PHOTO : Getty Images

Noir Nation, New York City students are showing out in the classroom!

NYC Schools Chancellor Melissa Avilés-Ramos just revealed some major wins in academics — and the numbers are proof that hard work is paying off.

Big Wins In English 📝

According to the latest reports obtained by ABC News, English proficiency scores jumped more than 7 points compared to last year. That’s a huge boost for students across the city, especially in communities that have been fighting for more resources and support in literacy.

Chancellor Avilés-Ramos says the growth highlights the dedication of teachers, families, and students working together to make sure kids have the tools they need to succeed.

Data 📊:

75 percent of Asian-American students were proficient in reading.

74 percent of white students were proficient in reading.

Latino students had 43.5 percent proficiency

Black students with 47 percent. With scores jumping 8 points in reading from previous years—they’ve been recognized as the largest increase of any racial group.

Math On The Come-Up ➗

The progress didn’t stop there. Math scores climbed 3.5 points, a major step forward in closing long-standing gaps in STEM achievement.

For years, math has been one of the toughest subjects for NYC students, but this new data shows that changes in instruction and extra support programs are beginning to make a difference.

The Bigger Picture 🎓

Chancellor Avilés-Ramos made it clear — while these numbers are worth celebrating, the fight for equity in education isn’t over. Many students, especially in underserved neighborhoods, still face barriers to access and achievement. However— with these gains, there’s new energy and hope that NYC schools are moving in the right direction.

“We’re just getting started,” Avilés-Ramos said, reminding the city that this is only the beginning of bigger wins to come.”

“These academic gains in English Language Arts and math are a testament to what’s possible when we invest in our young people and believe in their potential, and we are proud of our students, teachers, and the entire school community.”

13

When Cardi B opens her mouth, you never know if you’re getting a cultural reset or pure chaos and sometimes, it’s both at once. This week, the Bronx rapper left fans gagging, clutching pearls, and laughing uncontrollably after a livestream moment where she declared that she knows about glory holes because “a gay man lives inside of me.” Yes, you read that right.

Cardi Explains Her Inner “Butch Queen”

In her video, Cardi B didn’t just dip her toe into queer slang, she cannonballed straight in. She told fans:

“You know what’s so funny everybody asking me like how do she know about glory hole? I be telling ya I am a gay man. There’s a gay man that lives inside me. A whole gay man. He’s a butch queen. He’s not a queen. He’s a butch queen. He’s not a queen. He’s not a butch queen. He’s not a deal. He’s a butch queen. He lives inside of me.”

Now, if you’re not versed in ballroom and queer culture, a “butch queen” refers to a gay man who blends masculine and feminine energies. Cardi tossing that around casually shows she stays tapped into queer lingo, even if her delivery was giving “drunk cousin at the cookout who won’t pass the mic.”

The Internet Reacts: From “WTF” to Illuminati Theories

Of course, Twitter and TikTok lit up. Some folks were confused:

• “I like her but wtf is she talkin about”






• “That’s called the devil ma’am”






• “She literally CANT HELP but Cosplay Nicki”

Others got messy, dragging Cardi into old-school Illuminati panic:

• “She means, there’s a demon living with her. The pact she made with the devil to gain fame and fortune”






• “If this was 2010, the illuminati allegations would have haunted her for the rest of her life”

And then there was the hilarious pushback from the gay community:

• “Glory holes aren’t just a gay thing… women be sucking dick through glory holes since the beginning of glory holes… but y’all would like to make us gay men seem like sex maniacs, while the whole time you know about glory holes because YOU was probably on one side of those walls… but lemme digress…”

Leave it to Twitter to turn a throwaway Cardi B quip into a discourse about homophobia, sex culture, and Stefon Diggs of all people (yes, one commenter swore “the only gay man inside of her is Stefon Diggs”).

Cardi Ties It Into Her New Single

The timing of Cardi’s “butch queen revelation” wasn’t random. She had already slipped a glory hole bar into her new single Imaginary Playerz, rapping:

“Gloryhole, bitches don’t know who they fuckin’ with…”

And honestly? That’s classic Cardi, mixing raunchy humor, street slickness, and camp energy into a lyric that makes you Google something at 2 a.m.

Related

Louisiana sued the online gaming platform Roblox on Thursday, alleging the wildly popular site has perpetuated an environment where sexual predators “thrive, unite, hunt and victimize kids.”

