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There is no question that we have come a long way since the 60's and 70's. There's also no question that we still have a long way to go...

When I started the Civil Rights Connection in 1996, it was in response to my good friend Charles Evers urging "Bring some more young people down here to Mississippi. We like to see them. We like to show them how much things have changed."

My own son Gus also played a major role in convincing me to undertake what has become a very time-consuming project. Gus grew up hearing me tell about the brave men and women who made the Civil Rights Movement happen, but it wasn't until he visited Mississippi with me during my participation on a panel at Port Gibson, that he understood that history was still unfolding. He also, in his writing for Fabius-Pompey High School Social Studies classes, commented that the Civil Rights Movement history was not well-enough documented and certainly not well-understood by teen-agers today.

So when I began to bring them to Mississippi, I wanted teen-agers from throughout my Central New York Senate District to have the opportunity I have given my own son to realize three important things:

• The Civil Rights Movement was more a series of major marches, and speeches by Martin Luther King. It was primarily a long-term struggle by very ordinary people.

  Most wanted little for themselves, but they knew that future generations would benefit once equality was achieved. The fruits of their labors, unfortunately, are all too often squandered today by young people who fail to recognize the enormity of the mission undertaken by poor people in little towns, year after year, all over the South.

• Nonviolence, the key to success in achieving Civil Rights for all Americans, can and should play a major role in helping teen-agers today to find their way. The Civil Rights Activists who practiced nonviolence had to learn it so that they could prepare themselves to deal with anger, resentment and even acts of brutality directed against them.

  In a time when teen violence jumps out of newspaper headlines almost every week, it should be our mission as a country to see how people can overcome that need to over-react every time there is a slight, a put-down, or someone is "dissed." Listening to proud Mississippi men and women tell calmly how they triumphed in the face of rage by maintaining focus on their true purpose inspires young people from Central New York to greater maturity and citizenship.

  Senator Hoffmann stands above the beautiful Mississippi River in Natchez, Mississippi. Natchez is known as the "Bluff City."

• Manners and polite conversation still have a place in society. The early, forced "Thank you, Ma'am" and "Thank you, Sir" become much more genuine by the end of the trip. The students smile more readily. I am certain they will practice more gracious interaction with their peers and adults upon their return. And while in Mississippi they also help to dispel some of the animosity felt worldwide about New Yorkers. While we discuss racial profiling, the CRC students confront the unfortunate stereotype so many people worldwide hold about New Yorkers.

  I tell them to be "good ambassadors from Central New York" and invite people from Mississippi to pay us a return visit. We have much to show about our own abolitionist history, Erie Canal heritage and cultural smorgasbord. Although they may take it for granted because they live here, I ask them to "wave the flag" for our beautiful part of the world while we are visitors in Mississippi.

Each year when we leave Syracuse I know that there will be changes in the schedule, no matter how tightly I have it planned. I know that we may run into problems caused by weather, transportation or illness. That's part of group dynamics, and it's just another educational component to the Civil Rights Connection. I always pray that everyone will be safe and they will learn to look out for each other. I also pray for the strength in our chaperones to handle whatever comes our way.

On the first CRC trip in 1996, I took 16 students with 3 other chaperones. We drove in two vans, packed to the roof, and stayed exclusively with host families and at Tougaloo College. I had known the families since 1970, when I first went down as a civil rights worker myself. They opened their homes because they knew me and remembered what we had gone through together in those days. The conversation around the kitchen table in the morning with host families is among the most meaningful that the students experience. It's also the most difficult to plan.

Now the trip includes more chaperones and support teams, including our web staff, a nurse, and two New York State Troopers. The logistics of travel are enormous and the heat is often oppressive.

But one of the biggest challenges to me is always honoring requests from the many people in Mississippi who want to spend time with our young people, telling their stories. Old friends come unexpectedly when they hear I've returned with another group of students. They arrive at our destinations, and what happens spontaneously is as special as our planned events.

The students understand that they are not tourists. They are scholars, who are expected to write daily in their journals and to digest thoughtfully the content of the programs I have designed for them. Excerpts of their journals are posted on this site.

At the orientation session, I told them they represent thousands of other students. Upon their return, they will share their journals with fellow students in each of their 25 high schools, and in countless community appearances throughout Central New York. Information shared is much more powerful, they are now learning.

In years past, I have watched students of diverse backgrounds come together at Hancock Airport as we depart, full of nervous energy and apprehensive at about what they are about to undertake. Eight days later upon return to Syracuse, the airport is filled with hugs and exchanges of phone numbers, addresses and e-mails as well as plans to regroup often. Most of them do, and all of them feel a bond across their suburban-urban and wide-ranging economic differences. They share an understanding of this country's progress. They will feel a responsibility to continue the goals of the Civil Rights Movement. They return from Mississippi really feeling a "connection."

Whatever they encounter, I know these young people will come home changed. They will be strengthened for their own life challenges and they will also share those strengths, just as the Civil Rights Movement veterans have shared their strength during our trip. These young people are the future of our country. They must have the experience and connection to the past in order to carry forward those values and vision into the future.

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