Helloooo from Pittsboro (aka Circle City)!
Hey everyone!
Welcome to my blog post! My name is Courtney Cooper-Lewter. I am a dual-degree student with the Public Administration and Social Work programs. I just finished my first year of the MPA program, but technically this is year two of graduate school. Two down, one to go! More than anything, I am really excited for my professional work experience this summer with Chatham County!
Historic Chatham County Court House, the County Manager’s Office is behind this building
This summer, I will be serving as an intern in the Chatham County Manager’s Office in Pittsboro, NC. I will be working on helping the County create a community-led Human Relations collaborative to address some of the economic and racial inequities in the County by:
- Researching and identifying effective tools for outreach and engagement of the community around social justice
- Studying existing effective collaborative efforts around social justice
- Interviewing community leaders to assess what they view as important for the collaborative to be successful
- Developing recommendations for the collaborative to move forward
So far, everything has started off great! Everyone is so supportive! And I realize, I am pretty spoiled with my office space. I have my own office and a window (see below)! I have already interviewed quite a few community leaders and feel like I am getting a better understanding of the community dynamics.
I can’t wait to continue exploring Chatham County. For now, check out this beautiful video of Pittsboro and maybe you will notice why it is called Circle City.
I look forward to talking with you more next week about what I am learning! See you then.
