Our Work

Please note: Our beloved project officially wrapped up in 2016, with the publication of Integration Nation: Immigrants, Refugees, and America at Its Best. Please continue to enjoy and share ONI’s stories, which we hope will be a source of inspiration and hope during these challenging times. Please keep in touch, as Susan and Gina both remain engaged in similar work!

What We Do

One Nation Indivisible harnesses the power of storytelling and strategic organizing to support and celebrate people struggling to create, sustain and improve racially, culturally, linguistically and socioeconomically integrated schools, communities, workplaces and social institutions.

Why We Do It

Our stories are counterweights to the racial, cultural and linguistic divisions in American classrooms, neighborhoods, workplaces and other social institutions. One Nation Indivisible offers more optimistic, and more truly American, stories about inclusion and community building, about people facing challenges and winning victories together. These are integration’s existence proofs.

Our conferences and strategy sessions are designed to assist pro-integration educators, advocates and community members overcome challenges, to promote their successes and to expand the power and reach of the pro-integration community in cities and towns, in regions, states and the nation.

What We Mean

Integration refers not merely to the absence of physical segregation. It is an aspiration best imagined by Martin Luther King. “Desegregation,” King wrote, could be accomplished by laws, but “integration,” acknowledges a web of mutuality–a shared fate. Integration is not synonymous with “desegregation” and “diversity.” Integration requires a full acceptance, a richer coming together, a willful expansion of community circles.  Our project tells many stories about what advocates call “immigrant integration.” Used in this context, “integration” does not necessarily refer to the absence of physical segregation, but to a wide variety of practices, policies and programs that respect, welcome and fully incorporate immigrants into the communities where they live.

How We Do It

  1. We visit, study and then produce narratives through print, slide shows and short videos.
  2. We disseminate these stories on our website, through social media, targeted mailings, at conferences and through our partner organizations.
  3. We host conferences and strategy sessions in collaboration with community based organizations and leading civil rights groups.