Fannie Lue Neal

For Fannie Lue Neal, PSA coordinator in Cidon, Miss., there is religious meaning in her work through the program and how she interacts with other people.

"If I don't do right and act right there won't be heaven for me," Neal said.

About 15 or 16 kids from Cidon go to Wisconsin each summer.Students from several other Mississippi communities participate in the program as well.

Many sign up to go and are disappointed when the program runs out of available Wisconsin host families, Neal said.

Neal grew up in Mississippi and never left the state until she was 18 and visited an uncle in Memphis, Tenn.

Her family could not afford to send her on trips, she said.

Through the PSA program, her grandchildren were visiting Wisconsin when they were as young as 6.

In the 20 years Neal has been a coordinator she has hosted many families from Wisconsin who either visit or have volunteered to drive children back and forth between the states.

She recalled a store owner's reaction to seeing a crowd of white children entering and exiting her home in the 1980s.

He asked why all those white kids were in her house, she remembered.

Her reply was, "for the love of God, that's why."

Neal visited Wisconsin herself but most of her comments about what she liked about Wisconsin had to do with how people treated her than what things there were to do in the state.

Because she had already met her hosts she said she had no misconceptions about how she would be treated in Wisconsin.

"I was expecting to be treated nice before I went there," she said.