The lawsuit, filed in state court by Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill, alleges that Roblox has failed to implement effective safety measures to protect child users from adult predators.

“Due to Roblox’s lack of safety protocols, it endangers the safety of the children of Louisiana,” Murrill said in a news release. “Roblox is overrun with harmful content and child predators because it prioritizes user growth, revenue, and profits over child safety.”

The company has faced lawsuits and backlash for not doing enough to protect kids on its gaming services. Last month, a lawsuit was filed in Iowa after a 13-year-old girl was allegedly introduced to an adult predator on the platform, then kidnapped and trafficked across multiple states and raped.

In Louisiana, Livingston Parish Sheriff Jason Ard said his office has had multiple cases involving Roblox. In one, police allege a man used voice-altering technology to pose as a girl on the platform. Ard said there have yet to be any arrests made related to the gaming site.

Ultimately, Murrill said she believes Roblox should be shut down.

Roblox said it disputes the allegations.

“The assertion that Roblox would intentionally put our users at risk of exploitation is categorically untrue,” the company said in a statement.

“While no system is perfect, Roblox has implemented rigorous safeguards — such as restrictions on sharing personal information, links, and user-to-user image sharing — to help protect our community,” the company added. “Unfortunately, bad actors will try to circumvent our systems to try to direct users off the platform, where safety standards and moderation practices may differ. We continuously work to block those efforts and to enhance our moderation approaches to promote a safe and enjoyable environment for all users.”

The free online gaming platform has more than 111 million monthly users. Its website describes Roblox as “the ultimate virtual universe that lets you create, share experiences with friends, and be anything you can imagine.”

Roblox doesn’t allow users to share videos or images in chats and tries to block any personal information, such as phone numbers. However, as with other gaming platforms and social media sites with similar policies, people find ways around such safeguards.

Roblox, which according to its website has “a zero-tolerance policy for the exploitation of minors,” doesn’t allow children under 13 to chat with other users outside of games unless they have explicit parental permission. Because the platform does not encrypt private chat conversations, the company can monitor and moderate them.

However, Murrill said there is no age minimum or substantial age verification process once a user signs up. As a result, young children, teens and adults posing as children can sign up, she said.

The company says on its website that age verification “is a new feature that is currently in testing on Roblox.” Last month, it launched a feature that requires teenagers aged 13 to 17 to send a video selfie to verify their ages if they want to chat freely with people they know, called “trusted connections.”

Amid mounting criticism in recent months, the company has implemented additional measures that it says will keep their young users safe.

In August, Roblox told AP that it was rolling out an artificial intelligence system to help detect early signs of possible child endangerment, such as sexually exploitive language. Roblox said the system led it to submit 1,200 reports of potential attempts at child exploitation to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in the first half of 2025.

28

Indiana Fever guard Sophie Cunningham just reminded us all again why she’s the league’s humor champ and why her Twitter thumbs are as lethal as her jumper.

On Thursday, X user @fevertrick22 posted a side-by-side: a picture of Cunningham and goats and another of her and teammate Caitlin Clark. Caption: “these are the same picture.” Not pausing for a second, Cunningham countered with a perfectly timed burn: “they smell the same too.”

Enter the pandemonium.

Social Media Outburst

Fans immediately flooded the comments with goat emojis, belly laughs, and all the WNBA love necessary to fill Gainbridge Fieldhouse.

“If they smell like a Goat, then they a Goat ????” one of them wrote, giving Cunningham and Clark the highest compliment.

Yet another supporter was just enjoying the team chemistry: “3 hours ago before a crucial game, Sophie Cunningham was on Twitter teasing her teammate, how I love them, the team of good vibes.”

And, of course, someone christened the moment the day’s internet apotheosis: “This wins the Internet today. Shut it down, y’all ????????”

Fever fans are used to seeing players trade roasts, but Cunningham’s ability to do it at such a high level while still keeping locker room spirits up is now part of WNBA lore.

The Basketball Stakes

The entertainment is only hours ahead of a pivotal game: the Indiana Fever (18-15) receiving the Washington Mystics (14-18) on August 15, 2025, at 7:30 p.m. ET.

Indiana is clinging to sixth in playoff positioning, and the Mystics are at 10th, two games from the playoffs. The Fever are looking to bounce back from a tough 81-80 loss to the Dallas Wings on August 12, just demonstrating how shallow their backcourt rotation has grown due to injuries piling up.

