The Links, Incorporated

 

August 2024 Issue

by Edwina Hoyle
Photography (top) by Lindsay Gifford

The Links Incorporated is an international, not-for-profit corporation, established in 1946 by a small group of women in Philadelphia. Today the membership consists of more than 17,000 professional women of African descent in 299 chapters across 41 states, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of the Bahamas, and the United Kingdom. It is one of the nation’s oldest and largest volunteer service organizations of extraordinary women who are committed to enriching, sustaining and ensuring the culture and economic survival of African Americans and other persons of African ancestry.

Drema Jackson is the current president of the Hilton Head (SC) Chapter of The Links, Incorporated. The service area of this local chapter, which is 32 members strong, includes Beaufort, Jasper, Hampton, and Effingham counties. Members are professional women who are like-minded, influential opinion leaders and achievers who make a difference in their communities.

Their core values are friendship, integrity, honesty, service, commitment, family relationships, courage, respect for self and others, legacy, confidentiality, responsibility, and accountability.

Drema said the Hilton Head Chapter was formed in 2017 by their first president, Marcy Johnson. Marcy explained how she was attending a conference with her husband, and she and some of the other wives found themselves sitting around chatting. That’s where she learned about The Links, Incorporated and decided to start a chapter in the Lowcountry. She said the chapter is composed of many professional women, both transplants from other parts of the country, as well as native islanders.

“New members must be invited to join by a member and vetted by friends who serve. We look for strengths we need and are interested in like-minded people who will be a good fit,” said Drema.

The Links, Incorporated has five facets of programming, and local chapters must implement programs in line with: Services to Youth; Arts; National Trends and Services; International Trends and Services; and Health and Human Services. This group doesn’t take commitment to service lightly. The group has developed and put into action several strong programs to serve the Lowcountry. One of these, their new Rising Stars Mentoring Program, is an umbrella program which embodies all five facets. Partnering with Polaris Tech Charter School in Ridgeland, Links members will mentor approximately 20 female ninth graders, following these girls all four years of high school to improve their self-esteem and grades, teach them leadership skills, and bring awareness to possible career paths and opportunities.

“You have to be willing to share,” Drema said. “What you see is not what I was. I grew up poor—a coal miner’s daughter from West Virginia. I want to extend these girls’ horizons because sometimes people can’t see beyond their own corner. Mentoring is really important, and I am very much an advocate for children. We have to remember who we were and tell children they can go as far as they want to.”

The students at Ridgeland-Hardeeville High School were recipients of 20 Chromebooks and 42 technology access cards through a partnership between The Links, Incorporated Hilton Head Chapter and the Community Foundation of the Lowcountry. “You should have seen the smiles on their faces! They could use them during Covid,” Marcy said.

Another signature program underway in which these ladies are particularly proud of is VISA (Voting Impacts Student Awareness). Members of the Hilton Head Chapter taught virtual classes about the importance of voting in every election and how voting personally impacts each of them. The goal is to educate and encourage the students, hoping it will ripple to their friends and family members to become engaged in the voting process, too.

“One parent voted for the first time due to her child’s participation in VISA,” Drema stated. “The children get to use the real voting machines and vote on an issue they decide on. It takes the mystery out of it and eliminates the fear of the unknown. They may feel hopeless, but they can see how just one vote can make a difference.”

The organization has taken the VISA program to the Bluffton Boys and Girls Club, Campbells AME Church, Polaris Tech, and Hardeeville-Ridgeland High School. The chapter is non-partisan and also holds voter registration drives in church parking lots.

Another project the local Links, Inc. ladies provided was giving 60 book bags filled with school supplies to the James J. Davis Early Childhood Development Center, part of Whale Branch Elementary School.

The club’s services extend to adults, as well. “We are very proud of our partnership with the Center for Heirs’ Property Preservation in Charleston,” Drema said. “They provide free simple wills and financial literacy by teaching how to use one’s land as an investment. The lawyers come here, and we hold drive-up Last Will and Testament clinics at churches. We’ve facilitated 38 wills being prepared, and that’s the first step in keeping what is theirs.”

 

Join the Club:

Membership is invitation only.

For information: Log onto www.hhisclinks.org for the local chapter or www.linksinc.org for the international program.