Tracee Ellis Ross, award-winning actress and producer, and CEO and Founder of PATTERN Beauty will receive an honorary degree, Doctor of Fine Arts. Ross is an award-winning actress and producer best known for her roles in ABC’s award-winning comedy series Black-ish and Girlfriends. For her role as Rainbow Johnson in Black-ish, as a comedic leading actress, Ross won the Golden Globe Award in 2017 as well as nine NAACP Image Awards.
She was nominated for five Emmys and two Critics Choice Awards. Ross is the CEO and Founder of PATTERN Beauty, an award-winning haircare brand she launched in 2019 for the curly, coily and tight textured masses.
Ross is executive producer and narrator of The Hair Tales, a docuseries about Black women, beauty and identity through the distinctive lens of Black hair. It debuted on the Oprah Winfrey Network’s cable channel and on Hulu in October 2022. Ross recently produced a ten-episode podcast, I Am America, which aims to break through the noise during this divided time in our country in an effort to create space and to heal. Ross will star in and executive produce the animated MTV Entertainment Studios film Jodie, a spinoff of MTV’s iconic Daria franchise.