The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People unveiled two national campaigns during the Essence Music Festival in Houston in July of 2006. Joining forces with the NAACP, Essence Magazine will provide a forum to promote voter empowerment and the newly developed Arrive with 5 and Equity Matters campaigns, each designed to engage people in two of the most pressing civil rights issues—voting and education.
The NAACP Arrive with 5 campaign is a national voter empowerment initiative aimed at increasing voter registration and participation in the upcoming November 7 elections.
Working in partnership with People for the American Way, the NAACP is asking participants to identify five friends or family members and commit to helping them get registered to vote and Arrive with 5 at the polls on Election Day. The goal is to increase the overall African American voter turnout by 5 percent this year above 2002 levels.
“Arrive with 5 will no doubt engage African American voters on the issues that matter most and motivate them to make a difference by voting and helping others get to the polls on Election Day,” said NAACP President and CEO. “People of color will make a difference in key elections across the country and our goal is to make the greatest impact in states where we face some of the most difficult challenges.”
At the Essence Music Festival, the Association’s objective was to register 5,000 new voters and to promote the Arrive with 5 campaign that was officially launched at the NAACP National Convention being held at the Washington D.C. Convention Center July 15 –20, 2006.
Equity Matters is a national education campaign that recruits local advocates to annually track, monitor and submit data to the NAACP highlighting resource inequities in four key areas of their local and state education systems: funding, teacher quality, class size and access to a college-bound curriculum.
Schools where the majority of students are from low-income and minority groups have fewer financial resources than students in predominantly white districts. In fact, more than 70 percent of African American public school students attend under-resourced schools where the majority of students are African American or Latino. These students are also twice as likely to have teachers who lack a degree in the subject area they are teaching.
“There is an urgent need for communities to demand changes in the way that money and personnel are channeled to students of color in this country,” said Michael T.S. Wotorson, NAACP National Education Director.
As a part of the Equity Matters campaign, the NAACP plans to launch a series of roundtables, town hall meetings and community forums around the country on the issue of resource allocation in public schools.
The Essence Music Festival is sponsored by Essence magazine, the preeminent lifestyle magazine for today’s African American woman. The festival is an unprecedented three days of cultural celebrations and Essence Empowerment Seminars, featuring three nights of performances by some of the greatest African American artists. It is among the largest annual gatherings of black women in the country. For more than 30 years Essence magazine has been the only publication dedicating itself to reflecting black women and their lives.
Founded in 1909, the NAACP is the nation's oldest and largest civil rights organization. Its members throughout the United States and the world are the premier advocates for civil rights in their communities, conducting voter mobilization and monitoring equal opportunity in the public and private sectors.
NAACP Receives Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club Foundation Grant in Support of Organization’s Voter Initiatives
NAACP Supports Bi-Partisan Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks and Coretta Scott King Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act of 2006
NAACP Voter Assistance Centers to Prep New Orleans Voters Displaced By Hurricane Katrina for Absentee Voting
NAACP National Headquarters
4805 Mt. Hope Drive
Baltimore MD 21215
Toll Free:
(877) NAACP-98
Local:
(410) 580-5777
© 2008 NAACP
All Rights Reserved