Honoring Selma’s Legacy, Building Selma’s Future: Our 2025 Impact

In 2025, Selma stood at a crossroads. Families were navigating deepening poverty, crumbling infrastructure, and reduced access to essentials like SNAP, while new threats to Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act put hard-won civil rights protections at risk. At the same time, the spirit of the 1965 foot soldiers continued to guide us toward action, courage, and community power.

At Foot Soldiers Park, we’re on a mission to preserve Selma’s civil rights history, create opportunities for Black residents to heal, learn, and build wealth, and embolden youth to claim and use their power for change. Our 2025 impact report Step by Step, Building Power and Resilience shares how, with the support of donors, partners, and community members, we expanded our work across five key impact areas: Historic Preservation, Civil Rights in Action, Youth Engagement, Building Wealth, and Whole Self Health.

Read Foot Soldiers Park 2025 Impact Report here.

Keeping Selma’s history alive

Historic Preservation sits at the heart of Foot Soldiers Park. In 2025, our Historic Tours of Selma welcomed 4,143 visitors: from federal judges and corporate groups to churches, schools, and nonprofits, visitors learned first-hand accounts of Bloody Sunday and Selma’s role in the fight for voting rights. We continued to collect oral histories from 1965 foot soldiers, building a digital archive that preserves untold stories and strengthens the public record.

We also marked the 60th anniversary of Bloody Sunday as both a commemoration and a call to action, bringing together thousands of visitors and a new class of Youth Advisory Board members. By connecting past sacrifice to present-day leadership, we are turning Selma’s history into a living, community-driven asset.

Civil rights in action today

Selma is globally recognized as the birthplace of voting rights, yet civic participation remains low and trust in government fragile. In response, we strengthened our Civil Rights in Action work by expanding our Civic Engagement Corps (CEC), Footprints K–12 civic education program, and voter education and registration efforts for adults.

In 2025, our CEC team of Selma residents trained in civic education, history, and organizing, distributed 10,000 voter registration cards, completed 4,290 voter outreach calls, and logged 3,665 hours of canvassing, phone banking, events, and training. Their efforts in the community helped increase voter turnout by 20 percent among our target population.

Investing in the next generation

At Foot Soldiers Park, we believe young people are not just future leaders, they are leaders right now. Through our Youth Engagement impact area, we expanded the National Youth Advisory Board (YAB), where young people led community service, organized public discussions, and supported local schools while building their own leadership skills.

YAB members presented to mayors from around the world, took over the courtroom during Selma’s 2025 Bloody Sunday mock trial, and competed in an oratorical contest that highlighted youth voice and courage. Building on this momentum, we worked to design the Foot Soldiers Park Youth Leaders program, launching in July of 2026, to provide a year-long immersive leadership development experience for high school students that includes civic learning, financial literacy, mentoring, and a capstone project.

We also launched the Jo Ann Bland Civil Rights Legacy Scholarship, awarding two Selma-area students who are descendants of foot soldiers to pursue their education at Auburn University and Tuskegee University. The scholarship honors Ms. Bland’s legacy and her unwavering commitment to youth.

Building wealth and financial freedom

Economic justice is a core part of our vision for Selma. In 2025, we piloted BUILD UP, a K–12 financial education and empowerment program that engaged 111 high school students in just three weeks. Students learned practical skills in banking, budgeting, credit, loans, investing, and understanding the racial wealth gap, and participated in a real-money stock simulation. The program was developed in partnership with Professor Joshua Pierce of the University of Alabama and ensures Selma students receive consistent, high-quality learning opportunities regardless of background or school resources. BUILD UP is part of our broader Building Wealth strategy that also includes the launch of the Community Resource Center, a free online hub connecting residents to resources in financial literacy, workforce readiness, entrepreneurship, and homeownership.

Art, culture, and community events

Art and culture are central to how Foot Soldiers Park builds connection and community pride. In 2025, we launched the inaugural Selma Cinema Festival at the historic Walton Theatre, bringing together filmmakers and young people from Selma to Appalachia and beyond. We also hosted the 6th Photographic Nights of Selma, gathering more than 30 photographers from the U.S. and Europe and over 1,000 attendees for evenings of images, music, and dialogue.

Our Still We Rise Juneteenth celebration brought together residents, youth, foot soldiers, elected officials, and partners, and extended to national audiences through a SiriusXM interview and an op-ed by CEO Kimberly Smitherman calling for action beyond remembrance.

Looking ahead and honoring Ms. Bland’s vision

This report is a tribute to our co-founder Jo Ann Bland who passed away in February 2026. Everything in these pages reflects her determination to fight injustice and her bold vision: Selma should be a place where people come to be rejuvenated, to revitalize, and to go in their communities and help change the world. We invite you to read the full 2025 Impact Report and join us in carrying this vision forward.

Read the 2025 Impact Report

Thank you to our donors, partners and supporters

Our work and impact is possible because of the community members, partners, donors and funders who stood with us in 2025 and helped us bring Jo Ann Bland’s vision for Selma closer to reality.