Reba Elliott is a Changemaker

Reba Elliott founded Lifting Voices to harness the power of words to improve communities, changing lives by offering writing workshops on the power of the written word to young people.

Lifting Voices serves people living in high-crime, high-poverty neighborhoods of Washington, D.C. It makes words work on both the grassroots level and the policy level.

"Within these terrified streets, we find people of joy, compassion, and strength," Eliott said. "Lifting Voices reaches them to give them the power of their stories."

Its grassroots work is done through its writing workshops. In the workshops, Lifting Voices gives under-served youth a meaningful connection to words. These marginalized young people learn that the written word is a wondrous powerful thing, and that their voices matter.

In the oral history program, Lifting Voices gathers life stories from people living in fractured communities and shares them with decision makers. Decision makers get voices of experience. And those voices get a meaningful outlet for their knowledge.

"One-third of the adults in Washington, D.C. are functionally illiterate, and D.C. is hardly unique," Elliott said. "Lifting Voices envisions a world where people can use the power of the written word to their own ends, materially improving their lives and contributing to the policy decisions that shape their communities.

"Lifting Voices gives people the power of words and gives words to people in power. Lifting Voices gives people the power of words by building a passion for writing in fractured communities. Lifting Voices gives words to people in power by sharing voices from fractured communities with decision makers."

Lifting Voices is "staffed and run by a corps of amazingly creative and dedicated people, and supported by a passionate volunteers," she said.

Web site: liftingvoices.org

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