>> announcer: the following is a cnn special presentation. there are lots of tough issues in the headlines these days, there are also plenty of stories of hope and inspiration. 12 of us sought out the change makers tackling problems close to our own hearts. tonight you'll hear their stories, this is "champions for change."

♪ >> welcome to "champions for change." i'm dr. sanjay gupta. this hour we will spotlight people who are changing the way things are done. they're not celebrities. they're not politicians, but they are re-shaping the world with creativity, passion and heart. later in the show you're going to meet my champion for change, but first, cnn anchor and former track star ana cabrera catches up with a coach and mentor for some determined girls who are lacing up their running shoes and chasing down dreams. ♪ ♪ >> go get them! go get them! >> i wouldn't be the person i am today without her. >> excellent, baby girl. >> jean bell wears a lot of hat, she's a coach, a judge, a friend. to me, she's a dream maker. hat she's a coach, a judge, a friend. to me, she's a dream maker. >> i've been coaching my own team jeuness for 37 years. >> what does jeuness mean?

>> it's a french word for young ladies. >> i wanted to coach young girls as they became young women. i can let them know that education is the key to their success. >> what coach jean does on the track is volunteer work. her day job is as an administrative judge hearing workers comp cases every day. >> i leave here to drive each day to have practice. >> these are the goals for today's practice. >> most of the girls come from brooklyn and those areas that are underserved. they face teen pregnancy, drug use. you don't have to look for trouble. it's just out there waiting for you. >> this is where you grew up. >> yes. right here in freeport houses in brooklyn. >> i had two brothers and two sisters and we were cramped in a small apartment, the seven of us. >> what do you remember about living here? >> i remember that it was a dangerous place.

there was a lot of crime, a lot of gangs and a lot of drugs. i wanted to escape the poverty, and i wanted something better for myself. >> it was your own experience that has inspired you to want more for others. >> we knew that education was our way out. >> up and down with your arms! that's good! >> i'm one of five kids in my family and we grew up without a lot of money. my dad's a runner, and i enjoyed running. i remember that determination my dad saw as a runner himself and he really helped nurture that. i was able to get a college scholarship which took me to washington state university. >> the main focus of my team is to assist the girls in getting athletic scholarships to go to college, to build successful lives. >> how many of you, show of hands, plan to go to college? >> my goal is to get a full scholarship to college from running track.

>> my goal is to get a scholarship and start my own business. >> who here thinks jean is tough? keep your hand up if you think you're better because jean is tough. >> she shows you tough love, but in the end you know it's coming from a good place because she knows what you're capable of. >> she's now 16, she has big dreams. she wants to become a pediatric surgeon. >> when i first started running on the team, my self-confidence was definitely low. you don't always win everything. it just has to motivate you more to just strive to do your best going forward. >> she definitely has high expectation for all of us. >> why track and field? >> you're out there on that track, that lane, facing only the starter's gun and yourself, running makes you tough. strong in mind, strong in spirit, going after what you want.

>> don't be afraid to run out there. >> the work ethic that i got from running on jeuness, it follows me throughout my life and throughout my career. >> you were a long distance runner. >> i got a scholarship at st. john's university and i'm a controller, and i would love to be a vp of finance. >> she used to scream across the track, "come on, come on" and if i could hear her in my head. if you were able to talk to jean, what would you tell her? i would say that i love you and thank you for everything. >> i don't see myself as a champion, but i like to think that i make champions. >> while ana went the distance with those runners, cnn's poppy harlow crossed the finish line earning her masters of studies in law from yale. one of her unassuming teachers there turn out to be a courtroom fire brand for some of the most desperate people in the justice system.