The Mystics, though, are rebuilding beyond the trade deadline, counting on rookies Sonia Citron and Kiki Iriafen to do most of the heavy lifting.

The Caitlin Clark Factor

The trash talk hurts all the more considering Caitlin Clark hasn’t played on the court since suffering her right groin injury on July 15. Fever coach Stephanie White explained this past week that Clark is progressing but had yet to fully participate in practice.

Before the injury, Clark had been averaging 16.5 points, 8.8 assists, 5.0 rebounds, and 1.6 steals through 13 games shooting 27.9% from beyond the arc. Those numbers have her back as a potential game-changer in the Fever’s quest to make the playoffs.

In the meantime, meanwhile, she has Cunningham keeping her in the spotlight… and seemingly emitting a scent of a GOAT.

If the Fever are able to match the energy that Cunningham brought to the court tonight that she brought to Twitter, the Mystics are in trouble before the tip.

Related

New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell was indicted today by a federal jury on 18 charges, including false declaration before a grand jury, conspiracy to obstruct justice, and wire fraud. The FBI has connected most of the charges to Cantrell trying to cover up an affair with a city police department bodyguard since 2021. Cantrell is the first mayor of the city to be indicted on federal charges while in office.

This is a superseding indictment related to an indictment of former New Orleans Police Department bodyguard, Jeffery Vappie. 11 of the charges brought against Cantrell in the 45-page document are attached to Vappie, and the other seven are Vappie’s charges alone. Vappie, who was charged last year with wire fraud and false statement counts was also indicted today by a federal grand jury. The false statement counts include lies about Vappie’s relationship with Cantrell, which are allegedly related to an extramarital affair between the two.

The FBI said it found 15,000 messages on WhatsApp between the two, which have been included in conspiracy charges against the mayor. The indictment today reveals that Cantrell was also brought to the federal jury last year as a part of Vappie’s investigation, and that she did not submit all of the evidence she was subpoenaed for.

Some of the evidence brought forward by the FBI from the messages between Cantrell and Vappie aims to connect the city-funded work trips the two took together as a cover-up for the couple’s vacations. According to the messages, Washington D.C. and Napa Valley in California were included among these trips. The document said Vappie submitted around $2,400 in expenses to Cantrell for the trip to San Francisco, and around $1,300 in expenses for D.C., both of which Cantrell approved. They also took international trips to Scotland and the United Arab Emirates, according to the document.

There is a question of whether these trips and the amount of money spent on them are completely usable in this case. Because Vappie was Cantrell’s security, the travel expenses used on these trips may be justified. Or at least the total amount calculated—$70,000 in city funds—could be inflated when the reasons for the expenses are taken into account.

Evidence of the affair taking place in New Orleans was documented as well. Also outlined in the charges are the duo’s use of the city-owned Upper Pontalba apartment as a shared residence, calling it “our apartment” in the messages. When photographs were taken and shared of the couple dining outdoors at a restaurant by a New Orleans resident, the FBI alleges Cantrell used non-public information to get a temporary restraining order against them.

One of the more shocking elements of the document is that Cantrell and Vappie were apparently warned to shut down the affair around the time of the couple’s trip to the Napa Valley in 2022. Another member of Vappie’s unit, the Executive Protection Unit, sent a message to the entire unit saying that if anyone is having an affair with Cantrell they should stop because the consequences would be detrimental to the EPU and Cantrell. Both Vappie and Cantrell confronted the EPU member who sent the message, and Vappie denied the affair.

In other messages, an associate of Cantrell wrote to her over text, “It is a FELONY to have your lover be paid to work and have his travel paid for by the city. The Nashville mayor had to pay back 50k and serve 3 yrs probation. She is done! Please don’t let this be your path, LaToya!” The associate was referring to the former Nashville Mayor Megan Barry, who admitted to having an affair with her head of security, Sgt. Robert Forrest in 2018. Cantrell responded to the associate, “Please don’t accuse me.”

Before Cantrell, former mayor Ray Nagin was indicted by a federal grand jury in 2013, three years after he left office. Nagin was later convicted on charges of wire fraud, federal bribery, money laundering, conspiracy, and tax charges.

Cantrell is the first female mayor of New Orleans. Running and winning as a Democrat, she served her first term in 2018 and won reelection in 2021. The race for the next mayor of New Orleans is underway, and the election will be held in October.