Jak Beula Dodd, commonly known as Jak Beula, is a British entrepreneur best known for inventing the board gameNubian Jak. He is also a cultural activist, musician, social-worker, and former model. He is the founder and chief executive of the Nubian Jak Community Trust, which since 2006 has been commemorating the contributions of African-Caribbean people in Britain.
Early career
Beula is a former singer and model, who between 1992 and 1995 featured in a successful long-running advertising campaign by Interflora.
Social work
Beula has received recognition for developing African-centred products and campaigning to commemorate black history in the UK. It was in his capacity as a social worker that Beula began to notice what he described as society's neglect, particularly of young black and white working-class youth in the social care system. Not only did it appear as if care staff were ill-equipped to deal with demands of the young people. Some of the young people were adopting sub-cultural stereotypical behaviour. Beula put this down to, in part, their educational experiences, as well as a lack of positive role models in both the media and their immediate environment. Noting that there were hardly any multi-cultural resources available within their homes, he has said:
"They were hungry for role models, because we all need a sense of identification, a sense of self and of self-esteem. Most of the role models they were being given in the media were negative and were stereotypes, it was very disappointing. So I decided to give the young people some new information, whether they wanted the information or not, I was going to give it to them."
He began to devise an educational programme that would try to address these points, out of which came the board game Nubian Jak. It immediately became a bestseller in London, prompting Beula to give up work as a social worker. By the ending of 1996 educational magnates such as Time-Life were commenting on its innovation. In 1998 Beula self-published the first edition of Nubian Jak's Book of World Facts. Dubbed "the truth with proof", it was subtitled "The Ultimate Reference Guide to Global Black Achievement". In 2001 Beula signed a publishing deal with HarperCollins in New York to reissue the book. A Nubian Jak phone app was released in 2016. Beula was the founder of the Nubian Jak Community Trust, Britain's only national BMEcommemorative plaque and sculpture scheme, which since 2006 has been honouring Black personalities of the past, and also organised Britain's first African and Caribbean War Memorial, in Windrush Square. Beula worked alongside London 2012 with his innovated diversity project, On Track 4 Gold.
