Month: May 2026

CHARLOTTE, N.C., May 7, 2026 /3BL/ – The Truist Championship, in partnership with the Charlotte Trail of History, unveiled a commemorative statue honoring Dr. Charles Sifford at Elizabeth Park, celebrating the trailblazing golfer’s enduring legacy and ties to the Charlotte community.

The ceremony marked the launch of Truist Championship Tuesday, a new initiative designed to extend the championship’s impact beyond tournament week and invest meaningfully in the community year-round. Tuesday’s unveiling brought together tournament representatives, civic leaders and members of the Sifford family to reflect on Dr. Sifford’s historic role in breaking color barriers in professional golf and his lasting influence in Charlotte and beyond.

“The Truist Championship is proud to have partnered with the Trail of History to spotlight Dr. Sifford’s story that is defined by his excellence, courage and lasting impact in professional golf,” said Adam Sperling, executive director of the Truist Championship. “Launching Truist Championship Tuesday with this commemorative statue is a powerful way to honor Dr. Sifford’s legacy in his hometown while reaffirming our commitment to creating meaningful moments in Charlotte that extend far beyond tournament week.”

The statue was created by acclaimed sculptor Emmanuel Gillespie, who worked closely with the partners and the Sifford family to ensure the piece authentically reflects Sifford’s presence and significance.

“The Trail of History is delighted to welcome the addition of Dr. Charles Sifford as our 12th project,” said Scott Syfert, chair of the Charlotte Trail of History. “Since 2010, the TOH has sought to recognize outstanding individuals who made important contributions to Mecklenburg County across its 250-year history. We are very grateful to not only Emmanuel for his artwork but also to Truist, the Truist Championship and the PGA TOUR for their leadership as we commemorate Dr. Sifford’s sporting legacy.”

Dr. Charles “Charlie” Sifford (1922–2015) was a pioneering professional golfer whose courage and perseverance helped break the color barrier in the sport. Born in Charlotte, North Carolina, Sifford began caddying on segregated golf courses at age 13 and turned professional in 1948, competing primarily in tournaments organized by Black golfers while barred from the PGA. He won the United Golf Association’s National Negro Open six times before making history in 1961 as the first African American to join the PGA Tour. Over his career, Sifford competed in more than 400 PGA events, won the 1975 PGA Seniors’ Championship, and earned induction into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 2004. In recognition of his lasting impact on golf and civil rights, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2014.

“The Sifford family would like to thank Mecklenburg County, the Charlotte Trail of History, Truist Championship, Truist and all the other sponsors that made this moment possible,” said Charlie Sifford Jr. “I believe never in his wildest thoughts that a day like this would happen in his hometown of Charlotte. You are not just honoring my Father’s legacy, you are continuing it. Thank you so very much.”

As title sponsor of the Truist Championship, Truist emphasized the alignment between the tournament’s community commitment and the values embodied by Sifford.

“On this inaugural Truist Championship Tuesday, we’re honored to dedicate this moment to Dr. Charlie Sifford and the values he embodied that resonate so deeply with our purpose at Truist,” said Dontá Wilson, Truist chief consumer and small business banking officer. “Dr. Sifford didn’t just change the game of golf. He changed who got a chance to play it, and his legacy inspires us all to make sure more people get that chance on the course, in their communities, and in life.”

The Truist Championship returns to Quail Hollow Club May 6-10, 2026. For more information or to purchase tickets, visit TruistChampionship.com.

Verizon

By Stacy Morrison

At a glance

• Professional development: Teachers are utilizing research-backed strategies and free online courses from Verizon Innovative Learning HQ to increase student engagement.
• Shift in pedagogy: The program moves away from passive lecturing toward a collaborative culture where students direct their own learning and creative projects.
• Digital citizenship: Educators are balancing high-tech tools with analog skills to help students develop intentionality and curiosity in a digital-first environment.

When Dove Science Academy High School in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, joined Verizon Innovative Learning Schools in fall 2025, its teachers embraced not just the infusion of technology, but also the novel ways they could inspire their students. “Being part of the Verizon Innovative Learning Schools program has completely elevated the way we teach and the way our students learn,” says M. Atay, Principal of Dove Science Academy High School. “Our students are no longer just receiving information, they are creating, collaborating and solving real-world problems.”

