Kit Cummings
Founder & CEO, The Power of Peace Project (POPP)
Human Behavior Strategist | Community Systems Architect | Conflict Culture Specialist
Kit is an award-winning author, international keynote speaker, human behavior strategist, and
the Founder & CEO of The Power of Peace Project (POPP), a nonprofit organization dedicated
to reducing violence, strengthening communities, and developing transformational leaders.
For more than 30 years, Kit has studied human behavior in some of the most challenging
environments imaginable, including schools, prisons, juvenile justice systems, churches, athletic
programs, corporations, and communities struggling with violence and division. His work has
taken him into more than 100 prisons and correctional facilities, over 100 schools and youth-
serving organizations, and communities across the United States and around the world.
Kit is best known for launching the Power of Peace movement from a Georgia maximum-
security prison in 2010, where he brought together rival gang leaders in a groundbreaking 40-day
experiment based on the principles of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s nonviolence philosophy. The
initiative produced historic results and became the foundation for a leadership system that has
since impacted thousands of lives.
Today, POPP operates at the intersection of education, justice, law enforcement, faith, business,
and community leadership. Through programs such as Protect the Dream, Forty Days to
Freedom, Forty Days of Prayer, and the Power of Peace Leadership System, Kit helps
communities create sustainable ecosystems that address the root causes of violence while
building hope, opportunity, and accountability.
His work has been implemented in schools, juvenile courts, detention centers, churches, police
departments, athletic programs, and correctional institutions throughout the United States and
internationally. In one Michigan maximum-security prison, a two-year Power of Peace initiative
graduated more than 1,000 incarcerated men and contributed to a reduction in violence of more
than 50 percent.
Kit is the author of seven books, including Peace Behind the Wire, The New Convict Code,
Protect the Dream, and The Power of Peace. He has spoken to audiences ranging from Fortune
500 companies and sports organizations to educators, law enforcement leaders, elected officials,
faith communities, and incarcerated populations.
His current focus is helping communities become "POPP Communities.” These are unified
ecosystems where educators, law enforcement, justice agencies, churches, businesses, nonprofits,
and citizens work together around a shared vision to create safer communities and better
outcomes for young people. POPP is building “Beloved Communities” which was Dr. King’s
dream.
