February’s Bless the Mic at Philander Smith College features poet and spoken word artist Mayda del Valle. The program starts at 7pm.  Free and open to the public, it will take place in the M.L. Harris Auditorium. Tickets are not required; seating is first-come, first-serve. For more information, call 370-5354.

Chosen by O Magazine as one of 20 women on the first “O Power List,” the Chicago native is the youngest poet and first Latino to win the 2001 National Poetry Slam Individual Championship. Soon after she was chosen to perform on the first season of the HBO’s Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry, followed by a stint as an original cast member and contributing writer of the critically acclaimed Tony award winning production of Russell Simmons Def Poetry Jam on Broadway.

Del Valle, who has been featured in numerous publications including Urban Latino, Latina magazine and the New York Times, holds a B.A. in Art from Williams College.

Bless The Mic is a contemporary spin on the traditional President’s Lecture Series. These events, held on hundreds of campuses across the country, have been a way to stimulate the intellectual discourse on the campus. Even today, these series seek to bring in noted scholars, authors, politicians and public intellectuals to expose not only the campus community to their ideas and concepts, but the broader community in which the institution resides.