Great Convening in Atlanta
•Thank you Atlanta!
It was inspiring to see so many coalition partners and new faces last week in Atlanta, at an event cohosted by our fantastic partners Points of Light, HandsOn Atlanta and Jumpstart.
The event is part of our spring series of community conversations in various cities around the country. They are designed to help Opportunity Nation introduce our networks and tools more widely, and to learn more about the great cross-sector work going on in communities to expand educational opportunity and economic mobility.
Joshua McKinley, an Opportunity Scholar at Morehouse College near Atlanta, talked about his involvement with Opportunity Nation. After witnessing the differences in quality among the schools in his community, he realized that low-income students received inferior educations and were falling behind when they got to college – an injustice that spurred him to action.
Josh now works with the Roosevelt Institute on education policy, studying various education systems around the country. At Morehouse, Josh asked students from both affluent and low-income neighborhoods to take photographs of where they live. Then he brought the group together to discuss what they found and share policy ideas with the local city council that might help bridge the differences.
Josh plans to join Teach for America in Houston next year.
Several participants at the May 7 event mentioned their desire to spread information and open up the dialogue. You can join that effort by sharing Index data about your community, You can tweet about @oppnation on Twitter and take action by contacting your senator and asking them to support the CAREERS Act and American Dream Accounts Act on our Advocacy page.
We intend to stay connected with everyone we met in Atlanta and to hear more inspiring stories about expanding economic mobility in Georgia. Please stay engaged with the amazing work going on with our partners, Points of Light, HandsOn Atlanta and Jumpstart.
Thanks again to everyone who made the May 7 gathering such a success! This week we are holding a community conversation in Miami and May 21, we will be in Seattle. More news is coming soon from these events.
