Rev. Dr. Carol Burnett, M.Div. ’82

Rev. Dr. Carol Burnett, M.Div. ’82
Executive Director, Moore Community House
Biloxi MS
What do you do?
Since 1989 I have been the Executive Director of Moore Community House (MCH), a non-profit community center that is one of the United Methodist Women’s national mission institutions. MCH serves low-income families in east Biloxi, MS, by providing two programs that research shows make the most strategic and positive difference in moving low-income families closer to self-sufficiency: quality, affordable early childhood education (Early Head Start) and job training that leads to higher paying employment (Women in Construction). In addition, MCH sponsors Congregations for Children, a statewide advocacy network of people of faith promoting public policies to improve circumstances for poor children in MS.
Growing out of MCH’s work with low-income families, I founded the Mississippi Low-Income Child-Care Initiative in 1998. This statewide nonprofit organization strengthens the child care delivery system for Mississippi’s working poor families by making full-time services more affordable, improving parents’ access and retention of child care subsidies, and making child care centers serving low income families more financially viable. I served in state government as Mississippi’s administrator of the federal childcare subsidy program. This opportunity allowed me to learn first-hand about the impact of race and gender in policy-making and the long game required to win change in statewide systems.
What’s the best thing about your job?
It allows me to work with low-income working mothers to make real change at the individual and policy levels to improve their lives and the lives of their children. This work