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Biography

Donna Hampton from Council Bluffs, Iowa has long had a desire to help children. Blatant discrimination has not kept her from continuing to pursue her dream to better the lives of children and through them, her community and her church.

Transcript

Shaun Hampton: Hi. I’m Shaun Hampton and I am interviewing Donna Hampton.

Donna Hampton: Hi. I am Donna Hampton. I work for Offutt Air Force Base Child Development Center.

Shaun: My first question is, when you lived in Council Bluffs, how did you…how did discrimination affect you in school?

Donna Hampton: It mainly affected me in school when I was in elementary school. The kids would pick me last, and no one would be the little black girl’s partner. And the teachers kind of just made me feel like I was just average. They just really didn’t treat me that well.

Shaun: What advantages did you have being black?

Donna Hampton: Well we had different advantages being black because they had different programs that were set aside just for the black children. Like in the summer time you could work CITA Summer Jobs where you could get paid for the summer for working. Even after I graduated from high school, I worked through another CITA program where they paid me to go to college.

Shaun: What kind of discrimination did you encounter in the business world?

Donna Hampton: In the late 80’s I had opened up a child development center, through my church. It was a very nice establishment. I mean, we had all the things that we needed to start our child development center. We put it in the paper and it was well publicized. But when the people would come to bring their children they would see we were black and they decided they did not want to bring them. But over the phone they did not know what we were black over the phone. And they would make appointments and come for their appointments, but once they got there, they saw we were black and they didn’t want to leave their children with us.

Shaun: What are you doing with the black church in Council Bluffs today?

Donna Hampton: Well today, I work as a youth leader at Mt Zion Refuge Center. I am dealing with the kids and we have like a youth choir and the kids are going on different field trips and just kind of bringing the kids into the community, into our community, our surroundings just to teach them.

Shaun: What do you plan on doing in the black churches in the future?

Donna Hampton: In the future I plan on opening up a children’s church within our church, for Sunday mornings. Then later on, in the later future, I plan on opening up another child development center to see how it will work this time. I feel like this will be better.

Shaun: And that was my interview with Donna Hampton.