As part of their Verizon Innovative Learning Schools professional development, each Dove educator learned research-backed strategies and explored tools to help them get more out of a technology-supported classroom. The training features teaching approaches that support student choice and collaboration, reach all learners and increase student engagement with the material. Professional development opportunities—and courses such as Creating a Collaborative Classroom Culture, Leveraging Flexible Learning Formats and Design Better Learning Experiences with Learner Variability—are available freely for all educators online through Verizon Innovative Learning HQ.

“I’m really encouraged to see how much autonomy we’re providing the students,” says Verizon Innovative Learning Schools Coach Casey Lawrence. Instead of a “chalk and talk” teaching style, where students passively listen as the teacher lectures, Lawrence sees students collaborating and directing their own learning. “Now they are talking with each other and working with each other and that sets them up for success in the real world,” she says.

Here, four Dove Science Academy High School educators share how their fresh teaching approaches are making an impact.

“Students have new ways to share.”

Although she has taught English language arts for decades, Amber Harrison still embraces every chance to expand her skills. “Even with 20 years in education, I have the mindset that there’s always going to be something new I can learn,” she says.

As part of the Verizon Innovative Learning Schools professional development, Harrison was introduced to imaginative ways to engage students and connect them with the material. “It’s nice to have this fresh, new information,” Harrison says of the Verizon resources. “I liked getting to hear about tested and proven strategies that are actually working.”

Harrison learned a new prompt to use for exit tickets—short exercises that check for student understanding—that she applied after a poetry lesson. The responses revealed a shift in how her students viewed poetry. One student wrote: “When it comes to poetry, I used to think about boring words. But now I think that it is such a better way for people to express themselves.”

“Out of a class of 20 students, 16 of them are feeling more inspired to read and write poetry as a way to express feelings and connect with other humans,” Harrison says. “That is a win.”

She took the lesson further: She had students write their own poems, with some choosing to share their work on a hallway bulletin board. Harrison also anonymously shared poetry written by some of the quieter students in the digital classroom, an online space where the students and Harrison collaborate on assignments. “Those students got the shout out that what they’re doing is working,” Harrison says. “And now they are even speaking up in class more. They are feeling confident enough to share themselves out loud.”

“I see that the students are much more curious now.”

Daisy Colindres readily admits that before this year—her twenty-fourth as a teacher—she used a computer only to take attendance. “I was not using technology much,” she says. “But now, after learning all of the advantages [for the students] and how important technology is to their future, I realized I had to be updated.”

Once she started integrating technology in the classroom, she saw an immediate shift in how students communicated with her and with each other. One of her first tablet-based assignments asked students to research a Spanish-speaking country and make a presentation based on their findings. “They were very engaged, just in looking up this information,” she says. “They were excited and finding new ways to look for what they needed.”

As they worked, students began asking more questions than usual—even messaging her in the evenings through the digital classroom when ideas came to them. “I feel like the tools have helped extend their world a little bit more,” says Colindres. “And I’m more involved with them because they are bringing me their ideas and asking questions. I can see they are much more curious now.”

“It’s my goal to help them find the balance.”

Adam Jester is no stranger to using technology in the classroom: He came to Dove Science Academy High School in fall 2025 from a district where 98 percent of learning was virtual. But through the Verizon Innovative Learning Schools professional development, Jester has learned strategies to help students stay engaged and practice strong digital citizenship, while balancing technology with traditional learning skills.

Students have access to devices during class time, so Jester uses a tool he learned about in professional development to monitor and moderate which websites they can visit when doing research. At the same time, he wants to ensure students keep critical thinking at the center of their learning. He regularly switches between tech-based activities and analog approaches.

“It definitely helps to have a monitoring tool,” he says. “You can set it up on a schedule, so that it opens automatically at class time, or you can set it up to exclude certain websites or only allow certain websites.”

Jester’s priority is teaching students intentionality: choosing the right tool for the task and staying engaged in the learning process. The training reinforced strategies for building focus and supporting independent work, whether students are using devices or taking notes by hand. “It’s my goal to help them find the balance,” he says.
 

“I try to connect the topic closer to them.”

As a math teacher, Tam Hua knows that the conceptual nature of math can create an obstacle to learning for some students. During professional development, she picked up a simple, easy-to-apply tip that helps students stay engaged: “We were taught to make the topic, whatever it is, more related to the students,” Hua says. “We need to make the connection. Otherwise they will not be interested.”

Her real life example? Instead of using world population as a data set for a math problem, which can feel remote to the students, “I now will bring in sports data collected from a sporting event,” she says. “So that is helping a lot.”

Hua was already using digital tools to help her students master complex graphing problems. But she sees that the presence of additional tech in the classroom, such as the interactive worksheets she now creates, makes learning “very accessible for the student,” she says.

“I have learned a lot from [professional development], such as how to make fun activities where I can engage the students in class and not just be lecturing every day,” she says. “It takes time to create those exercises, but it’s worth it.”

 

^{Verizon Innovative Learning is a key part of the company’s responsible business plan to help move the world forward for all. As part of the plan, Verizon has an ambitious goal of providing 10 million youth with digital skills training by 2030. Educators can access free lessons, professional development, and immersive learning experiences to help bring new ways of learning into the classroom by visiting Verizon Innovative Learning HQ.}

How we’re developing the premier workforce 
Our human resources team focuses on a talent and culture strategy aimed at increasing our organizational resilience to mitigate risks. Our strategy is only as strong as our leadership, capability and culture. We’re working to ensure our people and teams are at the right levels, with the right skills, in the right place, at the right time, at the best cost, and are continuously driving performance improvement and innovation. We’re committed to fostering an inclusive environment where every employee feels valued, supported and excited to come to work each day.

Workforce planning and development 
Our workforce development initiatives focus on partnerships with high schools, technical and community colleges, universities and industry associations. These programs range from general promotion of energy and STEM careers to technical training programs that produce graduates aligned with our staffing needs.

How we’re building premier utility capability 
We’re committed to equipping our employees with foundational training, professional development and meaningful career growth opportunities. In 2025, we continued to invest in our workforce through a robust suite of courses offered in our employee development catalog.

We also continued three development programs for high-potential talent:

• RISE is our emerging leader program for top high-potential individual contributors. In 2025, 112 employees engaged in self-assessments, training, site tours, volunteer activities and networking to prepare for their first leadership roles at Entergy.
• Our 12-month VOLT leadership program, completed by 23 mid-level leaders, combines leadership assessments, team building, executive engagement, mentoring and team project assignments to strengthen our leadership pipeline and support sustainable high levels of performance and company growth.
• Power Up was completed by 17 leaders during a 12-month journey that blended field visits, executive engagement, skills assessments and memorable experiences.

Read the full report here.

AI has quietly become the new Google search, and most brands haven’t fully noticed.

Millions of people now turn to AI platforms like ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini before they ever open a traditional search engine. In fact, 50% of consumers now choose AI over legacy search — and the results they see directly influence where they choose to spend their money, who they choose to work for, and which brands they choose to trust. That’s just the start: Almost all B2B buyers (94%) now use AI in purchasing, and more than 75% of global investors turn to AI systems to help with investment decisions.

But most brands have no idea how they are showing up in AI responses. Are you being surfaced at all? If you are, are you portrayed negatively? Is the representation accurate and fair?

We couldn’t find a tool to answer those questions well enough for our customers. So we built one.

“Every communications leader knows their latest media coverage. Most can tell you their search ranking. Almost none can tell you what AI says about their company today,” says Charlie Wilkie, chief executive officer of 3BL. “That gap is the problem we built this tool to close.”

Introducing 3BL’s AI Visibility Tracker, the first tool built specifically for brand reputation in AI. 

What It Does

Unlike most AI monitoring tools designed for product discovery, 3BL’s AI Visibility Tracker is built around reputation: how your brand is being perceived, discussed and characterized within AI platforms.

