The OYF Spring Convening 2026 | Montgomery, AL

event

From Legacy to Liberation: Truth, Transformation, and a Collective Future

Gathering in Montgomery

This Spring, the Opportunity Youth Forum (OYF) will gather in community at the Legacy Sites in Montgomery, Alabama—a place where the past is not distant, but present; where the ground itself carries memory; and where the story of the United States is etched in truth-telling that refuses silence.

This gathering is not simply a convening.
It is a journey.

A journey toward truth. Toward remembrance. Toward healing. And toward the renewal of our shared responsibility to young people, to community, and to one another.

Across the Opportunity Youth Forum network, we work to transform the systems that shape opportunity in this country—education, workforce, justice, health, our civic infrastructure, and the broader institutions that determine whether young people can meaningfully live, learn, belong, work and thrive. Yet beneath every system are human stories: stories of struggle and resilience, exclusion and belonging, loss and possibility, stolen dignity and liberation, historical disinvestment and transformative opportunity, marginalization and collective healing, love and grief . To understand the present moment—and rebuild toward a more equitable future—we must begin not only with policy or structure, but with memory and the courage of truth-telling.

Montgomery invites us into that beginning.

We come to Montgomery in a moment of profound uncertainty and divides across our nation. Around the country, hard-won progress toward racial equity and civil rights is being questioned, restricted, and in many cases rolled back. At the same time, communities continue to organize, dream, and build toward a more just future.

Gathering in Montgomery is therefore not only symbolic but necessary—as this moment asks something more of us, collectively. We are honored to invite a diverse community of OYF network members to gather in Montgomery from May 12–15, 2026. Together, we will visit the Equal Justice Initiative’s Legacy Sites to encounter our shared history and reflect on how the past continues to shape our present—including the future of our democracy, our communities, and our young people.

The Historical Present Weight of History – the past continues to live with our present

The American story is inseparable from histories of enslavement, racial terror, displacement, and exclusion. These consequences continue to shape lives and systems today. From the institution of slavery and the racialized systems that followed—Jim Crow segregation, disenfranchisement, and mass incarceration—to the persistent inequities shaping access to education, economic mobility, safety, and belonging today, the past continues to live within our present. These forces have disproportionately shaped the lives of Black, Brown, Indigenous, immigrant, and other marginalized communities, and they remain deeply connected to the conditions that disconnect millions of young people from opportunity.

These histories are not abstractions. They live in neighborhoods, schools, courtrooms, and workforce environments. They shape who is safe, who is seen, who is heard, who has access to opportunity, and who belongs. They also shape the lives of millions of young people across our country—especially those pushed to the margins of education and employment not by lack of talent or aspiration, but by the accumulated weight of structural injustice and economic inequality.

Truth-telling mirrors our country and its present-state back to itself, revealing how institutions were shaped, whose voices were excluded, and why dismantling inequity requires more than incremental change. It requires remembering. Rebuilding our futures and collective healing—whether for individuals, communities, or nations—begins when truth is told and acknowledged.

The legacy museums in Montgomery embody this act of remembrance. Through powerful art, visual storytelling, archival record, and the voices of resistance and resilience, these spaces trace the continuum from slavery to the modern justice system—illuminating how history’s stain endures while also honoring the courage of those who struggled for freedom. They remind us that “hopelessness is the enemy of justice, and that memory itself is a form of resistance,” Bryan Stevenson, founder of the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI).

Our Collective Journey Toward Equity, Belonging, and Healing

For more than a decade, the Aspen Institute Forum for Community Solutions and the Opportunity Youth Forum have worked alongside young people and communities nationwide to dismantle systemic barriers that prevent youth from accessing opportunity, wellbeing, and belonging. From the beginning, this work has been rooted in racial and structural equity, shaped by the understanding that youth disconnection is not an individual failure but the predictable outcome of systems that were never designed to serve all young people.

Across the country, OYF collaboratives are transforming education and workforce pathways, investing in holistic supports, elevating youth leadership, and building cross-sector partnerships to transform fragmented systems into sustainable socio-economic mobility pathways. This work reflects a deeper commitment: not only to reconnect young people to opportunity, but to help build a society where opportunity is no longer determined by race, place, or circumstance — all rooted in the belief that every person deserves to participate, prosper, and thrive in society and beyond.

Gathering in Montgomery represents a pivotal chapter of pause, remembrance, and reflection—a meaningful turning point within our shared journey together.

Over the years, OYF convenings have centered themes of racial justice, democratic belonging, love, healing, and collective liberation. Artists, young leaders, practitioners, and scholars across our network have called us to imagine systems rooted in dignity rather than punishment, care rather than exclusion, and solidarity rather than othering. Past OYF convening speakers and leaders in the field such as Dr. Shawn Ginwright, Arnold Chandler, Desmond Meade, among others, have guided us to understand the interwoven complexities that shape, and meaningfully connect, our past, present, and future.

