Hadiya Pendleton’s family has continued to keep her legacy alive. The Chicago teen is the subject of Team Roc’s latest PSA about putting an end to gun violence.
The video titled “Hadiya’s Promise” is narrated by her mother Cleopatra Cowley-Pendleton, who shared her daughter’s hopes and dreams as well as her own efforts at social justice in her young years. The 15-year-old honor student was killed while hanging in the park with friends by convicted gunman Micheail Ward in January 2013 who mistook the group of teens for a rival gang. Just a week prior, the drum majorette performed at then-President Barack Obama’s second inauguration.
Seven years after her death, the teen’s story was shared through Team Roc, the philanthropic sector of Jay Z’s Roc Nation. The PSA is the second video released under his social justice partnership with the NFL announced last year. The first PSA aired during the Super Bowl and included the family of Bothan Jean, an unarmed black man who was killed by an off-duty police officer.
In Hadiya’s PSA, her mother discusses the Orange Tee initiative and the Hadiya’s Promise which looks to combat gun violence in Chicago and beyond.
“It wasn’t just a bullet that murdered Hadiya,” Cowley-Pendleton, says. “It was a bullet that murdered Hadiya, her mom, her dad, her brothers, her friends. We lost all her children, her children’s children. We lost generations.”
“If we gave the young people something to do, if we provide them with love and care, it would lift the awareness to the young that their voices matter, their lives matter,” she adds.
Cowley-Pendleton has continued to speak up against gun violence and appeared with the Mothers of the Movement which include the mothers of unarmed black men who were killed at the hands of police.
Learn more about Hadiya’sPromise here.