Leadership Tuesdays: Millennial Leaders...We Got Next!

If we stand tall it is because we stand on the shoulders of many ancestors.

--Yoruba Proverb

Every other Tuesday, WOMEN AT LIBERTY provides a platform for a variety of voices and resources to develop, encourage, and strengthen women leaders. 

Today's Leadership Tuesdays' blog recognizes a few young African American leaders of this generation. In 2012, I was impressed with the activism of four young ladies who, in a matter of days, organized a march in Washington, D.C. to bring attention to the untimely death of seventeen year old Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Florida. Heather Rasberry, Megan Goffney, Maliaka Mealy along with Yolanda Carr, their friend from Florida, combined social media, the communications tools of millennials, with the proven tactics of non-violent resistance--marching and speeches--to spark activism in another generation of young people. 

One thing that should be applauded about their March 2012 rally is the support they received from local community leaders like Rev. Tony Lee who answered their call and used his platform to promote the work the young ladies were doing. For more information on what these young ladies accomplished, click here.

Maliaka Mealy, Heather Rasberry, and Megan Goffney

Another brilliant young woman leader who has risen to prominence in the wake of protests related to the shooting death of Mike Brown by police officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri is Brittany Packnett. Ms Packnett is a native of St. Louis and the Executive Director of Teach For America in St. Louis, Missouri. A graduate of Washington University located in her home town, she has also spent time in Washington, D.C. earning a Master of Arts degree in Teaching at American University. She taught third graders in South East Washington, D.C. as a Teach For America Fellow while working on her Master's degree.

This energetic young lady also worked on Capitol Hill for U.S. Representative Lacy Clay (D-Missouri) whose legislative district includes Ferguson which is a part of St. Louis County. Ms. Packnett moved back to St. Louis in 2012 to lead the local Teach For America organization. In November 2014, she accepted an appointment by Governor Jay Nixon to the Ferguson Commission that has been tasked with addressing the systemic racial and economic issues in Ferguson. Their report is due in September 2015. 

She was also appointed by President Barack Obama to the Task Force on 21st Century Policing. To read Ms. Packnett's biography and learn more about her organization, click here. You can follow her on Twitter at @MsPackyetti.

Brittany Packnett

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Nona O.