>> when you're on death row that's when the clock starts ticking. he said i'll do my best and yes, he saved my life. >> i said i'm not going to make it through this. i can't do 25 years in prison. >> people have been the most desperate, the most despised, unfortunately, and the poorest and powerless people in the country. >> stephen bright is a lawyer, but for his clients, he is their last hope. i met him when i walked into his class at yale law school. >> thank to you both in atlanta and here there's one less person facing execution in georgia today. >> listening to him talk is like listening to justice. if we don't do better we're going to have to sandblast equal justice under law off the supreme court building. >> what does the southern center for human rights stand for? >> representing the people

facing the death penalty and representing people in jails with regard to unconstitutional conditions and practices. >> i wanted to go where the problems were and where i could be helpful. >> he has argued four capital punishment cases before the supreme court and he won them all. >> you've often said people are always much more than the worse thing than they've ever done. >> of course. tony is the perfect example. >> i get up in the morning and make me a cup of coffee and think about my blessings and what brought me here. >> tony amadeo served 38 years for his involvement in two murders. >> i'm responsible for their grief, my family's grief. i am deeply, deeply sorry. >> how close was tony amadeo from being put to death? >> we threw a hail mary pass by asking the supreme court to take the case. >> he won in a unanimous decision. >> the evidence discloses an intentional program of rigging

the jury by the prosecutor's office. >> why do you represent people that you know have committed murder? >> everyone has to be represented if the legal system is going to work. >> if you talk about a champion for change, you're talking about somebody that makes an individual commitment for the betterment of other people. i'm getting emotional. >> i certainly wouldn't have been the kind of lawyer i became without his model. >> civil rights attorney brian stephenson started working with bright right out of law school. he would go on to found the equal justice initiative, in a lot of ways it does become like ministry. i think you can't actually appreciate the burdens of the condemned, of the poor, of the marginalized if you haven't tried to carry some of those burdens. >> you have to let your heart be broken. >> yes. that's right. >> steve made it safe to love the people you represent.

>> someone like shana shackleford. what happened in 2009? >> my house burned down. i ended up getting blamed. we lose everything, end up homeless, and i was charged with first-degree arson. they offered me 25 years at first. >> 25 years in prison? >> yes. >> for a fire you didn't set. >> right. >> and then you wrote a letter to someone. >> i received a letter just two weeks ago. >> oh, my god, i have not seen this letter in forever. >> i've lost my job. i've lost my home. i've lost my dog, and now i sleep in my car. >> i'm tired and i'm beaten and i don't understand how to fight this. it's been days now since i've eaten. >> so bright took on her case for free. >> what happened to the charges? >> they were dropped. >> dropped. >> because he'd done a few weeks of investigation. >> it was determined that it was actually an electrical fire. >> how long has it been since you saw him? >> about a decade now?

>> what would you say if you got to see him? >> thank you for saving my life. >> we thought it would be nice if you could tell him yourself. >> because of his teaching and influence, he's doing more than most people to make sure that that legacy is carried on by new generations of lawyers and advocates, but nothing's ever quite as good as the original. >> the o.g. now from an idealistic lawyer to a lawman on a mission, up next, we will ride along with a beloved police chief who set a new tone for law enforcement.

>> welcome back to "champions for change." with all of the scrutiny law enforcement now faces, you might be surprised to hear that one of the most admired people in westport, connecticut, is the police chief. cnn's alisyn camerota rode along with this innovative top cop and found out why he's so revered. >> you're going to get in the car and you're going to take me for a drive. >> you're going to go to a ride. >> i moved to the u.s. from greece at the age of 11 and not knowing a word of english, i started as a police officer in 1996. >> what i found is that chief foti has managed to successfully straddle the line between being pro-cop and pro-community. >> it's a good stepping-stone. >> foti started looking into these issues years before george floyd. we saw out of him a commitment to look at what was going on in

the police force and establish a set of standards. >> the day of the george floyd incident we were not back peddling and backtracking and making excuses or even fighting the changes. we had already made the changes, choke holds and they're all common sense, every police department should be doing this. >> i think he takes so seriously the idea that he is the police chief of everyone whether it's the lgbtq rally, black lives matter. foti was in the middle of it showing that he was there. >> i stand here with you. i march with you. >> i specifically said to the group that i will kneel with you, but i will kneel with you for a moment of silence. i will kneel with you for a moment of prayer, and i will kneel for you against police brutality. i will absolutely not kneel with you against police and i will not kneel with you against the flag. >> i have challenged the status quo. at times i got in trouble for

