Welcome to Black Wealth Watch, where we round up the biggest stories in Black business and economic news each week. The wins, the setbacks, the deals getting done, and the conversations we should be having about money, power, and who actually gets a seat at the table.
This week brought an Ivy League school trying to prove it actually wants more low-income students, some major shake-ups in the beauty world, and a new scholarship program aimed at college students who want to do public service work.
Yale Makes Big Promises About Access
Yale announced Tuesday that families making under $100,000 won’t pay anything for their kids to attend, starting with students who enroll this fall. Families making under $200,000 only get free tuition and still have to pay for room and board.
The policy bumps up from the previous cutoff of $75,000, and Yale says this means about half of American families with high school-aged kids would now qualify for a completely free ride. For context, a year at Yale without any aid runs more than $90,000.
Harvard, MIT, and Penn have all made similar moves recently, and the connection to the Supreme Court gutting affirmative action isn’t exactly subtle. Whether any of this actually translates to more Black and brown students on these campuses is another question entirely.
Another Executive Out at MAC
Alicia Keys talked about a woman knowing her worth, and it’s clear Aïda Moudachirou-Rébois knows hers. The top level exec is leaving MAC Cosmetics after running the brand for barely a year as senior vice president and global general manager. She took over the role in early 2024, and now she’s already out the door.
The timing couldn’t be worse for her or for MAC. The brand’s makeup category just reported a $15 million operating loss last quarter, and parent company Estée Lauder has been cycling through executives constantly. They brought in Nicola Formichetti as global creative director, named Lisa Sequino to oversee the entire makeup portfolio, and there’s been ongoing speculation for years about potentially selling off brands like Too Faced and Smashbox.
MAC used to own the makeup game. It was the top-selling brand in the U.S. not that long ago (I still use RiRi Woo religiously if we’re being honest). Now it’s losing money and can’t seem to keep leadership in place. Moudachirou-Rébois had a solid track record at Revlon, L’Oréal, and Johnson & Johnson, but a year’s not enough time to fix whatever’s broken here.
Pat McGrath Labs Files for Bankruptcy
Mama no, say it ain’t so! Pat McGrath Labs, the brand that completely redefined prestige makeup when it launched in 2015, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last week with over $50 million in liabilities.
Chapter 11 doesn’t mean the brand is shutting down. It’s a restructuring process that allows the company to keep operating while it sorts out its debt and figures out a path forward. McGrath’s lawyers said she wants to preserve jobs and work out a viable plan, and the brand even requested a $1 million loan from Pat McGrath herself just to keep things running.
In 2018, this brand was valued at over $1 billion after raising $60 million from investors. Pat McGrath has done makeup for every major runway show, got a damehood from Queen Elizabeth, and when she launched her first product (that Gold 001 kit), it sold out in six minutes. So it’s safe to say, the bankruptcy filing is pretty stunning for myself and all of my homegirls.
So what went wrong? The early investor, Eurazeo, quietly sold its stake a few years back. Another investor marked down the company’s value by a staggering 88%, and sales started slowing down while the brand dealt with executive turnover and layoffs. Then last year, McGrath took on the role of creative director for Louis Vuitton’s new makeup line, which naturally raised questions about where her focus really was.
There was supposed to be an auction to sell off the company’s assets on January 27, but the bankruptcy filing put a stop to that. For now, Pat McGrath Labs products are still available at Sephora and Ulta, and the company says it remains committed to its customers.
Obamas Open Voyager Scholarship Applications
If you’re a college sophomore who’s been thinking about a career in public service, listen up. While the world is currently on fire, our Forever President and First Lady are ensuring that you all can still get to the bag. The Obama Foundation just opened applications for its 2026-2028 Voyager Scholarship, and the benefits are substantial.
Selected students receive up to $25,000 per year in financial aid for their junior and senior years, a $10,000 stipend to design their own work-travel experience during the summer between those years, free Airbnb housing for that summer trip, and then $2,000 in Airbnb travel credits every year for the next 10 years after graduation.
The program selects 100 students who are entering their junior year of college. You need to demonstrate financial need, maintain at least a 3.0 GPA, and show genuine commitment to public service. They define that pretty broadly too, covering everything from government work and nonprofits to teaching, community organizing, journalism, the arts, and social entrepreneurship.
The point is to remove the financial barriers that make public service careers impossible for people who can’t afford to take low-paying jobs right out of college. President Obama and Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky, who put up $100 million to fund this, want to give students the chance to actually explore what public service looks like without drowning in debt.
Applications are due March 17.