End of Year Reports:
Each year, we continue to grow. For the sake of transparency, we prepare these end-of-year reports to let the public know the impact their support has on the work we do for our schools and communities.
2024 Report
Introduction
The MO Equity Education Partnership (MOEEP) began in 2021 as a grassroots movement in support of equity in our schools. Since that time, we have expanded our mission to not just address equity in schools, but also in our communities and state. We believe that our organizational mission includes four primary areas: Education, Activism, Advocacy, and Support. Each of our teams consider these four areas as they plan and execute events through either MO Equity Education Partnership (501c3) or MO Equity Education Partnership–Action (501c4).
During 2024, we continued to grow and develop. This report will outline some of our successes, as well as our areas of growth for 2025.
Marketing and Communications
Our marketing efforts are key to our ability to organize. We use social media and other means to communicate with supporters, to ensure that the community is informed, and plan actions in support of equity.
Followers: Total audience is 7038 as of December 31, 2024.
*Please note that we deleted our Twitter account and sought to develop our audience on platforms more conducive to furthering our work.
Facebook and Instagram–MO Equity Education Partnership
TikTok–@ MOEquity
Email list sign-up: https://www.missouriequity.com/sign-up-movement
Programs and Community Engagement
In 2024, MOEEP sponsored a range of impactful events designed to build community, strengthen advocacy, and advance equity statewide. Our events brought together diverse members and volunteers, expanded public understanding of equity issues, and mobilized individuals to advocate for meaningful change.
Breaking Bread Social Event
Members and volunteers gathered to share diverse ethnic foods and connect in a relaxed, welcoming environment. The event strengthened relationships and affirmed community as a central value of MOEEP.
Advocacy Day
Held in March, Advocacy Day provided members the opportunity to meet directly with legislators, discuss the impact of proposed policies, and advocate for the interests and needs of their communities.
Trivia in Pursuit of Equity Night
This high-energy event brought entertainment and purpose together, raising nearly $7,000 through trivia competition and a successful silent auction. Funds supported MOEEP’s ongoing programs and advocacy efforts.
Educational Sessions & Skill Building
A series of sessions featured guest speakers addressing community activism, local needs, and the implications of current legislation. Members also engaged in the ongoing fight against book banning and efforts to protect diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility in education.
Additionally, a “Five Things to Do Now” workshop equipped participants with tools to share their stories and advocate for equitable learning environments.
Legislative Preview
Sponsored through MOEEPA, the Legislative Preview offered members a clear overview of upcoming bills and prepared them to engage in informed legislative advocacy.
“What’s the Big IDEA?” Storytelling Event
This event brought together community members, educators, and leaders to share how equity shaped their lives and relationships. It was the most powerful and inspiring event MOEEP hosted this year, fostering reflection, empathy, and collective purpose.
The Equity Fair
A celebratory event that highlighted the contributions of educators and community leaders across the state. Featuring live music, vendors, and games, the fair embodied the spirit of equity, connection, and community joy.
Impact
Across these events, MOEEP deepened engagement, expanded advocacy capacity, and celebrated the individuals driving equity work in Missouri. By fostering community, collaborating with policymakers, and uplifting diverse voices, MOEEP advanced its mission to create a more equitable and inclusive state.
Education and Youth Council (EYC) and District Captain Program
Through our Education and Youth Council (EYC), we partner with individuals in school districts across Missouri to build local organizing capacity in support of educational equity. These leaders, known as MOEEP District Captains, receive ongoing training in organizing skills and support in developing district-specific strategies to advance equity-focused initiatives.
This year, we had active District Captains in the following school districts:
Francis Howell
Kirkwood
Mehlville
Nixa
Northwest
Parkway
Rockwood
Wentzville
We continue to recruit additional District Captains with the long-term goal of establishing a chapter or affiliate equity group in every school district in the state. Individuals interested in learning more about the District Captain role are encouraged to contact Executive Director Heather Fleming at info@missouriequity.com.
Coalitions
MOEEP has always been committed to the coalition-building process, believing that we will only be able to achieve our goals through collective power-building with other stakeholders in our state and country. Below is a brief summary of the coalitions we have proudly participated in over the past year.
The Let Them Learn/Y’all Means All Coalition
This coalition was organized at the end of 2021 and began its work in 2022 with a number of statewide organizations who wanted to coordinate our efforts to defeat anti-equity bills and their proponents. In 2023, we expanded this coalition to include a collaboration with PROMO (a pro-LGBTQ civil rights organization) because we realized that anti-equity forces were also heavily focusing on removing LGBTQ rights in addition to attacking equity and belonging for all minority stakeholders. Through this coalition, we have been able to organize stakeholder groups who wished to testify, hold rallies and events in support of equity for all, and advocate strongly for more effective policy to support all citizens of MO. We continue to add organizations, advocates, and concerned citizens to this group each session.