challenging the status quo, but i wouldn't change a thing about it. if i didn't i wouldn't be where i am today. >> always challenge the status quo. >> now on to another community, this one scattered by the war in ukraine. erin burnett met three siblings who built great lives for themselves in the united states, today they're providing crucial help for fellow ukrainians who are fleeing for their lives. >> mariupol, ukraine, last christmas. ♪ >> mariupol, ukraine now. >> since the start of the war more than 7 people have been forced to flee ukraine. alex velychko came to the u.s., and they started a small and thriving business operating car dealerships when putin invaded ukraine their lives changed, too. >> we started calling our

relatives, friends, asking how they are there and people were panicking. >> yeah. the conditions was pretty bad. >> so, alex, tell me about the first family that you helped escape? >> translator: he's my childhood friend. we met when we were 5 or 6 years old. >> i met them, and their daughter was about to celebrate their 7th birthday and at times it is still so hard for them to even tell their story. >> translator: an explosion wave took out our front door and looters came in and took whatever they liked. >> we decided that we have to help them get them out from there somehow. >> they took them 19 days to get from mariupol to the ukrainian border. >> they had an 8-month-old baby. in the early days of the war, i left with hundreds and thousands of refugees it took 19 hours and

it was a grueling experience, and in the context, you think -- wow! the suffering that they endured and what they went through, the trauma, is really unimaginable. the velychko's reached out to the local organization and it's the edith and mark jewish community house and they worked with them and the united appeal to help the urozovs and so many other families who were trying to flee ukraine and come to the united states to start a new life. they first lived in alex's one-bedroom apartment in brooklyn. one bedroom, one bathroom and in that space he and his wife have hosted as many as 12 refugees at once. >> translator: of course, we have our challenges, but at the end of it all i understand that they don't have anything else. they have nowhere to go. >> they are doing a noble thing.

they help people get out of the country where the war is under way. alexander uses the war noble and that's what alex, angela and nick are, sacrificing their time and their hard-earned success just to help others have a chance to build new dreams. >> from fleeing violence abroad to preventing it right here in the united states. a pastor's bold plan to disrupt gun violence. that's next. been meaning to ask you, carl. does your firm offer personalized index investing? hmm? so i can remove a stock that doesn't align with my goals. i'm a broker, not a barista. what about managing gains and losses to be more tax efficient? not a wizard either. looks like schwab personalized indexing can. schwaaab! learn more about personalized indexing at schwab today.

wolf blitzer grew up in buffalo, new york, and he's always supported his home team. dion dawkins is a star lineman for the buffalo bills. he wasn't born there, but he embraced the community starting a youth mentorship program called dion's dreamers. this past may a gunman killed shoppers at a top's supermarket. what dawkins did next made him wolf's champion for change. >> my focus just changed from being the bigger brother to actually feeding people and giving them the supplies that

they would go to tops to get. >> dion held a number of special events after the massacre to raise money for some of the funds that have been set up for the families. >> who drives? let's do it. if it's a concert, backpacks, school day, whatever it might be to help that community at that moment, let's get it done. >> my parents were outsiders who came here, could barely speak english, had very little money and the city of buffalo, new york, welcomed them and it makes me proud that people like dion are doing what they're doing and the secret is literally the people here. the people make buffalo everything. >> people are always the most important. mass shootings like the one in

buffalo's tops supermarket often steal the headlines, but far more deaths occur as part of a result of vicious murders and revenge. jim sciutto's champion is disrupting that pattern with help from folks who have been there. the people are the most important part of any city. people in the land have a story around violence that is systemic and the trauma related to that story is often not told and even sometimes trivialized. i am committed to ensuring that we can live in communities that are free from gun violence. >> gun violence is almost a daily story. >> i am here in el paso. >> i remember covering the el paso shooting in 2019 and then quickly moving from el paso to dayton. >> together, 31 people were killed in these two american

