Our Mission

The Virginia Progressive Leadership Project exists to recruit, train, encourage and cultivate community leaders and activists across the Commonwealth. We focus on leadership development for Virginians who share our values:

• All of Virginia’s children deserve access to a quality and equitable public education that is adequately funded.
• Both private enterprise and government are essential for creating opportunity and growth, and our economy should work for everyone, not just those at the top.
• We must develop cleaner, more renewable forms of energy while protecting our natural resources and ensuring a healthy and safe environment for current and future generations.
• All people living in Virginia have the right to accessible and fair elections free from voter suppression.
• Virginians have the right to unrestricted access to abortions and everyone has the right to parent the children they already have in safe environments and healthy communities.
• No person is illegal and person’s document status should not determine their life’s outcome.
• The mission and purpose of government is to promote the interests of the people they govern and the duty to help create a high quality of life and community well-being for all.

Our Values

VAPLP  seeks to cultivate leaders who adhere to the following principles:

• Inclusiveness: Ability to work with diverse communities, across race, age, geography, class, sexual orientation and gender identities.
• Integrity: A willingness to openly, publicly and authentically stand for that which they believe to be right.
• Transparency: Ability to be honest, to consistently keep commitments and to be held accountable.
• Community: Invested in and be committed to their local community by always leading with the issues that reflect the needs community.

Our Commitment to Equity

The Virginia Progressive Leadership Project is committed to creating a progressive leadership development model that works to address structural and racial inequities. This commitment includes not only VAPLP’s responsibility to recruit and train a cohort of leaders that reflect the demographics of the Commonwealth, but also to develop a greater understanding among civic and community  leaders of inequalities based on race, class, gender, sexual orientation, religion and citizenship.