Archive | Story

Channa Pickett & Duke’s Office of Durham & Regional Affairs (DARA)

By Andrew Franklin on 2/23/16 in General, Partner Story, Story

Fostering Community Care in Durham and the Triangle

CEF received a $5,000 Community Care Fund (CCF) grant through the Duke University Office of Durham and Regional Affairs’ “Doing Good In the Neighborhood” (DGIN) program in October of 2015. We sat down with Channa Pickett, Senior Program Coordinator for Community Outreach, Engagement, and Evaluation, to talk about the CCF grant, her work at DARA, and her story.

When Channa Pickett joined the Duke University Office of Durham and Regional Affairs (DARA) in 2008, she was charged with building and running a grant-making program for Doing Good in the Neighborhood, Duke’s employee-giving campaign. Doing Good in the Neighborhood (DGIN) was designed to connect Duke employee donors to an array of giving options that impact the Durham community. Today, Duke employees can choose to donate to five options — neighborhoods, youth, schools, health, and the Community Care Fund — in addition to being able to donate to the United Way.

CEF received its grant through the Community Care Fund, which provides funding to Triangle nonprofits that present “strong and innovative proposals.” CEF will be using its grant money to deliver and continuously improve personalized one-on-one financial coaching to Durham residents, leveraging these efforts towards stable transitions from shelters into permanent housing for those experiencing homelessness and housing insecurity.

Community investment, especially in local schools, is what former Duke President Nannerl Keohane imagined when she created the Duke-Durham Neighborhood Partnership in 1994. “I really believe that Duke has in its heart and in its mission an investment in the community,” says Pickett, “and I think that happens in hundreds if not thousands of ways.”

For over two decades, Duke has bolstered communities and organizations in Durham and beyond through targeted giving and organizational support.

While raising money is not always an easy task, especially during a recession, Duke employees have continued to step up to the challenge raising $647,985 in 2015. Money raised through DGIN has been invested into high-impact programs and organizations that make our community a better place.

“It’s been an incredible experience watching the DGIN campaign grow over the past eight years,” Pickett reflected. “I’m always impressed by the generosity of my colleagues across the campus and health system.” Initially Pickett thought grant-making would be simple; however, she soon realized the unique challenges grant-makers face. “We feel a real sense of responsibility to our Duke donors to invest their money wisely,” Pickett says. “With so many deserving organizations in Durham, Wake, and Orange counties, we often face difficult funding decisions.”

In addition to her work with DGIN, Pickett oversees several Latino community outreach initiatives including Enlaces, a Latino youth outreach program for elementary and middle school students. “In 2008, as we started talking with school and community leaders, we heard the need for more support for our Latino community members,” Pickett recalled.

“We were seeing tremendous growth in our Latino Community,” she says, “yet language and cultural barriers prevented students and parents from accessing many school and community resources and fully engaging in the education of their children.” Partnering with El Centro Hispano, Pickett helped start Enlaces, a strengths-based program that better connects Hispanic students and parents to school staff and resources. The Enlaces team uses a holistic approach to meeting the needs of families and works to enhance communication and understanding among youth, parents, and school staff.

In an earlier interview, Maria, the mother of an Enlaces student at Rogers-Herr Middle School, said the parent workshops and the support of Enlaces staff have made a big difference for her family. “The meetings help me relate to and have more conversations with my son,” she said. “I’ve learned how to create a good studying environment at home, and I feel more connected with my son’s teachers.”

Through the years, Enlaces has expanded the focus from school navigation to parent leadership development and advocacy. It’s been exciting and very rewarding “to see parents go from calling us [Enlaces] for support to contacting the school directly, requesting their own meetings, and advocating for their issues,” Pickett reflects.

Now in her eighth year working for DARA, Pickett is excited to focus on cultivating youth leaders through Enlaces. “Our youth have a lot to say about their own experiences. We want to help them realize change on issues that impact their lives.” Pickett says that it’s “a pleasure and an honor to work in this office and to have an opportunity to invest in others as others have invested in me when I was a student at Durham Tech and Duke.”

We’re appreciative of Pickett’s efforts and of DARA’s generous support of CEF!

