Meredith (Coleman) McGee Awarded First Billie Jean Young Scholarship

RDLN Leader Meredith (Coleman) McGee has been awarded the first Billie Jean Young Scholarship, established in honor of RDLN's founding chairwoman, who served as head of our board from 1983 through 1996. Billie Jean is an organizer, poet, and dramatist, the creator of a one-woman show on the life of the late civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer called "Fannie Lou Hamer: This Little Light..." Founder of the Southern Rural Black Women's Initiative, she holds a law degree and is a former MacArthur Foundation Fellow. She grew up in a sharecropping family in Pennington, AL, and has returned to live in her hometown.

Meredith (Coleman) McGee, who has worked for the Mississippi Association of Cooperatives, Voice of Calvary Ministries, and Southern Echo, is a candidate for a master's degree from Antioch University. Her RDLN Field Project has been to develop new training on redistricting for people in the Mississippi Delta.