About This Campaign
In 2025, the Class of 2005 reached a meaningful milestone: twenty years since we walked across the stage and began shaping our paths beyond Altamont. This anniversary offers our class a unique opportunity to come together once again, not only to celebrate where we have been, but to invest collectively in where Altamont is headed. Guided by the values that defined us as students: leadership, integrity, and service, we can honor our shared experience by strengthening the Miree Center for Leadership at The Altamont School, ensuring future generations are equipped to lead with purpose and impact.
Why the Miree Center?
The C. Kyser Miree Center for Ethical Leadership transforms curiosity and ambition into real-world impact. Guided by the legacy of Kyser Miree, a 2005 graduate who believed deeply in the power of one individual to make a difference, the Center equips students to explore, lead, and grow through immersive summer internships and student-lead community initiatives. These experiences, supported by Altamont’s network of alumni, community partners, and local institutions, allow students to dive into fields that spark their passion, reflect on their learning, and make choices that shape their futures in meaningful ways. Leadership development at the Miree Center reflects the values Kyser carried with him from Altamont into every stage of his life: integrity, initiative, and a commitment to service. With student interest expanding and opportunities growing, this is the moment to honor his memory by ensuring that every Altamont student can experience the transformative power of leadership firsthand.
Your Impact
Your support will expand opportunities for Altamont students to lead both on-campus and beyond.
Because of your support:
-
Students can pursue meaningful summer internships, granting them real-world experience and insights
-
Initiatives can address real needs within Altamont, the Birmingham community, across the Southeast, or across the globe
-
Leadership workshops, conferences, and speaker programs can expand student learning
-
Relationships with community partners can continue to grow
These esperiences empower students to develop confidence, take initiative, and foster a lifelong commitment to ethical leadership.
Student Leadership in Action: Recent Miree Initiatives
-
Before Tomorrow: Life Skills for Teens
-
AJ G. organized a five-week series of workshops for teenagers in the greater Birmingham area,
designed to fill the gap between traditional education and the real world. Workshop topics
were simple meals, media literacy, mindset, financial literacy, and sewing basics.
-
Chime Forward: Young Voter Education
-
Chime Forward is a civic engagement-focused initiative Kennadi S. began to increase voter
education and registration among adolescents in the greater Birmingham community. She
created educational materials to promote awareness of voting deadlines and requirements,
organized voter-registration drives at Wenonah Highschool and partnered with the Alpha
Kappa Alpha sorority chapter at Samford University to host an information session there as
well.
-
Birthday Boxes: Baptist Children's Home
-
Lila B. worked with “Baptist Children's Home,” a foster care agency based in Birmingham. Her
goal was to meet the needs of “Baptist Children's Home” while helping educate the Altamont
community on foster care. She did this through a speaker and drives. Her Birthday Boxes
were a school wide intitative in which the school created more than 20 boxes for families to
create a special themed Birthday party.
From the Class Gift Organizers
Rachel Letcher ’05: "I give to the Kyser Miree Leadership Fund to honor the incredible legacy of my dear friend. Seeing the Miree Center students’ projects first hand has been a privilege. I am continually impressed by the thoughtfulness and deep commitment Altamont students bring to the Birmingham community beyond the classroom.”
Allison Smith Shields ’05: "Giving to the Kyser Miree Leadership Fund is a way for me to honor a dear friend whom I miss deeply by ensuring that his spirit, leadership, and presence remain at Altamont for years to come through the accomplishments of the Miree Center.”
Caitlin Lopez-Rogers, Alumni Office: "The Class of 2005 marks a momentous milestone this year—celebrating 20 years as Altamont alumni during the 50th Anniversary of The Altamont School. As a class shaped so deeply by Kyser’s presence, they continue to feel the influence of his legacy in that shared commitment to giving back to the Birmingham community. There could be no more appropriate way to honor that legacy than by supporting the leadership center established in his memory, by his loving family.
This center strengthens the entire Altamont community by nurturing ethical leadership for generations to come. Through that ongoing education, we carry forward the school’s mission “to improve the fabric of society…” and ensure that Kyser’s spirit of purpose, compassion, and service lives on."
