The Harry Potter Alliance harnesses the power of new media to communicate with more than 100,000 people, including 60 HPA chapters across the world. The average HPA member is young, passionate, enthusiastic, and idealistic, but often has few activist outlets that speak to them. The HPA makes activism accessible for young people by using the Harry Potter books- something they already love- as an access point to discuss pressing issues of social justice.

The HPA was founded in June 2005 by Andrew Slack, our Executive Director, and Paul DeGeorge of Harry and the Potters “I thought we needed an organization to act as a Dumbledore’s Army for our world, full of Harry Potter fans wishing to embody the message of the books to create social change,” says Andrew Slack.

After a kickoff event on October 10, 2005, Paul began to repost HPA action alerts and the emerging Wizard Rock scene soon followed suit. Not long after, major Harry Potter sites like the Leaky Cauldron and Mugglenet began to spread the word. By the end of 2007, the Harry Potter Alliance had reached over 120,000 people and attracted tremendous media attention; enough so to catch the eye of JK Rowling and Time Magazine.

In 2007, The HPA established the official Board of Directors: Andrew Slack, Paul DeGeorge, Seth Reibstein (who helped Andrew come up with the idea of the HPA while traveling together in their comedy group), Matt Maggiacomo of The Whomping Willows (who so successfully fund raised for the HPA in 2007 that it allowed Andrew to begin working full time), and Melissa Anelli, best-selling author of Harry, A History and head of The Leaky Cauldron.

In 2008, Andrew began to work to build a volunteer staff for the HPA. Enter stage right Kate Looby, a linguistics graduate student, and Karen Bernstein, a UNC-Chapel Hill student with a passion for theatre and social organizing: together these three began to build a network of volunteer staff, (which now includes over 40 volunteers) and the HPA chapters program.

In addition to this, many people contributed to this growing movement, donating time, resources, and energy to making the dream of a fictional story improving the actual stories of so many people across the world. The HPA has become as community of well seasoned academics, writers, activists, YouTube celebrities, fandom leaders, and donors.

But the the most profound contributions have come from our members. Andrew says, “We are grateful to their joining us, shaping us, challenging us, and engaging with us in building a better world more suitable to creative expression, justice, and love.”