• A multidimensional view of AI visibility. We show you where your visibility is strong and where it’s weak — broken down by platform, topic and query intent.
   
• Competitive benchmarking for crucial context. Measure your brand’s visibility alongside named competitors on the topics you want to lead. 
   
• Questions that shape reputation. Our database includes thousands of queries tied to brand governance, reputation and trust, asked by real people and curated by corporate responsibility experts.

Not only that, but it also tracks true sentiment that tells the real story. While most sentiment trackers simply reflect positive and negative keywords, ours is smart enough to tell you how your brand is being discussed — even in AI responses that also mention problems — so we never miss the nuance in complex conversations.

“The whole discipline of PR was built on the idea that third-party credibility matters more than what you say about yourself. AI has just made that truer than it’s ever been,” Wilkie says. “But most brands still haven’t caught up.”

As AI continues to become the first stop for consumers, investors, employees and others, knowing where you stand isn’t optional. It’s essential.

Sign up today to see your AI Visibility Score. 

About 3BL

Since 2009, more than 1,500 companies have trusted 3BL to distribute their news to credible publishers — extending beyond press releases to the full range of stories that shape stakeholder perception.

From Fortune 500 companies to nonprofits, 3BL combines targeted distribution, strategic insights, and measurable analytics to track what’s reaching audiences, identify what’s resonating, and provide the guidance teams need to keep improving.

Our digital media division, TriplePundit, covers business through the lens of solutions journalism and supports brand storytelling through the 3BL Studio.

AI has quietly become the new Google search, and most brands haven’t fully noticed.

Millions of people now turn to AI platforms like ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini before they ever open a traditional search engine. In fact, 50% of consumers now choose AI over legacy search — and the results they see directly influence where they choose to spend their money, who they choose to work for, and which brands they choose to trust. That’s just the start: Almost all B2B buyers (94%) now use AI in purchasing, and more than 75% of global investors turn to AI systems to help with investment decisions.

But most brands have no idea how they are showing up in AI responses. Are you being surfaced at all? If you are, are you portrayed negatively? Is the representation accurate and fair?

We couldn’t find a tool to answer those questions well enough for our customers. So we built one.

“Every communications leader knows their latest media coverage. Most can tell you their search ranking. Almost none can tell you what AI says about their company today,” says Charlie Wilkie, chief executive officer of 3BL. “That gap is the problem we built this tool to close.”

Introducing 3BL’s AI Visibility Tracker, the first tool built specifically for brand reputation in AI. 

What It Does

Unlike most AI monitoring tools designed for product discovery, 3BL’s AI Visibility Tracker is built around reputation: how your brand is being perceived, discussed and characterized within AI platforms.

• A multidimensional view of AI visibility. We show you where your visibility is strong and where it’s weak — broken down by platform, topic and query intent.
   
• Competitive benchmarking for crucial context. Measure your brand’s visibility alongside named competitors on the topics you want to lead. 
   
• Questions that shape reputation. Our database includes thousands of queries tied to brand governance, reputation and trust, asked by real people and curated by corporate responsibility experts.

Not only that, but it also tracks true sentiment that tells the real story. While most sentiment trackers simply reflect positive and negative keywords, ours is smart enough to tell you how your brand is being discussed — even in AI responses that also mention problems — so we never miss the nuance in complex conversations.

“The whole discipline of PR was built on the idea that third-party credibility matters more than what you say about yourself. AI has just made that truer than it’s ever been,” Wilkie says. “But most brands still haven’t caught up.”

As AI continues to become the first stop for consumers, investors, employees and others, knowing where you stand isn’t optional. It’s essential.

Sign up today to see your AI Visibility Score. 

About 3BL

Since 2009, more than 1,500 companies have trusted 3BL to distribute their news to credible publishers — extending beyond press releases to the full range of stories that shape stakeholder perception.

From Fortune 500 companies to nonprofits, 3BL combines targeted distribution, strategic insights, and measurable analytics to track what’s reaching audiences, identify what’s resonating, and provide the guidance teams need to keep improving.

Our digital media division, TriplePundit, covers business through the lens of solutions journalism and supports brand storytelling through the 3BL Studio.