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Preston McGee is no stranger to the citizens of Selma and the effort to make pivotal change.

On Wednesday, March 26, McGee was invited to St. Paul’s Episcopal Church as the guest speaker for the church’s Lenten Lunch series, speaking about his involvement in Selma and his efforts through his role as the Community Outreach Coordinator for the University of Alabama’s Selma Resilience Initiative.

The church’s Lenten Lunch Series held last week consisted of the theme called “Believing in Selma,” which can be looked upon as either civically or religiously, according to the church’s Rector, the Rev. Amy George.

George said the event is a yearly series during Lent that happens for five Wednesdays, educating the community about different topics through different speakers, and McGee told STJ that he’s grateful for the opportunity to be this week’s speaker and to share his story.

“It is a great environment to be in,” said McGee. “I wish I could do lunches like this every day, just sitting around the table with other people who want better for Selma and who want better for their community and so, them asking me to come speak today is an honor and a privilege, one to be here, but to then speak to the members of St. Paul Episcopal Church about the work that I’m doing here in Selma and how it contributes to why “I believe in Selma and believe in Selma’s future.”

During his speech, McGee spoke about just how proud He is to be in the Selma and Dallas County community and how he found his way back.

“So, I went off to the University of Alabama in 2019 to start my undergrad,” McGee said. I ended up graduating with two bachelor’s degrees in 2023 and that same extra year for my Masters Business Administration Degree. Actually, during that year is when the Dean Kay Palan came in and her team called me into the office and said, ‘Preston, we’re doing this work in Selma and we are now going to redo our approach to societal impact. So, instead of doing all these different projects in different communities across the state, they said, what can we do? Imagine what we can accomplish if we consider our efforts all in one place, all of our students, faculty, staff, and any societal effort. If we put it all in one area, what type of impact could we create? What type of sustainable impact could we foster that could outlast the university?’”

McGee went on to talk about the university’s plan during the Lenten series that involved first identifying two areas in the state where they would do just that and serve all of their efforts in those two areas.

“We had different things going on in Selma,” said McGee. “From students helping in accounting dealing with tax efforts to many other projects similar to that. So, they knew Selma was going to be one of those areas and then around last February or March. They started to site visit. During that site visit, they basically went back to Tuscaloosa, from what I have been told, if you are serious about willing to help Selma and if you are serious about what can make an impact, put someone on the ground here that wakes up in Selma and says, ‘This is my job to help make this community better.’”

McGee said he was already a part of the efforts in Selma, serving as a sounding board for ideas and projects but things got really real, according to McGee after the site visit and that’s when he said the dean of university called him and spoke about university latest plans. Soon enough, Preston said he interviewed for the position and a month later, he received the news that he was the chosen candidate for the position last July.

Continuing his speech, McGee spoke about his journey within his everyday role of being a Community Outreach Coordinator for UA’s Selma Resilience Initiative by saying that, “Whenever I am talking to people about why the UA is interested in Selma, I take them back to the beginning, starting with Selma’s motto that stems from Civil War to Civil Rights and Beyond.”

During his time in Selma, McGee has seen many efforts done that he feels many people that come to the city of Selma can appreciate. He posed the question to the audience, “How can we change their experiences in Selma to where they leave with something good, something positive to give back to the community?”

The reason the university is able to partner with Selma, McGee continued, is because it’s engraved in their core mission not only as a college, but also the university’s mission itself to impact all corners of the state of Alabama. That includes those regions in the Black Belt especially that are looked upon as underserved areas like Selma and Dallas County.

McGee showed visitors and members of the St. Paul Episcopal Church a slideshow catered to Selma called “Believing in Selma, Believing in the Beyond” that emphasized the history of Selma and just how UA’s Selma Resilience Initiative fits right in.

The three pillars that McGee wanted those of the church who attended the church’s Lenten Lunch Series to take away from his speech were the ideas of togetherness, beyond and believing, which he said put together is believing in the beyond together.

Dr. CeCe Grayson will speak at this Wednesday’s Lenten lunch regarding her topic that caters to “Believing in Selma” and on April 9. Jerry Siegel will close out the church’s series for the year.