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Honoring difference makers

Four award winners smiling while holding their awards and standing in front of a Quinlan School of Business backdrop

Black Excellence Award honorees (from left) Yvette Mensah, Jasmine Gilstrap, Kemena Brooks (MBA ’22), and Bashir Muhammad.

At the fourth annual Black Excellence Awards Dinner, the Quinlan School of Business honored four outstanding leaders and their contributions to Quinlan and beyond.

See the festivities in the event photo album.

2026 Honorees

Congratulations to the 2026 Black Excellence Award recipients:

Undergraduate Student Leadership Award

Yvette Mensah, a junior accounting and information systems major, is a student leader on many levels. She is vice president of Loyola's chapter of NABA, a student worker in the Baumhart Center, a mentor in the Accounting Department’s Mentor Program, a resident assistant in Francis Hall, and the co-president of the African Students Alliance. She also has interned at top accounting firms Deloitte and KPMG.

Her nominators describe her as the embodiment of purpose-driven leadership: humble, relentless, and committed to fostering an environment that empowers underrepresented voices in business.

"These experiences have taught me that leadership is not about titles—it’s about service, creating opportunities, and uplifting others," Mensah said.

Graduate Student Leadership Award

Jasmine Gilstrap, a student in the Baumhart Scholars MBA program, started her degree and her work as a Baumhart Center student associate in fall 2025. Her nominators share that she immediately added value to the Baumhart team and its community of students and professionals.

Gilstrap also served as the co-founder and executive director of Lion’s Pride Mentoring, a program that uses a peer-to-peer model to foster empowerment in high school students.

"I've spent my entire career caring for others, supporting them, uplifting them, empowering them. And I loved every moment of it. But I reached a point where I needed that same care, that same support I'd been pouring out for years. I needed someone to pour into me," Gilstrap said. "That's what this time at Quinlan is giving me: permission to invest in myself. To learn not just how to serve better, but how to sustain myself while I do it."

Distinguished Alumni Leadership Award

Kemena Brooks (MBA ’22) is a Baumhart Scholars MBA graduate and real estate developer with more than a decade of experience leading community and mixed-income housing developments throughout the Southeast and Midwest. She currently serves as the chief of staff at the Chicago Housing Authority. Previously, she served as the vice president of real estate development for The Community Builders and in several roles for Laurel Street. Her nominators describe her as deeply passionate about making an impact in Chicago's neighborhoods so that more families can have access to better living experiences.

In addition to her work, Brooks was selected for the Leadership Greater Chicago's Signature Fellows Class of 2025 and is the board chair of the Chicago Loop Alliance.

"May we leave here reminded that our presence matters, our ideas matter, and our responsibility to act has never been greater," Brooks said.

Community Leadership Award

Bashir Muhammad is an information technology leader who has been committed to serving and improving his community on Chicago's Westside for nearly three decades. His nominators share that his work and legacy speak for themselves and are emblematic of the Jesuit values of community, equity, and service at the core of Loyola's identity.

Muhammad is a co-founder and managing director at Net-Telligence Group (NTG), which was Chicago's first Black-owned managed service provider at its founding nearly 25 years ago. His nominators share that NTG was born out of a desire to bridge a digital divide caused by inequitable access to technology.

He is also board chair for Westside Health Authority, a human services organization that promotes wellness and development for Chicago’s Westside neighborhoods. As chair, he oversaw the recent launch of the Aspire Center for Workforce Innovation, a $44 million center in the Austin community that provides much-needed resources for workforce development and economic mobility.

"Whether we call them family, friends, colleagues, customers, employees, or partners, business is fundamentally human," said Muhammad. "As we move deeper into the digital age and into an era shaped by artificial intelligence, I encourage all of us to remember that technology should strengthen our connections, not replace them."

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