By Abigail Cox
Second Year Journalism and Communications student and intern with Holland College Marketing and Communications

It’s another Saturday evening in February and Bianca Ureña and Elisha Baptiste are busy preparing to release their latest episode of T is for Té. 

Bianca co-founded The Black Collective Media which launched its magazine The Block in February 2021. With the help of Elisha, she’s branching out with new media by co-hosting the web series T is for Té.  

Té stands for Tea in Spanish, so the name mirrors the phrase “spilling the tea” which means to tell the truth about someone or something.

The web series discusses Black History month and is a platform for Black Islanders and Black creators to express themselves in a fun and casual way.

Bianca has always been very passionate about podcasts and radio. 

“I always loved the idea of casually talking with your friends about topics on a podcast or on the radio, so I thought doing a web series would be a great opportunity for us to do something fun for Black History month,” she said. 

Elisha Baptiste, producer of the web series, is a second-year Marketing and Advertising Management student. 

She was introduced to Bianca through connections she made in the program.  

“Our instructors are always helping us network and make connections. That was how I got introduced to Bianca and everything started to grow and snowball from there,” said Elisha.  

The duo received a grant last fall to help them finance the series, so they started preparing throughout December and began filming it in January.  

“The web series discusses Black History month and how great we feel to be Black. We have a few different topics surrounding Black Folk on the Island.” 

Bianca graduated from the Marketing and Advertising Management program in 2019. 

“The program taught me how to be more vocal and not be afraid to speak up. It also taught me how to be able to promote and manage something like our web series,” she said. 

The team is hoping to keep the series going after this month. 

“We would really like to keep doing T is for Té if we have the money and time to continue it. It all just depends on what happens in the next few months,” said Bianca.  

The series has been launching new episodes every Saturday throughout February at 6 p.m. AT on Instagram. 

Check out their previous and upcoming episodes @theblackcollectivemedia on Instagram.

 

 

 

 

 

View this post on Instagram

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A post shared by The Black Collective Media (@theblackcollectivemedia)