The Unite Against Book Bans Campaign
This is a national campaign organized through the American Library Association. The purpose is to fight against attempts throughout the nation to ban books and lower access to diverse stories. MOEEP joined with a number of national organizations to support this effort. Our executive director Heather Fleming serves as a member of the coordinating committee of this campaign, as well as the chair of the Policy and Legislative Subcommittee. For this effort, she has helped plan coordinated campaigns in support of free access to literature, written a blog post encouraging average citizens and advocates to use their voices, and worked to inform the work that the subcommittee will be doing in 2024.
National Right To Read Coalition
This coalition was created by the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) and works to keep organization leaders of all types informed about how to fight book bans throughout the country. They provide educational opportunities for organizers to learn about the effective actions of other organizations and to make connections between leaders committed to educational freedom.
MO Right to Read Coalition
As our state faces more attacks on the right to read, a number of state-based organizations came together to create this coalition to address these attacks, provide information to proponents of the freedom to read, and to organize to push back against the policies and people who seek to ban books.
Financial Report
This year, MOEEP was able to raise more money than in previous years because of our 501(c)3 designation which made donations to the organization tax-deductible. The bulk of our funding came from small donors who gave through our $23 for 2023 campaign. However, we did receive a few donations from organizations, as well, which we will list below.
Total Revenue: $66,069.29
This amount includes large donations from the following:
Ben and Jerry’s Foundation National Grassroots Grant–$25,000
Deaconess Foundation “Seeding The Future” Grant–$20,000
It also includes individual donations totaling 17,996.78, as well as $3067.51 paid for consulting services.
Total Expenditures: $73,588.60
MO Equity Education Partnership–Action
While most of the work we do falls under the umbrella of our 501(c)3 portion of the organization, MO Equity Education Partnership–Action (MOEEP-A) is the 501(c)4 portion of our organization. MOEEP-A, like MOEEP, is non-partisan but maintains the same mission and vision as we work through the political process to advocate for equitable outcomes in our schools and communities. We do this through two specific teams: our Political Action and Legal Team which is responsible for monitoring and disseminating information to our partner organizations and members before, during, and after the legislative session each year; and the Special Projects Team that is responsible for our Candidate Scorecard process for school board, mid-term, and general elections.
Political Action and Legal Team
Leader–Dava-Leigh Brush
This Legislative Session, MoEEP worked hard to change hearts, minds and actions.
Legislation Monitoring
We monitored at some level over 250 of about 2700 bills between both chambers. There were some that we monitored actively and for the duration; others were dropped when they didn’t go anywhere.
◾99 bills stopped at the outset by never getting assigned to a committee
◾32 stopped at the committee level by not getting a hearing or not getting a vote
◾45 bills made it to a floor calendar in a single chamber.
◾15 bills were voted out of the original chamber and crossed over to the other one to repeat the process; some debated and others not
◾5 bills were Truly Agreed to and Finally Passed and became law. Two were budget bills we supported. We opposed three of the bills: defunding Planned Parenthood; expanding the auditor to possibly review curriculum; expanding the voucher program and restructuring education funding as part of an omnibus bill;
The Big Picture:
When reviewing the legislative priorities set at the start of the 2024 session, we advocated with partners to stop bills that failed to align with our vision. Bills that would censor curriculum, erode trust between parents and educators, and directly harm the transgender community stalled in committee. While SB 727, the voucher/omnibus, passed with exactly enough votes to do so and after adding over 100 pages of incentives, an open enrollment bill stalled in the Senate after barely passing the House because these bills do not have broad support among rural communities. Bills that would lead to voter suppression and harm the LGBTQIA+ community failed to cross the finish line again due to a combined effort of community advocacy and testimony, efforts of the Democratic Caucus, and dysfunction among the Republican and Freedom Caucuses.
We also advocated for bills that prohibited discrimination, protected women of color, prohibit child marriage, regulate firearms, provide childcare relief to families, and work to create curricula to teach respectfully about marginalized communities. Sadly, the same dysfunction that stopped bills we opposed also stopped these bills.
The Difference We Made:
First, we need to acknowledge that the Missouri Democratic Caucus worked tenaciously throughout the session to stop and/or amend a variety of bills and topics which ran counter to MOEEP’s values and vision. The Senate Democrats filibustered multiple times to keep bills from moving.
MOEEP increased our activity in Jefferson City this session. We had members and leadership at both Lobby Day and the Missourians for Constitutional Freedom rally. Members and/or Leadership of MOEEP traveled to Jefferson City 12 of 20 weeks, and testified in person 18 days; some days we attended multiple hearings. We called for testimony 67 times (in person and/or online) via our Calls to Action or Legislative Updates. There were over 6,000 witness testimony submissions in person or online for bills we monitored, and 85% of that testimony aligned with the MoEEP position. MoEEP members/leadership accounted for 11% of official testimony as well as over 1,300 additional contacts via email or phone calls to representatives and senators based on the contactmoleg email address we used to track off-the-record outreach.