Member Services Coordinator, Jean Adler Stean

By Andrew Franklin on 2/23/16 in Advocate Story, General, Staff Story, Story

Jean Adler Stean is CEF’s newest hire. She is the Chapel Hill Member Services Coordinator and comes to CEF from the Durham VA Hospital, where she worked as a chaplain. She graduated from Duke Divinity School in 2013 and the University of Virginia in 2009.

She was kind enough to sit down for an interview on her first few months of work with CEF.

Tell me about your background

I grew up in Virginia Beach, but was born in New York and lived a whole bunch of different places. Virginia Beach is home though. I love the beach, and I love the ocean — it’s my soul place.

I’m married to John Stean, who works for the North Carolina NAACP.

How did you end up in divinity school?

I felt a calling to ministry and then worked during and after college for a community development nonprofit. The organization was called “Abundant Life Ministries” in Charlottesville, Virginia, and the idea was that you lived in and served in the neighborhood. It was less about programming and more about cultivating the resources that are already abundant in communities, and that community members really have the knowledge and power to help their community thrive.

Through that experience and through the experiences of college I was very interested in justice and community development and how that could work as a ministry. I realized that I didn’t know much of anything about ministry, so I should probably learn more about it.

So it was a combination of experience and wanting to learn more and keep doing that work.

What did you do after divinity school?

For two years, I worked at the VA Hospital in Durham as a Chaplain. The first year was my general residency, and then they had a new position open up for a mental health chaplain, working with folks who suffer from severe mental illness. I’ve always been very interested in mental health and found myself really drawn to it in chaplaincy work. It was pretty intense, but I think it’s another one of those callings. I think there are some people who just love to work in mental health, and I guess I’m one of those people.

It was challenging for a lot of the same reasons our work is challenging. You get people cycling in and out, who can’t really ever get well or heal, people who are struggling day in and day out, who have countless other circumstances on top of everything that trigger their mental health. I heard and saw the effects of oppression and poverty on health — mentally, physically and spiritually.

Why were you interested in working at CEF?

I was interested in CEF as an organization because of a lot of what I’d heard and knew from Janet (Durham Program Coordinator). It seemed like CEF was an organization that really cares about looking holistically at why people are in poverty. So, for example, we look at systemic injustices and systemic reasons for how people find themselves in the situations that they do, and we work to support both individuals in the moment and also work towards systemic change.

Why were you interested in being the Member Services Coordinator, in particular?

As you can probably tell from past experience, I like direct interaction with people. I love people, I love getting to know them, hearing their stories, and hearing about who they are. For the past two and a half years, I’ve been learning how to listen well to people. I was excited about the opportunity to keep that focus on working with individuals and supporting their unique needs and goals while also working to build partnerships and relationships to help the community as a whole. That’s what most intrigued me with the Integrated Services Center model. I was very much interested in how we can work to build connections and relationships across people and groups and institutions, in a way that can alter the landscape of our community for the better. It’s kind of like community development in a very specific kind of way.

Now that you’ve been on the job for a few months, how has it been different than you expected it would be?

Well, I found out very quickly that I have a whole lot to learn! The amount of information and resources y’all have collected in the database is incredible, and it’s a lot to know. I’m also discovering that resources and people and other organizations are constantly changing — that our community is constantly changing. So there’s always new information and people to learn about. It’s exciting in many ways, even if it can be quite confusing!

What I really appreciate about CEF is that we do talk about systemic issues, both within our community and within our organization. We’re self-reflective, and always willing to grow, even if it’s painful and tough. It’s not like CEF is saying, “we’ve got it all figured out, we know how to not oppress people with systems,” that’s near impossible. CEF is continually asking the questions and working to figure out how to better our services and improve ourselves as an organization.

What do you think is the biggest challenge this work will present to you?

I think sustainability. If I’m honest, some days can be very exhausting when you’re continually running up against systems and powers that you’re pretty powerless against when you’re working with Members. And you run into those a lot. Being in it for the long haul or sustaining oneself through that kind of work is tough, but doable.

What project are you most excited about in the new year?

I’m excited about continuing to get to know Members. I’d love to, in a general sense, really get more Members involved in more inner workings at CEF. They are so much the heart and soul of CEF, and I’d love for them to be involved in our community and continue to teach and shape us.

