Rice Owls of Color Unite Named Student-Athlete Group of the Year at the Black Student-Athlete Summit

Rice Owls of Color Unite (ROC-U), a student-athlete affinity group at Rice University, was named the Student-Athlete Group of the Year Award at the 2023 Black Student-Athlete Summit which was held from May 21-24 in Los Angeles, California.

Christelle Bonzil and Sydney Bogan (track & field), Kennedy Clifton and Fatou Samb (women's basketball), Travis Evee (men's basketball) and JoVoni Johnson-McCray (football) represented Rice at the event along with Brian McDevitt, Assistant Athletic Director of SOAR, Director of the R Association and Alexis Garrett, Assistant Director of Student-Athlete Development and Letterwinner Engagement.

Rice Athletics hosted the inaugural BSAS from May 23-25, 2022, which inspired the creation of ROC-U in July of last year. ROC-U was honored for an extensive and varied set of events during the 2022-23 academic year, including:

- HISD College Career Readiness Panel Events
- ROC-U / Team Impact Christmas Toy Drive with Texas Children's Hospital
- NCAA DEI Social Media Campaign
- Black Panther 2 Movie Night
- ROC-U MLK Day Community Service Trip to Hermann Park Centennial Gardens
- Black History Month Social
- ROC-U Study Hall Sessions for all athletes
- ROC-U / Black Student Association Field Day Event

Sahara Maruska (volleyball) and Shelby DesRoches (soccer) served as co-chairs for ROC-U this past year while Bogan, Bonzil, Clifton, Johnson-McCray were members of the Executive Board along with Arayna Mickles, and Savannah Simms (track & field) and Nia McCardell and Lademi Ogunlana (volleyball)

Rice Owls of Color Unite (ROC-U) was created at Rice University to provide a support network for student-athletes that are black, indigenous, or people of color (BIPOC) and to provide cultural enrichment for the general Rice Athletics community. The organization serves Rice Athletics, Rice University, and Houston communities through outreach events and celebrating culturally-specific holidays as well as provides awareness of issues affecting BIPOC student-athletes through educational means, such as speakers, events, and open dialogues.

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