SENIOR PROFILE: Esther Jones is 'ready to go'

Esther Jones

Another year of hard work and dedication pays off for Claflin University graduating senior Esther Jones.

As the commotion of the long school year starts to settle, music education major, with a concentration in piano, Jones reflects on her accomplishments in her final year at Claflin. One is the success of her 4th annual FLY program this semester.

FLY stands for “Free Yourself, Love Yourself, You Have the Power.” It is a program Esther started on campus her freshman year to create unity and empowerment for people through words and the arts.

“Ever since I was a little girl, I asked God to help me be a beacon of hope,” Jones said. She created FLY after she was elected Claflin University’s Miss Freshman to lift people up instead of letting her title go to waste.

The word FLY came to her instantly, but she could not figure out the meaning of each letter. She thought of the ‘F’ and the ‘L’ but she lost sleep over the ‘Y.’

One night she woke up and thought, “Yell out loud I’m black and I’m proud.”

In her junior year when she ran for Miss Claflin, she changed the ‘Y’ to ‘You Have the Power’ to make her campaign more inclusive.

As a result, this year the turnout for FLY, held on Nov. 14, was more integrated and the audience was more diverse. This was the first year Esther was a speaker at the event and she enjoyed it and would do it again.

Esther invited groups and performers around campus to participate in the event. She had singing, instruments, bands, dancers and spoken word. She plans on taking FLY when she graduates and turning it into a Non-profit Organization within the next couple of years.

Now that FLY is out the way and she has passed her Praxis II and PLT exams for her education certification, she is “ready to go.”

Esther has now completed her senior recital, composed a song for the student-devised play, I didn’t know, and performed as the district attorney in The Trial of One Short-Sighted Black Woman vs. Mammy Louise and Safreeta Mae this year.

After Esther's matriculation from Claflin, she plans to immediately start teaching middle school for right now in the Orangeburg County. She has also been busy recording original gospel and inspirational music.

Look out for Esther Jones in the Orangeburg County. She has already been singing around the community and for friends’ release parties. She plans on dropping her own single, following with an album within the next year.