Digital Communications Advocate

The Southern Coalition for Social Justice (SCSJ) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that was founded in August 2007 and works across the South. Our mission is to promote justice by partnering with communities of color and economically disadvantaged communities to defend and advance their political, social, and economic rights. SCSJ’s focus areas are community-driven, and currently include voting rights, justice system reform, and environmental justice. SCSJ employs a community lawyering model, meaning that we bring a variety of professional supports to our clients and partners, including legal, organizing, communications and research, and work with communities to determine which tools to use and when in order to best advance our partners goals. 

For more information about our work and our unique community lawyering approach, visit our website at www.scsj.org. 

Diversity and Inclusion Statement: 

SCSJ is committed to a policy of equal employment opportunity for all persons without regard to race, color, creed, sex, religion, age, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, political affiliation, physical or mental disability, pregnancy, personal appearance, marital or family status, citizenship, past, current, or prospective service in the uniformed services, genetic information, natural hair styles, or other status as protected by State and Federal laws. It is our intention to promote the full realization of equality in opportunity and employment. 

Position Summary: 

The Southern Coalition for Social Justice (SCSJ), the South’s leading social justice organization, is seeking an experienced, creative, and strategic Digital Communications Advocate to help develop and distribute content across SCSJ’s social media channels and digital networks. The communications team positions are titled “advocates” to reflect our community-led work and to center advocacy in all we do. 

Central to this Digital Communications Advocate’s role will be to articulate SCSJ’s vision, mission, and work in a way which resonates with a variety of audiences while also building the organization’s brand at the local, state, regional and national levels. They will create and post social media content to uplift SCSJ’s story, its programs and campaigns, and the clients and communities they serve as a means of amplifying the organization’s crucial legal, research, organizing, and advocacy interests. Program areas include Voting Rights (including its Southern Leadership for Voter Engagement coalition, or SOLVE), Justice System Reform (including its Youth Justice Project), and Environmental Justice. 

Reporting to SCSJ’s Communications Director, the Digital Communications Advocate will have the opportunity to join a passionate group of committed communications professionals who believe in investing in bold ideas, innovation and storytelling to help grassroots organizations deepen their impact across the south. This is an exciting opportunity to be a major part of the mission, vision, and base-building of a fast-growing social justice organization centering the needs of communities of color. 

Responsibilities include: 

• Build an integrated content activation strategy with a growth mindset for all present and future social channels including Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and TikTok. 
• Create, edit, and post engaging content on SCSJ’s social media platforms on a daily basis, and maintain a social media calendar. 
• Significant experience creating professional social media posts (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube, etc.). 
• Leverage and/or tailor content and messaging for specific audiences, especially journalists and news media. 
• Create graphics for social media, presentations, and distribution designed to amplify and support SCSJ, its partners, programs and projects. 
• Ability to maintain website updates and posts as needed. 
• Identify and execute creative and culturally relevant distribution tactics to innovate how we use social media accounts, promote our content and engage with our audience. 
• Track and analyze weekly, monthly and quarterly data to monitor performance of all SCSJ social media accounts including the Youth Justice Project’s social media accounts. 
• Pitch stories to the relevant platforms when needed (Apple News, Flipboard, SmartNews, Facebook News). 
• Collaborate with SCSJ’s Communications team to align with community engagement opportunities, timelines, and messaging guidelines and translate messaging into highly engaging and effective campaigns. 
• Assist with monitoring media alerts and key publications for news related to SCSJ and share content with relevant parties internally. 
• Ability to occasionally work evenings and weekends, as needed. 
• Facilitate the development and design of promotional materials in-house using graphic design software, or in collaboration with graphic designers.  
• Maintain brand and messaging consistency in creating, reviewing and editing content. 
• Support communications campaigns as needed. 

Qualifications should include:  

• At least three years of social media and audience engagement and strategy experience. 
• At least two years of graphic design experience. 
• Competency with graphic design and audiovisual recording and editing. 
• Experience providing communications support through a racial justice lens. 
• Existing presence in the social justice and/or justice transformation community and or a commitment to social justice principles and to SCSJ’s community-lawyering model of practice. 
• Excellent communication skills (writing, editing, formatting, and proofreading skills). 
• Highly organized with meticulous attention to detail. 
• Ability to be self-reliant, self-directed, and highly efficient under tight deadlines; to independently resolve problems; to communicate clearly as part of a team of lawyers, organizers, researchers and communication specialists; and to take responsibility for multiple projects or tasks at a time. 
• Some knowledge of Adobe Creative Suite and other design programs, including Canva and Hootsuite, is a plus. 
• Some familiarity with HTML and experience editing and maintaining website content, preferably in WordPress. 
• Ability to prioritize, organize and balance a heavy workload with a high level of productivity, proficiency, and precision. 
• A willingness to learn new technologies and processes. 
• Strong team player. 

Salary & Benefits:  

The Communications Advocate starting salary range is from $50,000 to $65,000 base pay per year, commensurate with experience, and includes comprehensive health and retirement plans. 

Location:  

The Digital Communications Advocate will work from SCSJ’s office located in Durham, North Carolina. Due to the ongoing public health crisis, SCSJ staff will be working remotely until advised that it is safe to return to work. During this period of remote time, we are working with staff on an individual basis to set up flex schedules if needed for childcare or other care commitments. 

To Apply: 

Candidates must upload a cover letter, resume, and two social media or graphic design samples through the application form here. 

Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis.