Los Angeles, CA -- (SBWire) -- 08/08/2016 --Black Skeptics Los Angeles (BSLA), an African American atheist community-based organization, has partnered with the Freedom from Religion Foundation (FFRF) for its 2016 scholarship fund for youth non-believers of color. For the second year in a row, FFRF has granted the organization $10,000 for four awards to outstanding secular students of color from its Catherine Fahringer Memorial Scholarship fund. This year's winners are Jorge Banuelos (Carleton College), Kola Heyward-Rotimi (Amherst College), Sabria Harper (UC Berkeley) and Makeda Scott (University of Iowa).

In 2013, BSLA spearheaded its First in the Family Humanist Scholarship initiative which focuses on undocumented, foster care, homeless and LGBTQ youth who will be the first in their families to go to college. The organization was created to provide resources for non-believers of color and combat stereotypes about atheists not being socially responsible. Responding directly to the school-to-prison pipeline crisis in communities of color, BSLA is the first atheist organization to specifically address college pipelining for youth of color. If current prison pipelining trends persist the Education Trust estimates that only "one of every 20 African American kindergartners will graduate from a four-year California university" in the next decade.

The Freedom from Religion Foundation is a nonprofit organization that "works as an umbrella for those who are free from religion and are committed to the cherished principle of separation of state and church." The FFRF sponsors publications and competitions and conducts outreach and education on secularism worldwide.

Website: www.blackskepticsla.org

About Black Skeptics Los Angeles
Black Skeptics Los Angeles is a 501c3 community-based organization that provides resources and education for non-believers, humanists and secularists of color

Contact: Sikivu Hutchinson,
shutch2396@aol.com
213-703-8787
Los Angeles, CA 90043