Nancy Larraine Hoffmann's Civil Rights Connection
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  • Click here to view photos from the Orientation Session for the 2007 program held on April 25th.
  • June 4th 2007: Click here to view photos from the 2007 trip.



Nancy Larraine Hoffmann

During her tenure in the New York State Senate, former Senator Nancy Larraine Hoffmann began the Civil Rights Connection in 1996 as a way of helping young people to develop a personal understanding of the lessons of the Civil Rights movement. She drew on her own early experience as a Civil Rights worker in Mississippi in the late 1960's. The students learned how the elements of non-violence, religion and music made possible the great social revolution ending segregation.

Every year since 1996, Senator Hoffmann, accompanied by several chaperones, took young people from the Central New York area to Mississippi where they retraced the steps of northern civil rights workers. The students met with well-known figures such as former Mayor Charles Evers, brother of slain civil rights activist Medgar Evers, with other movement leaders, and, most importantly, with the ordinary people who sustained the equal rights movement.

While in Mississippi, the students stayed in dormitories at Tougaloo College, an historic black college, and with host families in other parts of the state, where they participated in work projects, just as civil rights workers did in the 60's and 70's. Senator Hoffmann required each student, most of whom were high school juniors, to maintain a journal during the Mississippi trip, and to participate in speaking engagements and programs during their senior year of high school.

In 2001, Senator Hoffmann took her Civil Rights Connection students to New Orleans in addition to the annual trip to Mississippi. While at Tipitina's, a world-renowned nightclub that supports and celebrates the music of New Orleans, Cyrill Neville and his son, Cyrill Neville, Jr., filmed an interview with Senator Hoffmann. Click on the following link to view the video.

Senator Hoffmann video from Tipitina's in New Orleans

Senator Hoffmann's website

With her departure from the NY State Senate, Hoffmann has created a not-for-profit organization to carry on the Civil Rights Connection activities. This organization is funded by grants and by generous contributions from private citizens and businesses who share her belief that the understanding these young people gain is an immeasurable benefit to them and to our society.