We are Highlander: The Movement School

Rest In PowerVonda McDaniel

With great sorrow, love, and respect, we mourn the sudden loss of our Co-Executive Director Vonda McDaniel, who passed June 30, 2026. Our deepest condolences are with her family, her labor community, and all who knew and loved her.

She was born into a legacy of Civil Rights Movement luminaries. Her life’s work was rooted in that inheritance, in her faith, and in her own experiences as a worker. Vonda was a lifelong member of the historic First Baptist Church, Capitol Hill, a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha (AKA) and a graduate of Tennessee State University.

Her 30-year tenure at the Bridgestone-Firestone Lavergne Plant reflected her dedication to workers rights, where she grew from a shop steward to an educator and leader as a proud member of her United Rubber Workers/United Steelworkers Local. Since 2013, Vonda served as President of the Central Labor Council of Nashville and Middle Tennessee and served as Vice President on the AFL-CIO Executive Council for a decade. In these roles, Vonda built leaderful movements as a founding member of Stand Up Nashville, the Nashville Justice League, Music City Construction Careers (MC3), and Tennessee for All. 

In her time as Co-Executive Director at Highlander Center, Vonda made a powerful impact on our work, our staff, and our broader community. Her wisdom as a leader, an organizer, and a movement builder will influence and inform our work far into the future. 

We lift up and honor her life and her many contributions. What she brought into the world will continue to bear fruit in all who had the privilege of knowing her, and will continue to be felt by those who did not.

“Vonda could see what was on the edge of possibility before others,” shares Co-Executive Director Garrett Stark. “She commanded quiet respect earned by decades of credibility and consistently showing up to do what needed to be done. She encouraged others to think big and was the kind of leader that was willing to be led, seeing the possibility in others’ leadership. She refused to be discouraged, working tirelessly across the lines that are used to divide us.” 

Visitation will be held on Tuesday, July 7, from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at First Baptist Church, Capitol Hill in Nashville, Tennessee, with the Ivy Beyond the Wall ceremony at 6:30 p.m. A Celebration of Life will be held on Wednesday, July 8, at 12:00 noon at the Music City Center in Nashville, Tennessee.

Vonda’s family shares her obituary here. Vonda is and will be missed. May she rest in power.

A Heartbeat for Radical Change

For almost a century, Highlander has been the training ground for emerging and established movement leaders across the South, Appalachia, and beyond, shaping a more just and sustainable future. From the labor movements of the 1930s and 40s to the Civil Rights Movement of the 50s and 60s, and into today’s struggles, our workshops and programs bring people together across issues, identities, and geographies to share and build the skills, knowledge, and strategies needed for transformative social change.

Since 1932,

Highlander has centered the experiences of directly-impacted people in our region, knowing that together, we have the solutions to address the challenges we face in our communities and to build more just, equitable, and sustainable systems and structures.

The Compass for The Movement

This work has created strong movement infrastructure in the South and Appalachia, building networks and organizing efforts that advanced the labor movements of the 1930s and 40s, the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 60s, and environmental, economic, and racial justice organizing across decades.

Today,

Today, this work is fortifying movements for the 21st century in powerful ways. We’re building the leadership of youth, LGBTQ+, and Black and Brown organizers while advancing solidarity economies to dismantle capitalism and extractive industries in our region.

Shifting Power, Shaping the Future

Through fiscal sponsorships and hands-on support for groups like the Movement for Black Lives and the Southern Movement Assembly, we’re creating capacity for movement organizations. We’re ensuring that Southern freedom fighters not only have a seat at the table, but are leading efforts to shift systems of oppression and exploitation globally.

Programming & Workshops

  • Introducing “On the Hill” Video Shorts

    “On the Hill” is our series of igniting conversations with organizers across the U.S. From mushroom inoculation with Chef Chris Roberson to discourse around the state of Black Tennessee — listen in on these bite-size instructionals to learn about everything under the sun, and on the Hill.

    Watch Here

  • Seeds of Fire

    Here, we hold space for intergenerational organizing. With a focus on the power of youth-led organizing, Seeds of Fire provides on-the-ground support, as well as guidance, mentorship, political education, and skill-based training to the rising activists of today.

    Learn More

  • Training the Trainers

    Our multi-day collaborative workshop brings together 170 pivotal cultural organizers to re-up strategies & strengthen frameworks that they can bring back to their communities.

    Learn More

  • Septima Clark Learning Center

    The home of Highlander’s library and archive, with collections and programming that weave together the layered history of Southern liberation, through movement memory work.

    Learn More

  • Economics and Governance

    Our multi-pronged programming to support democracy, which includes anti-fascist training, civics education, protections for organizers during the elections, and support for justice partners in North Carolina and Tennessee.

    Learn More

  • Greensboro Justice Fund Fellowship

    A fund originally created in 2011 to honor the work of the five organizers killed by members of the Ku Klux Klan and Nazis in Greensboro, 1979.

    Learn More

  • Children’s Justice Camp

    Our camp offers a week-long, in-person session for youth ages 6-12. Here, at the historic Highland Center in the Great Smoky Mountains, young people mentor one another’s leadership, with transformative experiences in community, collaboration, and confidence-building that will last a lifetime.

    Learn More

  • Electoral Justice

    Highlander’s Electoral Justice programming, led by Denzel Caldwell, is supporting communities across the U.S. and global South in defending and protecting democracy this year.

    Learn More

Highlander lives in the past, present, and future every day.

– Co-Executive Director Allyn Maxfield-Steele

The Long Journey To Power

On the journey to a better future, the narrative can get hung up on moments, rather than movements. These moments are exciting: think Dr. King’s speech on Washington, the Stonewall riots — but then they are over. Outside of the greater fabric of ongoing organizing, these electric moments might fizzle out, failing to turn the tide. Highlander is that fabric, connecting the dots between where we’ve been and where we’re going, to create a sustained path forward.

About Us
About Us
  • 1898 – 1987 | Septima Clark | Educator & Civil Rights Activist | Mother of the Movement
  • Anne Braden and Ella Baker leave the Highlander Folk School Library
  • June 1960 | Ella Baker and others at Highlander.
  • 1957 | Martin Luther King JR. | Minister and Activist | Attended Highlander
  • 1956 | Rosa Parks, Septima Clark and Leona McCauley
  • Rosa Parks with the Clinton 12 at Highlander
  • Thurgood Marshall, Anne Braden, Myles Horton, and Septima Clark, during a Civil Rights meeting at Highlander.
  • Martin Luther King Jr. at Highlander
  • Students dancing at Highlander