communities. >> it's impossible to feel how pervasive it is the fact that violence in this country is that most gun deaths don't take place in mass shootings. >> by and large, gun violence in this country is over represented with suicides. about 30-something percent of gun deaths in this country are a result of interpersonal conflicts that are associated with quotes, or cliques, quote, unquote, in communities. this has to be seen as a public health issue and it has to be seen as an extension of social political conditions. >> it is truly a vicious, deadly cycle and someone who gets killed in a shooting or wounded and there's an act of revenge and that's what pastor mike and his group and others working with him are trying to stop. tell me why this place is so important to you? >> one of my young people, his name was larry, he got killed right here. >> i told him, if you can just graduate, bro, everything in your life will be better.

>> and he did it. he did everything i told him to do and we still ended up having to bury him. >> i did a funeral for larry, and i asked the young people how many young people had been to at least one funeral and 500 young people put up their hand. i'm not doing enough. >> it's part of a raw ecosystem and we connect directly with the outreach workers or the families who have been shot or are at high risk of being engaged in shooting. >> if you've been shot or someone you love and you're close to, it's emotional and fearful. how do you convince people not to shoot them? >> find that person at their point of despair and help them pause. what you decide today can actually create another cycle where we'll be at the hospital tomorrow or the next night. the key is to have individuals who can have multiple conversations, incredible messengers and people that have relationships in the street and they do lots of groundwork to ease the tensions. what was the first experience of

the violence yourself? >> standing there, drive by. i still have the scar right here. two inches away from death as a kid. >> how old were you? >> 10. >> giving false promises in this environment for a long time. i'm going to tell the kids the truth. this is how you'll come up. if you want to live this way, you'll follow my path. it ain't squeaky clean. follow my lead, it will work for you. >> in other ways it's like they see it now. at first it was like you want to be the good guy. no, i want to live. >> can you describe an example where your approach worked? you got there in time and you prevented the next shooting. >> it's hard to count shootings that don't happen, but over time

we can say that at the height of our five-year production we were under 65 homicides when our height was around 120-something homicides. there is no hero or silver bullet. we have to have community in this. we have to have public health and mental health, behavior health, employment and opportunity in order to actually impact and effect and that is our ultimate goal. >> the pastor literally saving lives. my champion for change is a lifesaver. she has a potential game changer for people who need thousands of transplants. you'll get to meet her next. to five-hundred bucks. he just didn't wanna do that. he was proud of the price he was charging. ♪ my dad instilled in me, always put the people before the money. be proud of offering a good product at a fair price. i think he'd be extremely proud of me, yeah. ♪ you might have heard of carvana and that we sell cars online. we believe buying a car should be something that gets you hyped up. and that your new car ought to come with newfound happiness and zero surprises.

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♪ welcome back. now it's time for my champion for change. she's a fierce scientist doing what everyone said was impossible. right this minute thousands of people are in need of a heart transplant with an agonizing wait for a donor and a lifetime of anti-rejection meds, but my champion may have found a way around that, custom building new hearts with the patient's own stem cells. ♪

>> so much of what we believe about life is about heart. it's about love. it's about fundamental form. it's about connection. it's alive. >> this idea that you could start to construct that. >> right. >> in some ways, the biological sort of challenge of that is extraordinary. >> doris taylor is an innovator. she's trying to do something that everyone said was impossible, grow new human hearts. individualized, personalized, waiting for people, thousands of people who need heart transplants and simply can't get them. >> so we use a fake heart. we basically use the equivalent of baby shampoo and put it through the vessels in the heart and what was left was a scaffold of what we call a ghost heart. >> ghost heart. this is where it begins. >> if i was someone that you

were doing this for, building this heart. would it be my heart, ultimately? >> i will build you a personalized heart if you need a heart. i would take cells from your blood or your skin. i would make them into stem cells. i would then grow the billions of cells we need and put your cells on that scaffold and we'd cover every surface of that scaffold with your cells and we teach it how to grow up and become a heart that matches your body. >> i think this whole idea of teaching cells -- it's hard to get your head around. >> when you go out and jog, aren't you teaching the cells in your leg to get stronger? it's basically what i'm doing, too, i'm just using an artificial stimulator and an artificial blood pressure. >> do you remember the first time you actually saw it work? >> yes. yes.

