As a girl, Ambassador Susan G. Esserman, JD, founder and executive director of the University of Maryland Support, Advocacy, Freedom and Empowerment (SAFE) Center for Human Trafficking Survivors, was inspired by the work of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), the historic civil rights organization whose founding and longtime president was Martin Luther King Jr.
This month, the SCLC, whose roots trace back to the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955, when Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white man, awarded Esserman with its Justice for Girls Award for her advocacy in assisting survivors of human trafficking.
Esserman is a visiting professor with a joint appointment at the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law and the University of Maryland School of Social Work.