A woman from Missouri has totally changed her life and helped 62,000 others. She did this by starting a Facebook group to help Black women manage their finances. Since Dasha Kennedy created The Broke Black Girl in November 2017, her Facebook group has grown. It went from a small group of women talking about their money experiences to a huge community centered on sisterhood.
Dasha Kennedy: First Step
“I never thought that clicking ‘Create Facebook Group’ two years ago would lead to this,” says Kennedy, 32. “In the group, I’ve seen women paying off student loans and getting out of debt. I’ve seen them making family budgets that everyone can follow. It’s been amazing.”
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“I feel like I have 62,000 sisters cheering me on. And I’m cheering for them too,” she adds, highlighting the group’s size.
Dasha Kennedy: Her Career
“Being connected due to financial struggles and wanting to overcome them while helping others has been incredibly empowering for me.”
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Dasha Kennedy started her career in finance at just 19 years old. Living in St. Louis, she chose not to attend college. Instead, she got a job as a mailroom attendant at an insurance company. While working there, she met another employee who was an accountant.
Breaking Boundaries
“When I finished work early, there was a lady who sat across from me,” Kennedy remembers. “She would show me what she was doing and explain the problems she was working on in the insurance world.”
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Over time, Kennedy learned the job, and eventually, the woman’s manager decided to hire her. By the age of 25, she was a senior-level accountant at the company. She later became an insurance counselor at a bank.
African American Women and Their Finances
In her job, Kennedy started working directly with clients. She started teaching them about money management. She noticed that many women, especially African American women, were having a hard time with their finances.
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One of the issues was that they didn’t have the tools they needed. They didn’t know how to budget or reduce their spending. Kennedy said that the bank didn’t offer any extra programs to help them learn about money management. I knew there was a need for this information. It’s not something that many families share or pass down.
Income Statistics
There’s also clear financial inequality in the U.S. According to the Pew Research Center, in 2016, black people in the top 10% earned only 68% as much as white people in the same group, which is the same as in 1970.
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In the middle-income range, black people earned 65% as much as white people in 2016, up from 59% in 1970. For lower-income black people, the gap improved slightly from 47% in 1970 to 54% in 2016.
Facing Financial Struggles
“In the Black community, many of us earn less, often in single-parent homes or with just one income,” Kennedy says. “It reaches a point where we’re just trying to survive,” Kennedy adds. “We’re not thinking about the future, building wealth for future generations, or saving for tomorrow. We’re just focused on getting through today.”
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Around that time, Kennedy had graduated from Lindenwood University and had become a mother of two sons. She was facing her own financial struggles.
Dasha Kennedy and Her Ordeal
Dasha Kennedy narrated her ordeal. “A lot was changing in my life.” “I had another baby, I was going through a divorce, I broke my foot, and I lost my father.”
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I decided to do something about it. “I thought since I know a lot about managing money, budgeting, and getting out of financial trouble. Let me start sharing my journey on social media. And also see if I can help others or if someone can relate,” she said.
Will and Determination
Her will led to the creation of her Facebook group, ‘The Broke Black Girl.’ She explained that it was a name she felt personally connected to at the time.
“That’s how I realized where I was in life. I felt broke and didn’t know what to do with my money. I knew other women felt the same way,” she says.
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Although the group started with just a few hundred members, it quickly grew. Through word of mouth and local news coverage, more members flocked in.
Dasha Kennedy’s Finance Lessons
Today, members get daily financial lessons and tips from Kennedy based on the group’s interests.
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Some of the topics include taking a “money minute” each day to check bank accounts. Setting a weekly “money date” to track finances and budget, paying financial obligations immediately, and the importance of asking for help.” I create my lessons based on what the group is interested in at the moment,” she says. “The girls take what they find useful and ignore what they don’t.”
Moving Forward
Kennedy started a website linked to her Facebook group. On the website, she promotes herself as a financial coach and speaker for millennials. She provides different financial services to meet her clients’ needs, either in person or online.
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Thanks to the success of her Facebook group and website, she could move forward. Kennedy was able to leave her job just nine months after starting The Broke Black Girl.
Dasha Kennedy: Her Life’s Purpose
Dasha Kennedy now focuses on expanding her business as an entrepreneur. “Starting that job at 19 as a mailroom attendant was tough for me. I really hated it. But looking back, it reminds me that things happen for a reason.
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Seeing where I started at 19 and where I was by 30, I realized something. It took almost ten years for me to understand my purpose. My purpose is to help others, especially women of color,” Kennedy said.
A Helping Hand
“My purpose in life was greatly influenced by the woman who first taught me accounting when I was a mailroom attendant,” Dasha Kennedy said.
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“High-level jobs are so rare that it’s often easier to undermine potential rivals. Honestly, this woman had every reason to do that,” she says. “I was young, inexperienced, and eager to prove myself. She had no reason to help me succeed, but she did anyway.”
Allies, Not Competitors
“I could never repay her for what she did,” Kennedy adds. “She put me in a position that secured my job for the next seven years. She encouraged me to see other women as potential allies, not competitors. Because of that, I feel a personal responsibility to help others whenever I can.”
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Kennedy now encourages a strong sense of friendship among her followers. Many group members have become friends and go shopping together to help each other stay on track, she says. She wishes her dad could have seen this.
Dasha Kennedy: Changing Lives
“It almost makes me cry because I never expected this success,” says Kennedy, whose dad passed away a month after she started the group. “My dad and I were very close, and I told him everything. Since I didn’t think this would become so important, I never mentioned it to him.”
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“I thought it would just be a community where we talked about money,” she continues. “I had no idea it would change my life and the lives of so many women in the group.”