you know, it's one of those yes moments in life. you can't invent this stuff, although we kind of did. [ laughter ] >> i'm going to tell you about a 20-year journey that many people told me couldn't be done. i always just check the news on my phone and i was, like, oh, my goodness. ghost heart, what could that be? >> 26-year-old mikaela powell had a heart transplant herself. it saved her life, but it's not the personalized heart doris is describing. mikaela is on a daily regimen of anti-rejection drugs worried that one day her body might reject her donated organ. >> i was just insanely inspired by that video. it touched me so much that i had to message her, thank you for giving me hope. >> she said, to think that i could one day have a normal life, oh, my gosh. >> often times we don't hear the story behind the story to really understand the people that make these developments happen.

>> i can say one other thing? that story is not always told. >> as an lgbtq girl who was actually kicked out of college for being gay, i would have never thought i'd be standing on this stage doing something like this. thank you. >> she was told not only can you not pursue your scientific dreams, not even giving you a degree, a solution to one of the biggest problems in the world and it almost didn't happen because of who she is. >> for all of the people who still say no, they, you know, we'll do it first in pigs and then we'll go to people. every day we don't get there, somebody else dies. it's going to work. >> i got to touch a heart today that was created by doris. if there is such a place where science and spirituality really intersect it's a place like

this. >> someone else said to me you're not building organs, you're building hope. >> from one kind of heart to another, with the retired marine who helps fellow human vets. adam kisielewski lost an arm and a leg in iraq. a group provided him with a specially adapted house mortgage-free and how he's a board member and a full-time supporter of veterans and jake tapper's champion for change. >> adam was grievously wounded while serving for this nation. nobody would begrudge him whatever kind of life he led after these wounds, but he's an inspiration. >> i know you're on the veterans adviser group for homes for our troops. >> i helped stand that program up. homes for our troops has a tag

line of building homes and rebuilding lives and the rebuilding lives is the more important part of what they do. >> it's a real honor to come here and welcome you on the part of the troops. >> thank you. >> he is more active than most people i know. he is more charitable than most people i know. >> my life's goal is to provide these opportunities for other veterans and help them out wherever i can and i get more out of it than i ever put into it. >> i think most people really do. still ahead on champions for change, a mother and father grapple with tragedy, and then use it as a warning to help save lives.

♪ freedom doesn't wait. libre

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you probably know kate bolduan as a cnn anchor, and she is also more importantly a mom. her champions for change are parents fighting a dangerous trend. young people getting prescription drugs online without doctor's orders. too often those pills are not just counterfeit, they are poisonous. >> charlie, can you look at me and say merry christmas, daddy? >> merry christmas, daddy! >> to me, to be a father was the most important thing was to be a dad. >> i always remembered when i was a little girl they couldn't wait to have kids and we were very blessed to have these children. >> happy halloween, 2000. >> charlie was a very easy baby. >> what are you going to be for halloween, charlie? >> batman! >> cool. >> he was happy. he had a great laugh. >> charlie was about to graduate and he was in love, and it was

like we were almost ready to high five and say well done. we did it. we raised great young people and sent them off into the world. and three weeks before he was supposed to graduate it just exploded. >> we'll go to his room. >> he's gone, and he's not. >> we still have his clothes in here and his smell. >> oh. >> what happened? >> in 2018 charlie was 20 had he hurt his back? >> he was prescribed percocet at the time of his surgery and took it while on the press corruption ask then he stopped. >> in 2020 he heads back to school. he called us and told us his back was hurting. >> and somebody knows somebody on snapchat and they look at the menu and he took percs and he took what he thought was percocet.

