy to claim their spot in the Class of 2030.
Leading the energy were the event’s student chairs — Mya Booth of Xavier University of Louisiana and Sonse’rae Fuery of Dillard University — current HBCU students who kept the room excited from start to finish and helped recruit, promote, and connect the local HBCU community. Their dedication set the tone for the whole night.
And the trunks were the whole point. Students walked away with the essentials to actually start their college journey — trunks and bags packed with dorm necessities, school supplies, Vote HBCU bags, and giveaway items — alongside alumni advice and scholarship opportunities, all surrounded by the food, music, and decor that turned a logistics night into a celebration.
None of it happened alone. Powered by co-host Onyx Impact and over $3,500 raised from alumni, students, and friends of HBCUs all across the country, the event turned community generosity into gear students could carry to campus. Alumni went further, volunteering their time and donating school supplies, gift cards, and full giveaway baskets.
A roster of partners made the giving tangible, including Southwest Airlines, Struggle Beard Bakery, and Lime, alongside a number of individual donors from the HBCU community who added to the giveaway haul. Xceleader co-founder & Director, Communications & Strategic Partnerships, Tevon Blair, had the great support of his mother, who also raised an additional $1,000 for two scholarship recipients, with awards to be presented in September.
Alumni giving back — beyond the check
At its core, that’s what Xceleader is about. “Everything Xceleader does is an opportunity for HBCU alumni to give back to support current and future HBCU students,” said Tevon Blair, who organized the Chicago Trunk Party. Community service was woven through their own college experiences, and the mission now is helping alumni recognize the many ways to give back — not just financially.
The Trunk Party proved the appetite is there. “This year showed me that an event like this is needed for our students,” Blair reflected. HBCU students and alumni are already in Chicago in real numbers. What they’ve been missing is a community-based event that lets alumni pour into the next generation, and lets students understand, early, what community actually looks like. As the Vote HBCU team put it in their recap: community is here — the students just need to know where to find it.
What’s next
The vision for next year is bigger and earlier: more community partners, more alumni engaged from the start, more students able to attend, and more funding for scholarships and giveaways. The first year was a proof of concept. The blueprint is set.
For a Class of 2030 now heading to more than 30 campuses across the South, the message they carry with them is the one Build The Bloc was built to send: you were seen, you were heard, and the bloc has your back.
The Chicago HBCU Trunk Party was hosted by Xceleader’s Vote HBCU program and Onyx Impact at Kenwood Academy High School on July 31, 2026. To learn more or get involved as a partner or alumni donor, email info@xceleader.com and follow @xceleader.
Photography: pejamane
