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Hopkinton Hotline: 774-278-4455
Hopkinton Freedom Team is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization established in January of 2022. Your help and support will help us tremendously as our initial seed funding. A small amount goes a long way!
hopkinton is "lit" = Love, Inclusion & trust
hopkinton is "lit" = Love, Inclusion & trust
Thank you to all who joined us at the HCA for a Bystander Intervention workshop with True Story Theater on May 10, 2025. Here is the training packet for anyone interested: link to the packet
Please join the Hopkinton Freedom Team at the Hopkinton Center for the Arts for our monthly Artful Connections evening with Herbert (Elvis) Ayesiga for Juneteenth at 6:30 p.m. Please register here to attend: June 2025 Artful Connections
Herbert (Elvis) Ayesiga has dedicated over a decade to the nonprofit sector as a passionate human rights activist and social worker. Throughout his career, Elvis has collaborated with established and emerging groups to promote the rights and well-being of marginalized communities. He excels in program design and implementation and worked through Uganda PFLAG, where he fostered understanding and advocacy among parents of LGBTQ individuals. Additionally, he served as Programs Director at Icebreakers Uganda, where he championed health advocacy and conducted groundbreaking research on mental health challenges in East Africa. Committed to mentoring young leaders, Elvis also volunteered with orphanages and organizations supporting vulnerable women and girls, such as Gather for Children, making a lasting impact on the community. In his free time, Elvis loves to cook and listen to music.
To hear the latest from jamele adams, creator of the Freedom Team concept, listen to this 15-minute Tedx Natick Talk, November 2023, by clicking on the title: You Are Amazing, Believe In Yourself
To hear the latest from jamele adams, creator of the Freedom Team concept, listen to this 15-minute Tedx Natick Talk, November 2023, by clicking on the title: You Are Amazing, Believe In Yourself
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POETRY and HAIKU from our APRIL 26TH EVENT that participants paired up and created together on the spot in a minute or less with prompts from our guest Jamele Adams:
Unite in harmony Voice is my paintbrush
Uplift one another The whole world is my canvas
Everyone has a voice Erase pain with love
The universal call and response of love. I will not be silenced.
Stronger together, Thinking together we are stronger,
The din is deafening Thinking apart we are diminished.
Each make up that mighty roar All is possible.
Vibrating higher with uplifting voices Depends on what we choose.
Each one, pulling up another
We can rise above the fray,
if we just believe in the person next to us My voice is with me
Strangers are only strangers until they Loud and quiet it can be
become teammates. Don't let it stop.
Who am I? My big voice is strong
I am strength and love It wants to say many things
My voice carries me proudly Let me speak right now
Loud is not a sin The time for change is now.
My voice speaks for others
As well as myself. Unified Voices
Where do I begin? Don't hold back in silence to be eloquently mean
I search for community Lift and raise for a world yet unseen
And I speak my truth Where each of us will rise above from everywhere
Existing in the truth of others. that we have been
Weave the tapestry of unity
Create a world of serenity.
Here in the city
The crowd and the streets are so loud I speak for the possible
But I will be heard The hope love and all there is
Surrounded by men. Come say YES with me.
Where to begin with unified voices One Heart of Love group poem:
We have done this before We are all one
But I forgot how I made it happen One heart, one soul of longing
We are running out of time to figure it out... We wanted to stay,
We are out of space We wanted to run
Out of our minds But we stayed - even tho' we didn't feel comfortable
We are full of doubt. We were anxious, insecure, afraid, overwhelmed, at risk
And yet I stayed, he stayed, she stayed, they stayed...
We stayed as one heart of knowing,
Love, peace, personal growth, justice and possibilities.
We stayed because we needed to hear what Jamele was
begging us to do.
To be.
To stand in our light, be the light, spread the light.
Make a difference by who we are
Don't hide.
Stand proud in you and spread your love all around.
Give ourselves a voice.
We needed someone to remind us of how much love
and wisdom we have to share.
Thank you.
PeACE DAY 9/21/2022
PeACE DAY 9/21/2022
The HFT and the HHS Diversity Club paired together at Polyarts and Family Day for peace in our world. Visitors stopped by to decorate cut out hands that are now on display at the HHS above Hopkinton artist Michael Alfano's sculpture.
AT THE HIGH SCHOOL
AT THE HIGH SCHOOL
Inspired by Sadako and the One Thousand Paper Cranes as told by Eleanor Coerr, the HHS Diversity Club and HFT members, along with other community members, made origami cranes for health and world peace at Polyarts and Family Day, September 2022.
Past Events
Past Events
Want to know about our past events and projects? Go to our Blog
Photo Credit: John Cardillo, Hopkinton Independent
DONATE TODAY in our mission to CREATE Unity in our Community through Love, Inclusion and Trust!
DONATE TODAY in our mission to CREATE Unity in our Community through Love, Inclusion and Trust!
Donate Online
OR
Mail a check to:
Hopkinton Freedom Team
P.O. Box 60, Hopkinton MA 01748
Our Mission
Our Mission
The mission of the Hopkinton Freedom Team is to create unity in the community by fostering inclusion, solidarity and compassion for all people. The Freedom Team is focused on moving beyond tolerance to embracing, sharing and celebrating our community’s diversity. Its members meet monthly to explore ways of offering dialogue, support and programming to community members with a goal of promoting love, inclusion and trust (“LIT”).
The Freedom Team also offers a safe and respectful space to discuss incidents involving harassment or discrimination related to race, color, sex, gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, national origin, religion, disability or class using a transformative justice model. This model offers opportunities for conversation and reconciliation to help repair experiences of misunderstanding or harm. Individuals may access this opportunity to talk by calling the hotline number at 774-278-4455 if they have experienced or witnessed bias-motivated threats, harassment or violence.
The first Freedom Team formed in 2016 in Natick through the inspiration of jamele adams; the Hopkinton Freedom Team formed in 2020.
#HopChalkAboutChange 9/3/20
Hopkinton Freedom Team Membership
Hopkinton Freedom Team Membership
Your membership starts with a pledge to promote love, inclusion and trust within our community.
Every year our town of Hopkinton becomes world-renowned as a place of world-wide unity and common ground for thousands of people who come here from all over the world to run in The Boston Marathon. In a way, this is the same intention of The Freedom Team. Our wish is to promote this same sense of being a welcoming town to all its residents as well as visitors by growing more inclusive-minded and welcoming as a community for all people. Our ultimate dream goal is to have every resident of our town sign up for general membership to the Freedom Team and its mission to promote love, inclusion and trust within our community.
You are invited to sign up for general membership to The Freedom Team by submitting a pledge form below and sharing what you have done to bring more unity, peace and acceptance to Hopkinton and beyond.
call town of hopkinton HOTLINE at 774-278-4455 to report bias-motivated threats, harassment and violence.
call town of hopkinton HOTLINE at 774-278-4455 to report bias-motivated threats, harassment and violence.
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