Rhoda Blackwell was not raised thinking about politics. She was raised around people trying to survive life while helping each other through it.

She was born in Arlington, Virginia, but her family’s direction changed early. After the death of her aunt, her parents moved the family to Tazewell County to help her uncle raise four children left without a mother. Around Southwest Virginia, people do not usually call that sacrifice. They just call it doing what family is supposed to do.

For a kid coming from Northern Virginia, Tazewell felt like another world at first. Different pace. Different people. Different expectations. Before long though, it became home. The friendships she made there stayed with her for life.

Rhoda says much of who she became came from her mother, who grew up in Jenkinjones, West Virginia. Her mother taught her children to treat people right no matter the color of their skin, their religion, or who they loved. Rhoda still talks about that lesson because she knows not everybody in those days was raised that way. She also laughs remembering how her mother insisted on proper grammar despite growing up deep in the coalfields herself.

In school, Rhoda found her place in choir and drama. She sang alto in chorus and remembers a teacher who made every student feel accepted. That stayed with her because kids who normally would not have mixed together learned how to work together in that classroom. Many of those friendships survived long after graduation.

By fourteen, Rhoda was already working in a jewelry store. She babysat for local families too. Today she still sees some of those children she once watched, now grown with children of their own. Small towns work that way. Time moves forward but somehow circles back around.

Life was not always easy. Rhoda describes parts of her early home life as dysfunctional, but instead of letting that define her, she decided her own children would be raised differently. She raised them to respect women, not fight, love each other, and support family.

As a single mother, Rhoda worked two and sometimes three jobs while trying to raise children, pay bills, and finish school. She remembers childcare costs eating up paychecks before she ever saw the money herself. She remembers student loans hanging over everything. She remembers sitting at the kitchen table trying to figure out how far a paycheck could stretch before something had to wait.

Those years shaped the way she looks at public education now because she knows some children walk into classrooms carrying burdens nobody sees. Some feel overlooked. Some feel like they matter less than others. Rhoda believes every child deserves a good, strong, free education no matter where they come from or what color their skin is.

Part of that understanding also comes from being the grandmother of a special-needs grandson. As she says herself, “I understand the struggles.” That experience stayed close to her heart and strengthened her belief that every child should flourish and that adults making hard decisions should always keep children in mind.

That belief is what pushed her to run for the Bristol Virginia School Board.

Rhoda talks often about Bristol’s working people, volunteers, teachers, parents, and grandparents who quietly hold the community together without much recognition. She believes the city already has the people needed to improve its schools and strengthen its future, but too many folks do not feel part of the important conversations and decisions.

“We have what it takes to do good things,” she says. “We just need to make everyone feel a part of the important issues and make sure everyone votes.”

Friends describe Rhoda as compassionate but direct. Strong-willed. Too assertive. Rebellious. Rhoda laughs at those labels because, as she puts it, those are often the words people use for accomplished women.

What matters most to her are the children and teachers in Bristol classrooms right now. Whether they feel supported. Whether parents feel heard. Whether families struggling financially feel forgotten. Whether every child has somebody standing in their corner.

At the center of Rhoda Blackwell’s campaign is a belief shaped by family hardship, work, motherhood, and experience. Children remember the adults who stood beside them when it mattered.

Rhoda Blackwell wants to be one of those adults.

Rhoda Blackwell for Bristol VA School Board

 Rural America Rising PAC, a grassroots organization supporting rural Independent and Democratic candidates working to restore political balance in small towns and communities across America.