Stories

Mississippi

  • Shirley Sherrod: Approach to Organizing

    Shirley and Charles Sherrod founded the Southwest Georgia Project for Community Education in 1961 to educate, engage and empower through advocacy and community organizing. SWGAP has successfully addressed school segregation, welfare rights, voter rights and education, housing, land loss, economic development and unfair policies affecting school children and families.

    After decades of...

  • Hollis Watkins Singing

    A veteran of the civil rights movement, Hollis Watkins founded Southern Echo, a leadership development, education and training organization working to develop effective, accountable grassroots leadership in rural Mississippi and the surrounding region.

    Watkins and Southern Echo have been instrumental in challenging redistricting in Mississippi, protecting communities from landfills and...

  • Perry Perkins: Investing in Infrastructure in the South

    Perry Perkins is the Supervisory Organizer for the southern region of the Industrial Areas Foundation, the nation’s oldest and largest network of organizers and training institute for institutional organizing. He serves on the National Strategic Team and is Co-Chair of the Staff Transition Process. Perkins also serves as Lead Organizer for Together Louisiana, the coalition of IAF-affiliated...

  • Hollis Watkins: Funding South

    A veteran of the civil rights movement, Hollis Watkins founded Southern Echo, a leadership development, education and training organization working to develop effective, accountable grassroots leadership in rural Mississippi and the surrounding region.

    Watkins and Southern Echo have been instrumental in challenging redistricting in Mississippi, protecting communities from landfills and...

  • …So Goes the Nation

    The South’s population is booming, increasing its influence on the rest of the country. The region holds a third of the Electoral College votes needed to take the White House, and it’s expected to gain five more after the 2020 Census. Thanks to immigration and reversal of the Great Migration, the region is becoming ever more diverse and its urban centers are growing. This evolution of the...

    Sophia Bracy Harris