>> is it true that he died within 30 minutes. >> he did not have a tolerance to opioids at the time of his death so he wasn't addicted or dependence. >> it was a poisoning because of the deception. a counterfeit prescription pill where the only active ingredient is fentanyl. there are certain dangers that we have in the back of our minds that we want to protect our kids from, but a counterfeit prescription pill wasn't on that list. >> i have two young kids, and i, like every parent, worry about keeping them safe every day, but fentanyl is a synthetic opioid 100 times stronger than morphine. the size of just a few grains of salt can be enough to kill an average adult man. so a lethal dose of fentanyl could be in any counterfeit pill and that's why ed and mary ternan decided to tackle this after they lost their son and they established song for

charlie for warning parents that one pill can kill. >> if it's not from a doctor or pharmacist, it's not legit. >> we started our first campaign about a year ago, social media campaign, and in just a year we have reached 52 million unique viewers, and that's really where we are laser focus side to reach them where they are and to warn them. >> hi, guys. >> we have made dozens of presentations to school assemblies and in school classrooms and in community groups. we have a monthly awareness meeting. >> rick and i lost our son logan last year. >> we are at times square. >> i can tell you there's a lot more awareness now. >> where we co-sponsored a

billboard. >> two years after charlie's death and then there was where we started. ♪ ♪ >> what are some of your favorite memories of charlie here? >> seeing him try to figure out how to body surf. >> the fact that your story, charlie's story, through you is now saving lives. what do you think charlie would think about all of this, about these beautiful agents of change that you have become? >> i think he'd be very proud, and even hugging us and he is hugging us. he knows that we're doing good work his behalf. >> they really are. >> making something positive from tragedy is something anderson cooper's champion for change does all the time. we first introduced you to jimmy hatch five years ago. the ex-navy s.e.a.l. survived career-ending wounds in afghanistan and then founded a non-profit to protect police dogs.

today hatch is one of yale university's oldest undergrads. he's helping shape future american foreign policy nowadays, and he continues to be champion for change. >> last year after the united states' chaotic withdrawal from afghanistan, i asked jimmy to come on cnn. >> did a lot of wrong things in afghanistan and solution is figure out how not to do it again. >> turns out yale university liked jimmy's idea, in a matter of weeks they designed a year-long class to investigate what went wrong in afghanistan and to produce a report of their findings. they invited jimmy, the undergraduate to not only take the graduate-level class, but to be an unofficial co-professor with retired ambassador jen paterson. >> he was the founder and the brain child behind the course. >> the class spent months speaking to a number of generals, ambassadors, members

of the afghan special forces and even a spokesman for the taliban. jimmy hatch hopes the report will inspire americans of all walks of life to hold the country's leaders accountable in america's future conflicts. >> up next on "champions for change" -- ♪ >> musicians tap the healing power of music to set a tone of racial understanding. i remember when i first started flying, and we would experience turbulence. i would watch the flight attendants. if they're not nervous, then i'm not going to be nervous. financially, i'm the flight attendant in that situation. the relief that comes over people once they know they've got a guide to help them through, i definitely feel privileged to be in that position. ♪

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california, mountains, oceans, natural wonders, diverse and creative people. but when the out-of-state corporations behind prop 27 look at california, they see nothing but suckers. they wrote prop 27 to give themselves 90% of the profits from online sports betting in california. other states get much more. why is prop 27 such a suckers deal for california? because the corporations didn't write it for us. they wrote it for themselves.

