Choosing a Cause

What needs to change in our neighborhood, city, state, country, or world? This workshop intends to encourage and provide the boost to get you started and/or expand your work. The recent election should be a wake-up call to everyone who wants America to be the country described in the Declaration and Constitution, a country where ALL of us can enjoy life, liberty, and pursue happiness, a country where ALL of us are included.

Whenever I think about the millions of persons who marched after the death of George Floyd, I think about all the persons who could have continued their activism had they been invited, encouraged, directed. Participants will be asked to cite places where they believe our society needs improvement. Then, in no particular order, they will be given a list of places needing changes: gun safety, electoral college, voting laws, climate change, education--pre-school, elementary, middle, secondary, college, funding education, medical care, housing costs, homelessness, mental health, sidewalks, lead pipes, requirements to be president, rules for lobbyists, term limits for Supreme Court, clean bodies of water, arms sales, fossil fuels, recycling, environment (many aspects), etc. Participants will then be given strategies for becoming activists and recruiting others to assist.

Presenter: Georgia Stewart McDade, is a member of Mount Zion Baptist Church and African-American Writers' Alliance. She is an English teacher who loves reading, writing, and traveling.  She is a charter member of the African-American Writers’ Alliance (AAWA).  Convinced all of us can learn to write well, McDade conducts and participates in a variety of writing and literary workshops. “Good writing can force us to think and think critically; we can theorize, organize, analyze, and synthesize better,” says she. A prolific writer, she has works in all seven AAWA anthologies.  

Co-presenter: Winona Hollins Hauge, MSW, LICSW will be representing the National Council of Negro Women as their Social Justice Chair, and I will be offering assistance by making referrals to those who need professional counseling resources and or job coaching resources.  She represented Delta Sigma Theta Sorority as their Social Action.I am a native of Seattle who grew up in the Leschi Madrona neighborhood on Cherry Street . She graduated from Garfield High School and the University of Washington. 

Winona Hollins Hauge, is a Seattle native, who grew up in the Central District. She attended Leschi elementary and later bussed out with the Voluntary transfer program as one of the first families to participate. She is a former manager for the Odessa Brown Children's Clinic and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. She is currently a semi-retired counselor,serving as a dedicated volunteer for her Mount Zion Church Community and holds several offices and leadership roles in several organizations. She also has worked with Grandmothers Against Gun Violence. She was on their board for nine of her ten years in the organization. She remains passionate about working on legislation that will prevent gun violence and has taken a lead role in building relationships and partnerships within systems that will help reduce the loss of life in our inner-city communities and hold gun sellers and unresponsible parents accountable for not using proper means of protecting our youth.