Who We Are
2012-2013 Atlanta Diaper Relief Board Members and Staff
Kia Morgan Smith
Founder/ Executive Director
Kia Morgan Smith is Atlanta Diaper Relief’s Founder and Executive Director. Kia is a former education Reporter and worked as a foot soldier on the front lines of critical education issues for 15 years before deciding to become an educator in 2001. She understands what each child needs and what it takes to help them reach their full potential. Kia dealt with education on such an intricate level as a reporter that she became a teacher in hopes that she could somehow make a difference in the lives of children.
Kia has served as an elementary school teacher for the Philadelphia School system and for People for People Charter School in Philadelphia for five years before moving to Douglasville Georgia from her hometown Philadelphia.
In 2008, Kia served as the Director of Preschool at the Andrew and Walter Young YMCA in Atlanta, but stepped down from the demanding job to give birth to her son and spend the next years as a stay-at-home mom and blogger. She is mom to five children and understands how difficult is it at times to constantly have to supply diapers while living on a budget.
In 2003, Kia earned a Master of Arts degree in Education from Cheyney University of Pennsylvania. (She earned a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism in 1997 from Norfolk State University).
She started this diaper bank after her son was left in a wet diaper all day at daycare. That situation ignited her passion to help parents who have no choice but to stretch their child’s diaper because they can’t afford to buy more. Realizing how prolific this problem is across the globe and how hard it is for low-income parents to buy diapers, she founded Atlanta Diaper Relief in 2011.
Kia loves children and has five of her own. She is married to Rudolph Smith, an Engineer for the City of Atlanta. Kia is also author of the whimsical children’s book, Goony Goo-Goo and Ga-Ga Too (Authorhouse)
Media Relations Manager
Tai Saint-Louis is The Remedy, LLC’s co-founder. Tai will now serve as our Media Relations Manager and lead our efforts to connect with Atlanta’s movers and shakers.
Tai is a Hip-Hop/Urban Entertainment Journalist by trade. When she left her position as Senior News Writer at AllHipHop.com to focus on The Remedy, she soon found that she just COULD NOT ignore the need to share the interesting stories and experiences of the people who make the Entertainment world spin. Thus was born The Feed: a news and content “wire” service for the Urban Entertainment media community.
Intern
Kristen Gittings is a student at Georgia State University majoring in Journalism with a concentration in Public Relations while also minoring in English. She is the younger sister of a former Miss Georgia USA, Kimberly Gittings, and her mother is from Suwon, South Korea. She is a city girl who is an avid shopper, loves to travel, spend time with friends, be involved in her sorority, Zeta Tau Alpha, is a member of Public Relations Student Society of America and likes to explore new places to eat around Atlanta.
Kristen is just a doll! She will officially start May 7th and will intern with us throughout the summer until August. We are so glad to have Kristen on the ADR TEAM!
Kristen has actually already learned a lot about Atlanta Diaper Relief. She is one of several students in a Public Relations class at Georgia State University that has been working with our non-profit to put together a media package for our website.
Now Kristen will go behind the scenes and become involved in the interworkings of this non-profit. From crafting press releases, to managing monthly diaper drives to various community outreach efforts, Kristen will gain valuable experience and will be able to easily transition into a PR job after graduation armed with a new skillset.
Board Chair
Vanessa Parker is a wife, mother, and successful “serial” entrepreneur and CEO of The Pink Boss, Inc. , a business boutique. Together with her husband, she owns and has operated a small business development company based in Atlanta, GA for more than 5 years. In 2010 she branched off and focused on her business dreams and PinkBoss, Inc was born. Vanessa says she is delighted to take all the experiences and mistakes she learned being a small business owner to educate women all over the world to create the foundation for their successful business. Her mission and purpose is to empower women to use their passion and skills to generate income that will allow them the flexibility to love what they do every day.
Over the past few years, Vanessa has worked with many organizations teaching entrepreneurship workshops. Vanessa has been actively involved in promoting Atlanta Diaper Relief’s mission and is dedicated to the cause.
Directors
Daaimah S. Poole is an Essence magazine best-selling Author and was born and raised in Philadelphia, PA. She graduated from Temple University with a B.A. in journalism in 2003. Daaimah completed her first novel Yo Yo Love at the age of 19, without owning a computer or knowing how to type. Originally published by Oshun Publishing, and later picked up by Kensington Books, Yo Yo Love went on to become an Essence Magazine Best Seller. Her subsequent novels, Got A Man, What’s Real, and Ex-Girl to The Next Girl, have cemented her reputation as an author on the move.
