Our Values

Commitment to LEADership
At the Sunflower County Freedom Project, we believe that education is the seed of freedom. Our students, staff and interns all speak in the language of LEAD: Love, Education, Action and Discipline. Without a challenging, achievement-oriented education, children in the Mississippi Delta will be as powerless in the future as were illiterate sharecroppers in the twentieth century. 

The Sunflower County Freedom Project is a non-profit organization dedicated to educational excellence and leadership development in Sunflower County, Mississippi. We use the history and spirit of the 1960's freedom struggle to motivate young people to become capable and compassionate leaders in their communities.

The Freedom Project was founded by Chris Myers Asch, Shawn Raymond, and Gregg Costa in 1998. All three had served as Teach for America/Americorps teachers in Sunflower County and were thus acutely aware of the need for an educational program that would challenge and engage young people in the area.

Initially a summer program held at Mississippi Delta Community College, the Freedom Project grew into a year-round fellowship with a residential summer program at the University of Mississippi. In 2002, we purchased two abandoned buildings in Sunflower, Mississippi, and built the LEAD Center, a permanent home for all our programs.

The Freedom Project offers middle and high school students intensive academic enrichment, mentoring, educational travel, physical education, and art classes. Since, 1999, Freedom Fellows have graduated from Sunflower County high schools and enrolled in colleges around the country. 

Sarah Riback

Director of Literacy Programming

Ms. Riback is originally from Baltimore, Maryland. She attended the University of Maryland, College Park where she studied sociology & English. Ms. Riback is grateful for her first encounters with the Freedom Project, first as a young student visiting Sunflower, and then as a returning teacher-advisor with the Rosedale Freedom Project. She most recently taught English in Clarksdale, MS at W.A. Higgins Middle School. She is so excited to work with Freedom Fellows to grow, build community, take risks, and ask questions.

sHIRLENCIA smITH

Americorps VISTA Member

Ms. Smith is a Sunflower County Freedom Project Alumni. She is a resident in Sunflower County. She is excited to be an AmeriCorps VISTA Member and is motivated to do his part to alleviate and defeat poverty in the United States. She is also excited to continue her journey with the SCFP, grow the community, and contribute to more community involvement.

Chris Perkins

Board Chair
Former SCFP Program Director/Freedom Fellow

Out-of-school-time programming has been a part of Chris Perkins' success since the 7th grade when he joined the Sunflower County Freedom Project. Chris often says that for him “Freedom Project staff took a shy D student who had never really considered being anything more and turned him into an outspoken A student who could seriously consider college.”  After graduating from the Freedom Project, Chris moved to Kentucky to attend Berea College and graduated with a degree in African and African American Studies.  After college, Chris returned to Mississippi to work as the Program Director of the Freedom Project. Since then, Chris has moved to Washington DC and has served as Higher Achievement's Lead Manager of Instruction, where he assisted in recruiting and managing more than 70 volunteers, as well as transforming the Ward 7 Center into the organization's first single school site. Currently Chris is Higher Achievement’s Manager of Volunteer Recruitment and Development where he recruits and trains more than 400 volunteers and manages corporate partnerships.

Trey Peacock

Board TREASURER

A native of Beaumont, Texas, Trey is a successful attorney and partner at Susman Godfrey LLC in Houston, TX. He graduated with Honors from Princeton University and from University of Texas School of Law, where he was Managing Editor of the Texas Law Review, Order of the Coif, and a Chancellor.  After law school, Trey clerked for the Honorable Joseph T. Sneed on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, California.

Trey has been active on non-profit boards in Houston for many years, including the Alley Theater. In his spare time, he is an avid fly fisherman and snow boarder and participates in triathlons. Trey learned about the SCFP from co-founder, and Susman Godfrey colleague, Shawn Raymond and has been a long-time supporter of the organization before joining the board in May 2018.

Shequite Wilson-Johnson

BOARD SECRETARY
SCFP parent

An Indianola native, Shequite is happily married with three beautiful children who continuously teach her the power of love and family. Shequite currently works for the Sunflower County Consolidated School District. She is enrolled in the graduate program at Mississippi Valley State University, studying Rural Public Policy and Planning with a concentration in Non-Profit Management. With the proper education and experience, Shequite plans to continue working in the non-profit sector and eventually run for office in Sunflower County. She serves on Save the Children Policy Council, acts as a CARES mentor at Lockard and Carver Elementary School, and leads the Girl Scout troops # 30200 and 30123. She is passionate about helping youth and LOVES being a mother.