cnn's don lemon is really passionate about art. his champion for change is an artist named rasheed johnson who uses pen, sculpture, and paint to express what many african americans feeling. he's lifting other artists of color up along the way. ♪ >> rasheed johnson's art is in major museums all over the world. always engaging. it always pulls you in, beautiful, stirring, infuriating. rasheed and i have become friends over the last couple years. this journey we have gone on as a country over politics and the state of the world, we have sort

of ridden that together. >> your job is to tell us what's happening. my job is to listen and translate over the next few years. a big part of what my work speaks about is anxiety and fear and the stresses of occupying space in the world that we currently live in. i started making these. i was calling them "broken men." >> it's very personal for me. some of the mirrors you can fully see yourself. others are cracked and broken. others are scarred. it makes me think about all the slings and arrows that come at me. it makes me very proud that i have survived those. so many people, especially people of color, were locked out of the arena for so long. rasheed is doing what our ancestors told us to do as descendents of slaves. each one, teach one.

>> one thing i'm interested in outside of helping younger artists is how institutions function. what are the gatekeepers? who lets who in? what artworks are invited into the conversation? >> at the guggenheim we are including trans artists, including women. he created a paid internship program, supporting it financially and making sure that everyone across any sort of class and education spectrum has the ability to take on an entry level job at this institution. >> why is that so important to lift people up? >> it's the right way to be. generosity is something that lives in most artists. i think it's the natural way of kind of giving back after you've been rewarded for your vision. >> from the visual arts, now to the performing arts.

cnn's victor blackwell meets two songwriters striking a chord in racial dialogue. ♪ >> music is so powerful. if you ever want to understand people, a place, a time, listen to their music. >> music is the universal language. it's just a fantastic force to bring people together. >> todd has been doing this for more than a decade now. his organization music in common has evolved into creating these conversations through music. going city to city to bring different races and different religions together. ♪ >> i started in response to the murder of my friend daniel pearl, the "wall street journal" reporter.

he and i were bandmates and good friends. it was sort of a call to action for me to harness that power offing music to combat the hate that drove his murder. >> how did you meet trey? >> trey was one of our program participants about six years ago. it's been fantastic to see him rise in the organization. trey, in my opinion, is the poster child for gen z. he is simultaneously young at heart and wise beyond his years. i learn from this guy every day. >> for someone so young to live in atlanta and to absorb and appreciate the history around him to try to ease some of the suffering across this country, it's admirable. >> to be able to share the home of king, the home of congressman john lewis, it really gives us

inspiration and direction for us to build a world inviting more equity and belonging. >> hands up, don't shoot! >> they in 2020 saw the problem that the entire world saw and said, what can we do with our talents, with our love, with our passion of music and this problem that we need to face? >> so we thought how can we bring what music in common does to engage in this context? there are songs written by black and white folks alike throughout the 400-year history of race relations in the u.s. that still ring true today. ♪ we shall overcome ♪ that became the ground for black legacy project. we will travel to communities, spread word about the roundtables, engage in this healing dialogue that can recognize your shared humanity. using these historic songs as the talking point to do so. from that, those conversations

have local black and white artists create present day interpretations of those songs. ♪ >> and cowrite an original about how we can move forward. then the project culminates with a showcase of the songs. >> the black legacy project. >> and that is something that we promote to the entire local community so people of all backgrounds can come see it. ♪ >> this is a really innovative way to approach topics difficult to talk about, and through those conversations, bring about change. ♪ rise up rise up ♪ >> but you are musicians. you used what you have to try to change and improve race relations in this country. what's the message for them? >> we have a five-word motto. music can change the world. i think that's the answer.

♪ >> whether on center stage or in the background, these are just some of the people who work every day to shake up old ideas and lift us all up. i hope they inspire you in ways big and small to be a champion for change as well. i'm dr. sanjay gupta. thanks for watching. ♪ ♪ live from cnn world headquarters in atlanta, welcome to all of you watching us here in the united states, canada, and around the world. i'm kim brunhuber. ahead on "cnn newsroom" -- just hours after hurricane fiona crashed into eastern canada, there are new tropical storm concerns, this time in the caribbean as ian has florida in its sights. protests inside russia against president vladimir putin's push to mobilize thousand