Shine a Light Alabama

Alabama incurred the 7th highest death-rate from COVID-19 in the United States. There were also increased deaths from overdose, suicide, and violence. Compounding these traumas are historical legacies of inequality in Alabama, which manifest in maldistribution of health resources. Despite featuring among the nation's highest rates of infant and maternal mortality, Alabama has the nation's worst ratio of mental health providers to residents. Most of the state's county health departments have only one nurse or none at all. The state is one of two that offers no statewide database of hospital-reported health data. In this environment, complicated grief related to losses suffered during the pandemic will likely produce self-disenfranchisement and vulnerability to misinformation that threatens to further undermine civic engagement of our democratic institutions. Shine a Light Alabama uses digital and grassroots outreach to provide collective ritual and resiliency resources to Alabamians who experienced loss and stress during the pandemic. 

We seek to address the specific facet of the problem described in this challenge as the need to "combat loneliness, stress, depression, and other mental health impacts of disease outbreaks." Alabama has 4.9 million residents. With 223 fatalities per 100,000 residents, Alabama experienced the 7th highest death-rate due to COVID-19 in the entire United States. This scale of loss is devastating, especially in a region of the country with historic divestment in healthcare and legacies of racial and economic inequality. Community isolation has only increased political polarity and the spread of dangerous misinformation. Democracy becomes more vulnerable and deteriorates in such a context of compounded traumas. In the 2020 national election, there were 1.4 million Alabamians who were eligible to vote, but who chose not to. This sense of hopelessness locally is reinforced by national disdain, the withholding of resources, and entrenched and powerful interests controlling Alabama's state and local government and investing in keeping many Alabamians excluded from the democratic process. 

Alabama Forward is a 501c3 civic engagement table with 24 nonprofit members (and growing) leading urgent equity work across the state. We are working to civically engage 1 million Alabamians in the next decade. We are employing technology, cultural outreach, and grassroots door-to-door digital and physical organizing to build year-long, state-wide infrastructure that shepherds and supports all Alabamians to participate in democracy. Our digital narrative campaigns will interrupt how we envision and embody civic identity and participation in Alabama. These include Shine A Light Alabama - a health and cultural outreach campaign using digital memorialization and online health resource sharing, with a civic engagement component; Build the Block Parties - using digital tools to create virtual meeting, "edu-tainment" spaces to engage folks in a celebratory and information-rich on-ramp to shaping government policies, systems and possibilities; Shake the Field - a digital platform to engage 18-45 year-olds to shift out of resentment and frustration at current traumas and into local learning, creativity and community leadership that makes clear what we are fighting for; a digital engagement and training campaign to mobilize, educate and activate community members to create and advocate for equitable electoral maps; and finally, documenting local oral histories. 

COVID-19 hit some harder than others—many Alabamians were more vulnerable based on age, race, family obligations, or type of job. It took a much higher toll on our elders; rural neighbors with less access to healthcare; frontline workers; and those without health insurance. Even people outside of these categories became critically ill. Therefore, Alabama Forward's solution focuses on those who are most vulnerable and also most primed for mobilization: Black and Latinx communities, 18–45-year-olds, women, and members of LGBTQ communities. These communities are under-invested in, overly policed, and constantly attacked by the legislature. We recognize that it is critical that we seriously consider the social experiences shaping the lives of the neighbors we seek to reach. Effective civic education and engagement requires establishing human connection consistently and relentlessly to earn attention in creative and unique ways. We should not assume that our neighbors share our understandings of civics and democratic traditions, nor should we assume that they rank civic engagement as a high priority among the varied challenges, traumas, and responsibilities of their lives. If we seek to inspire neighbors who vote less frequently or not at all into habitual voting and participation in redistricting and other forms of civic engagement, we must first listen to learn who our neighbors are and what they need; then offer services, products, and experiences that are keyed to their emotional realities and most urgent needs. This is how our programs and outreach function. We believe it is earning us the attention and trust required to educate, train, and mobilize — and the knowledge to do so effectively.

Our work deeply aligns with the challenge's calls to combat the numerous mental health impacts of disease outbreaks, as well as to prevent the spread of misinformation and encourage community self-protection through informational campaigns. We serve communities who have experienced persistent economic, civic and social discrimination, in particular Black, Indigenous and People of Color. These are the communities most devastated by COVID-19, and by the indifference of government and healthcare agencies to respond to their needs. Our comprehensive program of digital engagement - from emotional connection to advocacy mobilization - was born from listening and responding to our communities' needs.

We are currently rolling out Shine a Light Alabama, Build the Block Parties, and Shake the Field across the state of Alabama. We are approaching the state from the perspective of five localities: North Alabama (Huntsville area), Central Cahaba (Birmingham area), Central-East (Montgomery-Auburn area), Wiregrass (Dothan area), and the Gulf Coast (Mobile-area). Alabama has 4.9 million residents in total. These five regions, and the urban anchor areas identified, are our focus because they exhibit voter participation rates of our target groups that lag behind those groups’ proportions of the total population, which reveals a high yield potential for focused health and civic engagement efforts. We are tracking and measuring the impact of these efforts, which will inform our approach to community engagement and mobilization across the coming 10 to 20 years.

The United States has been defined by an era of technical access and opportunity for many years. Despite the incredible power of the internet, mobile applications, and digital platforms, very basic problems -- such as successful and sustained participation in your state and country's democracy -- remain entrenched. Technology can be efficient and powerful, but it requires people to use it. Often, civic engagement is strategized from a transactional, disconnected stance. This approach does not take into consideration the trauma, both immediate and generational, of the communities we are trying to reach and mobilize. We believe our digital platforms, tools and content are innovative because they prioritize acknowledging and creating space for emotional realities of grief, desperation, joy, celebration and evolution. We seek to transform the market of democratically active Alabamians. Currently, the digital landscape does not speak to or in the language of 18-45 year olds, women, Black and Indigenous Communities, and LGBTQ+ neighbors. Meeting them where they are - digitally and emotionally - can catalyze the movement for genuine, representative democracy in Alabama, the South, and the Country. 

Currently, Alabama Forward and our Member organizations serve thousands of community members across the state. Each year, we aim to connect with 500,000 Alabamians in order to civically engage 100,000 people annually. In 5 years, we aim to civically engage 500,000 Alabamians. In 10 years, we will civically engage 1 million Alabamians. Achieving these goals require creating and resourcing a statewide, year-round voter engagement structure which will attempt 500,000 direct engagements each year. This will be facilitated by a team of 100 canvassers working 4 hours a day, 6 days a week, 40 weeks out of the year at a rate of $25 per hour. 

Each program component has distinct, measurable goals. For example, Shine a Light measures the number of community partner organizations involved, the number of households that participate in Community Commemoration Days, the number of digital commemorative pieces uploaded by participants to the virtual memorialization hub. Community training on redistricting, voter registration and rights restoration will be evaluated by the number of trainings offered, the number of community organizations engaged, and the number of individuals who attend as well as a virtual “Build the Block” virtual party to celebrate trainings and new connections. The oral narrative collection effort will be evaluated by the number of stories collected and the number of stories accessed by community members. 

As our civic engagement infrastructure grows and we initiate our year-long, state-wide canvassing effort, VAN will measure many facets of detail concerning how many individuals are contacted, how many translate into civic action and what kind of engagement that represents. This will be by member organization, region, and demographic data.

We have one full-time staff member: our Executive Director. We have 4 part-time staff members: an Organizational Development Manager, a Data Manager, a Project Director for Shine a Light Alabama, and a Development Manager. At least one part-time staff member is expected to transition to full-time this year. 

Fundamentally, this project’s credibility is rooted in Alabama Forward’s member organizations that which are all community created and directed. Shine a Light Alabama, the training and mobilization components of Build the Block Parties and Shake the Field, and the oral narrative collection effort will be led in the community by these groups, in partnership with additional direct service organizations. Alabama Forward’s staff team use our expertise to resource and support these groups to do what they do best - engage with and uplift the communities they represent and serve. Our credibility to hold  trust between and foster connections among diverse groups is strengthened by years of working in the field, establishing a reputation of caring and supportive action, and an enduring commitment to the well-being and  humanity of all Alabamians. 

Evan Milligan is a native Alabamian and graduate of Birmingham-Southern College. He spent six years working at the Equal Justice Initiative where he led research and community engagement efforts to document historical legacies of racial injustice, change the  narrative about race in America, and memorialize and commemorate victims of racial terror. Amanda Hiley has  worked on many angles of social change efforts in Alabama, including helping to launch the Women’s Fund of Greater Birmingham and serving as the Director of Grassroots Strategy in the 2003 effort to reform Alabama’s  inequitable tax system. Ms. Hiley’s experiences as a pastor and hospital chaplain inform her understanding of  grief and how to build community in times of loss. 

Alabama Forward prioritizes race and gender equity across all aspects of our work. Three-fifths of Alabama Forward's team identifies as African American, and four-fifths identify as women. Our Board of Directors has nine members. Eight identify as women and one identifies as non-binary; four identify as Black, 4 identify as white, and 1 identifies as Latinx. 

As a civic engagement coordinating table, Alabama Forward supports a coalition of organizational partners who represent and are also composed of  BIPOC communities, and women in particular. Twenty-one of our twenty-four member groups are lead at the executive level by women and all twenty-four have women in senior leadership positions. Eleven of our member groups serve predominately Black constituencies; two serve predominately Latinx/Hispanic constituencies; one serves LGBTQ constituents; and the remaining organizations serve coalition constituent  groups that include low to moderate income residents, women, LGBTQ residents, and BIPOC community  members.

Alabama is historically an environment that is resource-scarce and hostile to the development and implementation of meaningful technological tools and expertise. Joining the incredible community of MIT Solve Challenge winners and alumni would be an immeasurable benefit for the communities we seek to serve. These are the kinds of connections and learning opportunities that have been historically restricted to our communities. We are immensely eager to engage, share, learn, question, and evolve with an incredible and vast group of dedicated and brilliant people.