Daaimah is also featured in Jay-Z’s Rocawear’s “I Will Not Lose” campaign Spring/Summer 2008 and is currently working on her seventh novel. She has served as a teacher at the People for People Charter School for seven years. Daimaah, a single mother of two boys believes in this cause and is committed to help change the lives of babies everywhere.
Chanel Morgan currently works for the Burns Group, an engineering firm in Philadelphia. Chanel is the sister of Kia Morgan Smith and understands the needs of children and distressed parents having grown up with her sister in a single parent home. Chanel has a strong administrative background and served as an Executive Assistant, Legal Secretary and most recently an Administrative Assistant with Jacobs Engineering. She has provided assistance to multiple functional areas including accounting, marketing and human resources. Chanel attended Norfolk State University and majored in Political Science.
Elizabeth Jacobsen
From diapers to diplomas, Elizabeth Jacobsen believes in supporting children. Elizabeth has worked as a public, high-school math teacher since 2006. She specializes in working with at-risk students and English Language Learners. The daughter of two educators, Elizabeth loves learning – she has a master’s degree in Mathematics Education and bachelor’s degrees in Economics and German from the University of Georgia.
Elizabeth is also an accomplished ballroom dancer. She earned her full-bronze certification for 13 major ballroom dances at Fred Astaire Dance Studios of Atlanta where she worked as a Ballroom Dance Instructor from 2004-2006. Elizabeth worked with the Perfectly Polished Etiquette School of Athens from 2004-2010, where she choreographed numerous performance pieces for the group’s annual Spring Formal. Elizabeth got involved with Atlanta Diaper Relief shortly after her son was born. Believing that every baby deserves to be clean and comfortable, Elizabeth immediately became a diaper champion. She is thrilled to be a part of such an amazing cause. Elizabeth lives in Cobb County with her husband, Tom, and their son Andy.
Jennifer Salazar Hutcheson is Founder and Editor-in-Chief of the bilingual blog, Mami 2 Mommy. As a Latina mamí she wanted to provide other moms with a platform to be heard – una comunidad with many voices. And to further reach the fast-growing, underserved market of modern, confident Latinas she co-hosts the Chicas Chatting Blog Talk Radio Show. Along with being involved in the mom blogger and social media communities she is also very involved in the Latino community – serving on the National Advisory Board for Hispanicize 2011, as the Twitter Community Manager for Being Latino and as an active member of Latinos in Social Media. Jennifer also serves on various local Atlanta committees for organizations such as Product Camp Atlanta, Social Media Atlanta, TEDxPeachtree, and Social Media Club Atlanta.
Jennifer is currently the owner of a public relations/social media company, Ash Breeze Media. She has worked with brands/companies from Johnson & Johnson, Macy’s, Clorox, Discovery Familia, Pampers, Graco as well as events such as The Georgia Kite Festival and The Super Bowl Gospel Celebration. You can also find her contributing to sites such as Momtourage, GalTime Atlanta, and 11Alive.com. As a proud mami of a 2-year-old little boy and wife to an incredibly supportive husband, her days are often filled with the joys of her crazy mami world and the passion for her work.
Tax ID: 27-2412708
Atlanta Diaper bank is the FIRST diaper bank in the metro Atlanta area solely dedicated to diaper distribution only.
We are excited about this new venture and want to ensure that families living in poverty have an adequate supply of diapers for their infants and toddlers. Not enough is being done to help these families with this specific need. We plan on serving families in Fulton and Douglas counties and have future plans of expanding to other metro area counties.
We aim to raise community awareness that “basic human needs” include diapers and that these needs are not being met for children living in poverty; and we will serve as advocates for policy reform so that diapers are included in the definition of and provision for the “basic human needs” of families
We will collect new and wrapped diapers through various local Diaper Drives and distribute them to Douglas and Fulton County families in need through our partner agencies. We have future plans of expanding to more metro Atlanta surrounding counties.
We are currently accepting applications from daycare centers and agencies that want to become a part of our Diaper Distribution Network. Through our network we will deliver diapers to families.
We are currently looking for churches, daycare centers or any agency interested in hosting a Diaper Drive for us! Please send us an email at director@atlantadiaperrelief.org if interested and find out about how you can help!