The Andrew Goodman Foundation Announces Recipients of 2011 Hidden Heroes Awards

The Andrew Goodman Foundation (andrewgoodman.org) is pleased to
announce the recipients of the 2011 Hidden Heroes Awards.

The winners are:
Deborah Bial, President and Founder, Posse Foundation
Yusuf Burgess, Family Intervention Specialist, Green Tech High Charter School
Susan Retik, President and Co-Founder, Beyond the 11th
The Rev. Nicholas S. Richards, President, The Abyssinian Fund

Mayor David Dinkins will also accept a Lifetime Achievement award at the Hidden Heroes event.

The recipients will be honored at a ceremony, hosted by DeMarco Morgan, NBC News Anchor, at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem, NY on November 20, 2011.

The Hidden Heroes program aims to inspire, educate and reward people who take personal responsibility for healing the world - carrying on the spirit and the love that inspired Andrew Goodman to travel to Mississippi in 1964. Hidden Heroes are ordinary people who are doing extraordinary things to change the world for the
better. Our award honors and supports social activism that gets results.

The Hidden Heroes Award is presented each year to four individuals whose work exemplifies the Foundation’s origins and mission: promoting human dignity, civil rights and social justice through actions characterized by great personal initiative, selflessness, fearlessness, compassion, imagination, and achievement.

Posse Foundation, Deborah Bial, for creating a foundation that identifies outstanding young leaders/scholars from diverse backgrounds, sends them in teams (Posses) to college and ensures that they persist in their academic studies and graduate, so they can take on leadership positions in all walks of life. www.possefoundation.org

Green Tech High Charter School, Brother Yusuf Burgess, founder of the Environmental Awareness Network for Diversity in Conservation and New York’s representative on the Children and Nature Network, for creating an organization that fosters youth development, environmental education and is in the forefront as friend and mentor to many underserved urban young people committed to environmental awareness. Brother Yusuf’s approach is to take youth on camping, boating, hunting, fishing, hiking and skiing excursions into the Catskills and Adirondack Mountains in the Albany, NY area. www.greentechhigh.org and www.childrenandnature.org

Beyond the 11th, Susan Retik, a 9/11 widow herself, for creating a foundation that increases awareness of the desperate situation of widows in Afghanistan, and raising funds to help them. By providing grants and partnering with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) on the ground in Afghanistan, they fund education and income-generation opportunities that are sustainable and culturally appropriate to assist women to regain their lives. www.beyondthe11th.org

The Abyssinian Fund, The Rev. Nicholas S. Richards, for creating a foundation to develop and create greater economic opportunity for Ethiopian Coffee Farmers and their families. Abyssinian Fund partners with farming communities to provide training and equipment with the goal of producing and selling high quality coffee in the United States and globally. Additionally, it supports sustainable development programs in clean water, healthcare and education. www.abyfund.org

Andrew Goodman, a 20 year old college student, along with James Chaney and Michael Schwerner, were murdered June 21, 1964 in Neshoba County, Mississippi, while participating in “Freedom Summer” – a voter registration project in Mississippi to expand black voting in the South. The Andrew Goodman Foundation was created in 1966 by Robert and Carolyn Goodman to honor the spirit and the purpose of their son Andy’s life. Carolyn Goodman led the foundation until her death in 2007 at the age of 91. Today, Andy’s brother, David, and other family and stakeholder members continue to bring the story of Andy’s life and social contribution into public view with the intention of inspiring and supporting the kind of change that brings peace and justice to all.

More information about the awards is available at www.andrewgoodman.org/our_agf_award.html or on Facebook.

The Andrew Goodman Foundation’s mission is to recognize, encourage and inspire creative and effective action in support of social justice, human dignity and civil rights.

The Andrew Goodman Foundation
Melissa Brady
Administrative Director
P.O. Box 394
Mahwah, NJ 07430
info@AndrewGoodman.org
(201) 995-1808 ext. 11

This release was published on openPR.