On a very specific point, I’m really hoping to get us some more robust legal resources. I think there’s been a gap here that was made apparent early on to me by some of our Advocates. So I’ve been following the connections as they come, and it seems like there are people in our community who are super excited about it as well. The resources are there, and we just have to tap into them. I’m tapping!

Tell me about a memorable Member meeting

In general, I think it’s just fun to get to know Members and to be able to call them by name, hear about their weekends, and know a little bit more about who they are and what they’re doing in the world.

One of my more memorable Member meetings was actually during a situation where I felt pretty powerless to offer tangible support. I met with a couple when they first came to Chapel Hill and they were homeless and didn’t have anywhere to stay that night. At that moment, I didn’t have many resources to offer them, which obviously is difficult, frustrating, and sad. But, I got to learn more about them in that hour and hear their story about how they got married and more about their family. I got to meet with them again recently, and it had been a while and they remembered me and I remembered them, and we were just kind of catching up about their holidays and getting to share about all the things that humans want connections with.

So, even though there are these monstrous barriers that can limit us in giving support to Members, sometimes I just have to say, “Whatever, barriers! We’re going to be human today.” That feels important to me. A lot of our hard work doesn’t always have the results that we want, but at the end of the day we can connect to someone meaningfully and that’s important to me.

Why do you think connecting with people is so important to you?

I really, truly love people. I think what all of us most want is to feel connected with and to feel loved by others. And in my work, I see how powerful it can be to have connections for myself and for other people — that a lot of healing takes place in that connection. And I’m really about healing, that’s what I want to be about in the world — for myself and for others. We could all use a lot of healing and I want to be a person who offers that, and I think connection is the way that I can offer that.

Member Story: Sue and Howell

By Jonathan Young on 12/30/15 in General, Highlight, Member Story, Story, Videos

Spend as little as five minutes with Sue and her son Howell Brown III and be prepared to fall immediately and deeply in love. Little Howell, with a thick Appalachian accent and black cowboy hat covering his head, talks in that lively way that only a 12-year old boy can about the RC cars that he races at Northgate Mall and his service dog Bo. He is the epitome of exuberance. He is one of those rare people you feel blessed to meet, who breathes in the same air as the rest of us, but then manages to breathe out pure joy.

Sue and Little Howell came to Durham when Howell was diagnosed with a brain tumor. They left everything behind at their home in Asheville, and were sleeping in hospital waiting rooms at first. Howell shares, “When I got diagnosed, we had to leave right away – no messing around.” After relocating to Durham, Howell and Sue were very fortunately connected with the Ronald McDonald House to live while Howell received his first year of chemotherapy and treatment.

During this time of upheaval and crisis, Sue ran into financial troubles. Howell’s oncologist encouraged Sue to “put everything on hold” while taking care of Howell through his treatment, meaning that Sue has been unable to work consistently. To help with bills, she took out a payday loan, not knowing the neverending debt trap the loan would lead to. Since then, Sue has received numerous threatening collections calls – and paid back her loans with exorbitant interest – all the while navigating the complicated health system and making sure Howell was receiving all the care that he needed.

Sue has been an amazing advocate for her son throughout his treatment – seeking out resources within the hospital and within the community that could support her son’s well-being as well as their future as a family. She learned about CEF when attending a resource panel offered by another local organization, and jumped at the opportunity to work with CEF to get her finances back in order.

Sue and Howell truly joined CEF as a family. Sue and Howell worked with their advocates to strive through their financial crisis as Sue focused on her son’s healing and treatment. Of CEF, Sue shares, “They’re helping me find hope by getting my financial security back… Before, we were struggling so much, and now I feel like I am breathing again.”

With CEF, Sue has opened a new account at Self-Help Credit Union, allowing her a fresh start with banking, and she is also working towards a personal savings goal through CEF’s Safe Savings Account. She has also connected to many local resources, filed back taxes, and better understood her credit situation. Her Advocates also help to investigate when she suspects she is receiving phone calls and emails that are financial scams. With her tireless CEF Advocates, “I can reach my goals,” says Sue.

And Sue has made this progress and tackled these issues concurrently and alongside traveling back and forth to Florida for special treatments for Little Howell, countless appointments at Duke Hospital, and dealing with news that is sometimes good and sometimes not what they hoped to hear. What’s more, going above and beyond super-mom status, she has found ways to give Little Howell the opportunity to be the exuberant, joyous, full-of-life child that he is, approaching a glimmer of normalcy, by doing everything from racing RC cars to attending Duke football games through the Ronald McDonald House.

