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Oral Histories

The SFA oral history program documents life stories from the American South. Collecting these stories, we honor the people whose labor defines the region. If you would like to contribute to SFA’s oral history collections, please send your ideas for oral history along with your CV or Resume and a portfolio of prior oral history work to info@southernfoodways.org.

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ORAL HISTORY

Wande Okunoren-Meadows

Little Ones Learning Center

Wande Okunoren-Meadows is the Executive Director of Little Ones Learning Center, a childcare center in Atlanta founded by her mother. She discusses how the pandemic impacted the daily operations of Little Ones, including considerations for employee safety, support for children of essential workers, the Paycheck Protection Program, and false unemployment claims. She recently won a contentious battle with the City of Forest Park to bring the Little Ones farm stand to the public, as reported in Forbes, Mother Nature Network, and other national news outlets.

Date of interview:
2020-12-29

Interviewer:
Diana Dombrowski

Photographer:
Lynsey Weatherspoon

Download Transcript

“

"It's really important for my mother and I to make sure that there is exposure, and these children, our children, our community has the same access and opportunities that our friends in Roswell and other places have, from education to food. I don't want our kids having big tomatoes that are this big, even if they are complimentary. It drives me insane when people say, oh, well, it's free, it's complimentary. Don't y'all want it? Like, no. If y'all don't want the GMO tomatoes don't bring them over here. I don't want those GMO tomatoes either. Let me have the organic good stuff. That's what we want. So even when we're doing food drives and COVID drives and those kind of distributions, that's what we're giving out over here." - Wande Okunoren Meadows

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