Dr. Shawn Ginwright, articulated the healing justice vision through healing-centered frameworks that have deepened our understanding that lasting systems change must also be relational, cultural, and soul-deep. Arnold Chandler, has guided us toward a deeper understanding of structural racism, including its presence across our communities, institutions, and in everyday society. Desmond Meade, enlightened us with how democratic processes work in light of restoring voting rights and civic participation. These leaders, along with many others, have helped shape collective learning. These and many other visionary voices have graced our convenings over the years—inviting us to look honestly at the past so we may more clearly imagine and build the just futures our communities and young people deserve.

See featured content from past convenings in the appendix below, that informs our learning arc.

The Experience We Will Create Together – Montgomery as Sacred Ground for Truth-Telling

In Montgomery, truth is made visible. This convening is designed as an immersive collective journey of learning, reflection, and collective imagination—one that moves through remembrance toward renewal. Participants will engage with history not as distant observers, but as witnesses whose present-day work is part of an unfolding story. Through guided museum visits, facilitated dialogue, artistic and cultural expression, and intentional space for personal and collective reflection, breathing, and healing, the experience will cultivate:

Historical grounding that connects structural racism to present-day systems through storytelling
Shared community and reflection that honors grief, resilience, resistance, love, and hope
Healing-centered community rooted in belonging, trust, relational solidarity and mutual care
Strategic imagination and courage to bear witness, dismantle inequities, and transform systems to expand opportunity

At the Legacy Museum, visitors walk through four centuries of American history—from the transatlantic slave trade to the modern crisis of mass incarceration—encountering stories carried through testimony, art, and memory. On the site of a former cotton warehouse where enslaved people were once forced to labor, the museum invites us to witness lives too often erased from public narrative.

At the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, more than 4,400 victims of racial terror lynching are named. Steel columns hang in quiet formation, each representing a county where lynching violence occurred. Standing among them, the immense moral weight of remembrance is present.

At the Freedom Monument Sculpture Park, overlooking the Alabama River where enslaved people were trafficked, art and landscape create space for reflection on courage, love, resistance, and survival.

Together, these sites form more than a museum complex. They are a place of pilgrimage. A transformative space that invites us into a journey of remembering as an act of courage. A call to conscience. Truth is spoken aloud and shared in community. And in doing so, they open the possibility of collective healing and reconciliation.

In walking these grounds together, we affirm that our work for young people is inseparable from the histories that shaped the present—and from the futures we are called to build.

“History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, however, if faced with courage, need not be lived again.” – Maya Angelou

Participation, Care, and Collective Support

To support a meaningful and transformative experience, we are thoughtfully curating participation so that a diverse range of network members are able to fully engage with the depth of this journey. As capacity at the Legacy Sites and within our facilitated experience is limited, we are prioritizing participation from Opportunity Youth Forum community collaboratives. At the same time, we warmly encourage all members of the broader network who may not be able to join this convening to consider visiting the Legacy Sites independently, as these spaces offer profound opportunities for learning, remembrance, and reflection.

The journey through Montgomery invites truth-telling, remembrance, and reflection—experiences that can be both powerful and tender. In recognition of this, our team is intentionally working in close partnership with trusted healing-centered practitioners and facilitators, including Madison Barney, Laura Calderon, and other practitioners, to thoughtfully curate spaces of support before, during, and after our time together, This reflects our deep commitment to ensuring that our network is not only intellectually engaged, but emotionally and relationally held throughout the experience.

Together, we are shaping several pathways of care and learning, including:

Guided preparation and grounding to help participants enter the experience with intention and shared context.
Facilitated spaces for reflection and debrief that honor grief, insight, memory, and meaning-making in community.
Healing-centered practices and cultural expression that support restoration, connection, and collective care.
Opportunities for dialogue and integration to carry learning forward into local work, relationships, and systems change.
Integrated supports that nourish emotional, physical, and spiritual wellbeing, including somatics
Ongoing accompaniment and resources to sustain reflection and wellbeing beyond the convening itself.

Note: Please note that due to the content of the Legacy Sites, this gathering will focus on collectively exploring the various sites that comprise the Museum experience (including the Legacy Museum, National Memorial for Peace and Justice, and Freedom Monument Sculpture Park). To foster meaningful learning, we will provide our network with a range of supports, in addition to curating spaces for reflection, healing, and shared meaning-making. As such, this gathering will not follow our typical format of workshops, Design Institutes, or plenary sessions, with the exception of a network-wide gathering with Bryan Stevenson, to collectively process, and culminate, our time at the Legacy Museum. Please don’t hesitate to reach out to the Aspen Forum team if you would like to connect on technical or strategic content outside of the convening.