The Ivory Club of Tampa is an organization of African Professionals living and working in the Tampa Bay area. The organization was founded in 1993 and is made up of Africans who lived their early lives in several different African countries before moving to the U.S.A.
In 2006, the Ivory Club applied and was approved as a not-for-profit organization – under section 501(c) (3). This designation helps promote one of the objectives of the Club, which is the support of humanitarian causes arising from crisis situations in Africa. Along these lines, the Club has made donations to a Liberian Orphanage in 2004 and more recently to “Medecins Sans Frontières” – Doctors Without Borders – to help with the Ebola epidemic in 2014 to mention just two examples.
Over the years the signature annual event of the Club has been its Annual Lecture Series. The first in the series was held at the University of South Florida Event Center in 1995 and the speaker was Professor Roland Abiodun, a world renowned Professor of Art and prior curator at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC. Over the years, the Club has been able to attract other outstanding academics or activists covering a variety of topics.
The objectives of the organization cover educational, social and cultural activities designed to promote friendship among its members, well wishers of Africans, and Africans in the Diaspora. In summary, the Club seeks to:
- Educate its members and the Tampa Bay community on current and past political, social, economic and cultural issues that affect Africa.
- Support humanitarian causes arising from crisis situations on the African continent.
- Support and promote the Arts and culture of Africa and the Diaspora.
- Provide a forum for socializing and networking among its members and the larger African community in Tampa Bay and in the Diaspora.