Greetings friends,

As we begin year two of the pandemic, the light at the end of the tunnel grows a little brighter. Positive signs are there, even as we’re still traumatized by the hardship and loss of the past year. Vaccines are more abundant by the week, and the number of reported infections in our state, once in the thousands, continues to drop.

Reflecting on this daunting year, Dan Cardinali, of Independent Sector, describes it well:

“To say that 2020 has been challenging is nowhere close enough to the truth. It has been a cruel and brutal year that has touched our sector, the organizations we help lead, and our communities in unforgiving ways.

What has been clear throughout this year is that civil society and the nonprofit sector are at the core of both the nation’s response to, and recovery from, this time of COVID-19 pandemic, economic crisis, and racial reckoning. Without a strong sector and resilient civil society, democracies like ours can atrophy and people will suffer. Without a healthy nonprofit sector, the climb out of 2020 will be nearly impossible.”

But recover, we must, using the adaptive skills and crisis intervention abilities we have all acquired. Despite the challenges, the Alliance team – small but mighty – has worked very hard over the past year to bring you new programs representing the sum of our work. We are committed to bringing new tools to ensure the sector’s health and success in Mississippi and beyond.

Moving forward with inclusion and civil discourse, we have an opportunity to model the society we want our state to reflect. No better leaders could be found for this purpose than the women you’ll read about in our stories in this issue as we observe Women’s History Month.

All the best,
Sammy

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