Age: 33
Board Chair of IMPACT Delaware Inc. (Dover)
Tell us about your organization: Our mission at IMPACT Delaware Inc. is to encourage youth to trust adults, educate youth to learn individual assets and empower youth to use resilience skills in pursuing their dreams. Our core values are based on self-respect (confidence, driven, composure, expression, and service. IMPACT Delaware is the collaboration of two gender-based mentoring programs UNIQUE and Man Up that seek to inspire critical thinking, life-skill development and youth activism, encouraging youth to embrace their educations, value their self-worth and aspire to achieve their dreams. Our programs are designed for ages 10 to 25.
Why me? Because I am gratefully a living example/role model for young people that you can defy the odds, reach your goals, and use your success to then give a hand up to those youth who are in the same position you were at their age. That resilience and perseverance are keys to success and that having a sense of “community” through organizations like IMPACT is vital to one’s overall wellbeing. The more youth get to see themselves through the hard work of others who are on the ground interacting and assisting them, the more they experience what is necessary to make their dreams attainable.
Leadership examples: Professionally I earned the position from a therapist to a community interventionist coordinator. I also began a grant-funded community youth program through the state of Delaware named Virtue and Valor that focused on healthy well-being and substance- use awareness. I am a part of the Love Creek Elementary leadership team, which provides support and intervention to students in need. Personally, I demonstrated leadership through mentoring, coaching and guiding youth from elementary throughout young adulthood. I am a firm believer that love doesn’t stop and because I put my heart into what I do I continue to care about the young people reach their success and becoming their true selves.
Vision: I want to renew the sense of community within Delaware. We are strong in Sussex County but it’s critical that the power in IMPACT’s model of community connectedness is spread. It will be beautiful to see our students later become a part of the organization holding positions as well. I believe that nothing runs better and is appreciated more than an organization ran by those whom it helped.
Community service: I live and breathe youth community engagement and empowerment. I am a youth leader within my church community and I also support cancer awareness and student athlete life-skills coaching. Through Life CHAMPS, I provide and volunteer my life coaching services to youth organizations and sports teams to assist with teambuilding and individual coaching. More specifically, #Fightlike4 is a movement to support a local Delaware high school athlete battling renal cancer whom my family and I support greatly.
Not on my LinkedIn profile: I have been an ordained minister since the age of 22.
Guilty pleasure? S’mores, candy apples.
Currently reading: “Crushing,” by T.D. Jakes.
Favorite superhero: Iron Man
Family and education: Husband Reggie, three kids; 4-year-old twin daughters Rylie & Re’gan and 2-year-old son RJ. Bachelor’s in criminal justice from University of Maryland-Eastern Shore, master’s of social work from Delaware State University, and doctorate of education in Organizational Leadership from Wilmington University.