🗳️Voting alignment
During the 2022 election, MoEEP vetted all candidates through an equity lens using a survey and publicly available information, including past voting record to place candidates The voting records of the bills we tracked demonstrate that our process is highly accurate. A 100% or 0% voting record is rare for a variety of reasons. This session, we had 12 representatives and 10 senators whose votes aligned 100% with our position. (One other Senator shows as 100% but he voted only 3 times and these were budget votes.) Only one senator was 0% aligned and he will not be returning to either chamber in 2025.
We look at bills exclusively through a DEI lens. Sometimes bills have things added to them after committee votes that give us pause. Sometimes our state leaders vote PRESENT as a statement, and those are calculated lower than a full SUPPORT and higher than OPPOSE. Also, our leaders have a varying number of votes in the calculus because of committee assignments. The data below reflects the average voting percentage of legislators/senators in a particular category aligned with our organizational positions and values.
Note: The senate had half of the senators who didn’t have an election and are reflected as “leans.”
PRO-EQUITY: House 93.54%, Senate 100%
UNCLEAR: House 54.51%, Senate 66.67%
ANTI-EQUITY: House: 32.52%, Senate 38.55
Senators with no election: Leans Equity: 100%, Leans Anti-Equity 45.24%, Unclear 25.24%
These numbers are similar to last years’ records. There was only one representative whose voting record (38.5%) did not align with her pro-equity survey/online information. This demonstrates that our process is solid!
💡FINAL THOUGHTS
We worked diligently, along with other advocates, to convince both chambers that voucher expansion would ultimately harm Missouri students, but those handling that bill added enough incentive to drag it over the finish line. It is easy to focus on what we were unable to accomplish, and it’s necessary to do so to course correct. It is necessary to remind ourselves what we did accomplish.In addition to direct testimony on legislation and reaching out to elected officials, MOEEP made connections to legislators and senators across the aisle; building connections is what can make the most difference. The 2025 session will look very different from 2024 because there is a high turnover rate in House, but we will continue to build connections with new elected leaders, other advocates, legislative staff, and associations to ensure MOEEP’s voice, the voices of our members, and the voices of folks who might not be able to express themselves,are heard.
We thank our supporters for all they have done, continue to do, and will do towards that end.
Special Projects Team
Leader–Ken Susman
This year, the Special Projects Team worked to revise the previous year’s process to more closely align with the one utilized for the 2022 Midterm Election scorecard, incorporating best practices discovered at that time. The results of this revised process are outlined below.
Time frame: November - April
November-mid-December: working on setting up structures and procedures
Late-December-January: reaching out to school districts to gather candidate names and contact information
January-early March: reaching out to candidates, researching candidates, grading candidates, building scorecard data presentation
Early March - April 4: endorsing candidates, sharing and boosting messages, working to get targeted voters to the polls
By the numbers
Total districts with MoEEP outreach: 559
Surveys returned:
42 candidates in 25 districts, 17 counties represented
Final scores of candidates who participated:
Endorsed!: 18
Pro-Equity: 7
Unsure: 6
Not Enough Info: 0
Anti-Equity: 11
Final scores of candidates who did NOT participate:
Endorsed!: 0
Pro-Equity: 17
Unsure: 0
Not Enough Info: 50
Anti-Equity: 12
Many candidates were left unscored. We graded every candidate in every district where a candidate participated, but left many other districts untouched. This was a decision made to protect the time of both the volunteers and the candidates who participated. We still scored 121 candidates statewide, and were able to endorse or approve of over ⅓ of those candidates.
The results
Statewide
Endorsed candidates won 72% of their races (13 / 18)
Pro-equity candidates won 71% of their races (17 / 24)
Anti-equity candidates won 8% of their races (2 / 24)
Where did our candidates make major gains?
St. Charles County swung hard against equity in April 2023, but swung back even harder in April 2024.
Overall
Endorsed candidates: 3 out of 3 won (100%)
Pro-equity candidates: 5 out of 5 won (100%)
Anti-equity candidates: 0 out of 4 won (0%)
By district
Ft. Zumwalt: of the two winners, one was Endorsed, and one was Pro-Equity. We did not have enough information about the two candidates who lost.
Francis Howell: both Pro-Equity candidates won, and both Anti-Equity candidates lost
Wentzville: of the two winners, one was Endorsed, and one was Pro-Equity, and both Anti-Equity candidates lost
Orchard Farms: of the two winners, one was Endorsed, and one was Pro-Equity, and the candidate who was Not Enough Info lost
Other positive notes:
In St. Louis County, only one Anti-Equity candidate won (Kirkwood), while 7 lost
In Boone, Callaway, Cape Girardeau, Christian, Clay, Cooper, Jefferson, Lincoln, Oregon, Osage, Platte, Reynolds, Washington, and Wright Counties (the counties other than Jackson, St. Louis, and St. Charles), zero Anti-Equity candidates won, zero Endorsed candidates lost, and only three Pro-Equity candidates lost.
Comparing year over year is difficult, but our win rates for both Endorsed and Pro-Equity candidates are up approximately twenty percent each.