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Hail To The Queen

The United Negro College Fund (UNCF) will honor Aretha Franklin with its prestigious Award of Excellence on its annual television special, An Evening of Stars, which will air nationwide in January.

Previous honorees include Lou Rawls, (2004), Quincy Jones (2005) and Stevie Wonder (2006) The Queen of Soul will be the first female artist to receive the award, which recognizes her "longstanding and generous support of the UNCF's mission to provide deserving students with access to higher education, as well as for her well-known activism and philanthropy on behalf of numerous other causes."

In a statement, Michael L. Lomax, who is the president and CEO of UNCF, said: "UNCF is delighted to show Aretha Franklin some of the R-E-S-P-E-C-T that she has shown us for so many years…Now it is our turn to honor her by giving her our Award of Excellence. As an artist, an entertainer, and a citizen, her career has established a standard of excellence that exemplifies the educational distinction to which our member colleges are dedicated and to which they hold their students."

'An Evening of Stars,' formerly the Lou Rawls Parade of Stars, first aired in 1979, and since that time has become one of the longest running and most successful televised events in U.S. history.

Rawls, who passed away this past January, helped raise more than $200 million for the UNCF to supplement the cost of higher education for scholarship recipients and member institutions.

The three-hour concert tribute will be taped at the Kodak Theater in Hollywood on Sept. 8 and 9.