Nick Allen

BOARD MEMBER
FORMER SCFP Executive Director 2011-2013

Nick taught fourth grade math in Clarksdale, Mississippi for two years as part of the Teach for America program. Inspired by the mission and spirit of the organization, Nick joined the Freedom Project in 2011 as Executive Director.  His favorite memories of his time in Sunflower include camping trips, logic problems, study sessions, drama performances, shout outs, capture the flag, and football on the slab.  Nick lives in California where he continues to be involved in mentoring, strategy, and fundraising for the SCFP. 

Thad Fairley

Board Member

Thad is a native of  Sunflower, MS and currently resides in Indianola, MS. He serves as the Mississippi Delta area Program Officer for Hope Federal Credit Union.  In this capacity, he is responsible for a variety of duties including membership outreach to community organizations, churches, and employers; developing partnerships with groups that can provide business outcomes with HOPE’s financial products and services; credit counseling and financial education to HOPE members. He also assists the organization with managing investor relationships by discussing the impact that Hope has in the Delta.
Thad’s career, prior to joining Hope in 2015, consisted of 5 years in the areas of banking, sales, and collections. He is a an Honors graduate of Mississippi Valley State University, where he served as the President of the Student Government Association. He is currently pursuing his Masters of Science in Non Profit Administration with a specialization in Non-Profit Development from Louisiana State University at Shreveport. He and his wife of 6 years, Felicia, have two sons, Thad Jr and Joshua Rashad.

LUKENDRIC WASHINGTON

BOARD MEMBER
FREEDOM PROJECT NETWORK REPRESENTATIVE
FoRMER FREEDOM FELLOW

Luke is a Moorhead, MS native, graduate of Gentry High School in Indianola, and alumnus of the Sunflower County Freedom Project. College trips with the SCFP to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill convinced Luke to pursue his undergraduate degree at UNC where he made the Dean’s List and became the BSM Homecoming King. After graduating, Luke earned a law degree at Florida A&M College of Law and then an LLM degree in Taxation at the University of Miami School of Law. Since then, he has enjoyed a career that includes Bankruptcy Law, Estate Planning, and Corporate Law & Accounting. He now works in the area of Wealth Management as an entrepreneur where he combines his law, accounting, and investment skills to help families plan their finances.

Chris Myers-Asch

A native of Washington, D.C., Chris Myers Asch came to Sunflower with Teach For America in 1994. After four years in the classroom (including a year in South Korea), he helped launch the Freedom Project in 1998 and ran the program until 2006. He has done many things since – earned a doctorate in history, worked to build the U.S. Public Service Academy, wrote a book, taught at a university – but his best job may always be the years he spent as “Mr. Myers,” the head of the SCFP. He and his wife, Erica, have three children. 

Shawn Raymond

Shawn taught a variety of subjects at Ruleville Central High School for two years as part of the Teach for America and Americorps programs.  While in law school, he teamed up with his former TFA roommates, Gregg and Chris, to create the Freedom Project.  He’s a partner at Susman Godfrey L.L.P. in Houston, Texas – a law firm that successfully recruited him by making what at the time was the largest single donation the Freedom Project had ever received.  Shawn enjoys taking his four sons for visits to Sunflower to see the incredible things happening at the Freedom Project.

Gregg Costa

Gregg taught 3rd and 4th grade for two years at East Sunflower Elementary as part of Teach for America.  Gregg and Freedom Project Co-Founder Chris Myers were the first Teach for America teachers ever placed in the town of Sunflower.  After his time in Sunflower, Gregg returned to his home state of Texas to attend law school and practice law.  Gregg is now a federal judge in Texas, where he relies on the classroom management techniques he learned in the Delta to help control a group that is far more unruly than his former students--lawyers. 

Directions

From the South:
From highway 49W, enter the Town of Sunflower on Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd. Follow the road until you reach the first stop sign. At the stop, make a Left through town. At the first stop, make a right. The LEAD Center is the large white building on the right.

From the North: 
From highway 49W, enter the Town of Sunflower on Quiver Road. Follow Quiver until you reach the first stop sign. Continue through the stop. At the next stop sign, make a right. The LEAD Center is the large white building on the right.

Email

Site Director // valerie.simpson@freedomprojectnetwork.org

Director of Literary Programming // sarah.riback@freedomprojectnetwork.org

OFFICE HOURS

Monday to Friday // 12:00pm – 7:30pm

Our Sister Project

The Freedom Project Network https://www.freedomprojectnetwork.org/
The Meridian Freedom Project themeridianfreedomproject.com
The Rosedale Freedom Project rosedalefreedom.org