Sue and Little Howell have been a joy to work with in CEF, and we are delighted to share a little bit about their journey here. As they reflect on their time with CEF, Little Howell shares, “I just hope we can do something for them some day, they’ve really helped us out a lot.” We hope he knows that they already have.

Meet Anthony: “CEF All-Star”

By Andrew Franklin on 11/24/15 in General, Highlight, Member Story, Story

(Anthony sporting his CEF “People Helping People” hat in front of his new home!)

Anthony raised four boys as a single father – two his sons and two of his sons’ friends who he raised as his own. He was an All-American football star at Chapel Hill High and went on to coach football for 19 years. In his own upbringing and as a parent, Anthony emphasized “Hard work, showing them you can do anything, and family – I was always at their events, reading, football games, I was always there.” With all 4 of his sons now grown and successful in business and public service, you can tell when talking to Anthony that family is at the center of his life.

Anthony became homeless after a large lay-off at the assisted living facility where he was housekeeping manager. “I had an apartment, a car, and slowly I started losing those things.” After spending some time staying with family, Anthony moved into the IFC shelter.

(Anthony’s 2014 Holiday Party Graduation)

He shares, “I found out there was a lot of social help here in Chapel Hill. Of course CEF was one of the first groups that I was led to… I mean, I had become kind of down in life, things not going well for me, and thought nobody really cared about what happened to Anthony Sharp. But when I walked into CEF it just changed. The enthusiasm the college kids had, you know they’re wiling to help, and just the care that they had – that made me feel different about myself.”

Anthony began working with Karla, a CEF advocate and current senior at UNC. Karla shares, “In our first meeting, he had so many plans for himself, ranging from academics, finances, employment, business, and service. And of those things, I feel like he always emphasized the service he would perform.” Karla and Anthony built a resume, completed countless applications, and connected with legal services to address issues on Anthony’s background.

(Anthony goofing around with fellow CEF graduate Robert at the 2014 Holiday Party)

Anthony highlights that in his struggle to “defeat homelessness… you know it wasn’t just me or one group, it was the whole community that came together.” He engaged in Orange County Literacy programs, many groups that meet at the shelter, and all of CEF’s programs, including Opportunity Classes. As he accumulated certificates along the way, he began including those with all of his job applications – and it all paid off!

Anthony secured a full-time position at UNC with health insurance and retirement benefits, and quickly saved with CEF to move into an apartment of his own. But even more, “For me, I found out I was smarter than I thought I was… I found out how to live again. As a term I have heard a lot from others, I’ve turned out to be who I was really supposed to be.”

Anthony gives back way more than he received. “It has just been a great life change for me, and I want to give thanks to a lot of people, and my community most of all for showing me a different way to live. It’s just great to be able to give back to this cause in Chapel Hill of ending homelessness.”

(Anthony with State Senator Valerie Foushee at the ribbon cutting for the IFC at SECU Community House where he is a new board member — Anthony delivered remarks about his journey out of homelessness)

Living Generously: Demonte’s Member Story

By Andrew Franklin on 11/17/15 in General, Highlight, Member Story

Demonte teaches us all to live generously. While living in a tent in the woods of Chapel Hill, he showed up bright and early every Saturday morning to the CEF Opportunity Class, making coffee for everyone and helping with classroom set-up. With a gift for photography he quickly became the resident photographer at CEF, capturing fun daily moments in the office, where he spends time every day of the week. He routinely snaps photos and then runs right across the street to print the pictures and give copies to everyone.

Demonte came to Chapel Hill after his home in Maryland burned down. “I didn’t have anywhere else to go… When I came here all I really had was the clothes that I was wearing.”

Running through a list of all the ways he has worked with CEF, Demonte shares, “When I came down here, everything I needed help for, if they couldn’t help me, they referred me to somebody that could. They just basically helped me put my whole life back together.”

His list of goals he accomplished with CEF includes: Getting his social security card and birth certificate after losing all his documents in the fire; connecting to doctors and mental health; getting help with managing his benefits; and finding housing.

On top of all that, Demonte points to the lessons he has learned from CEF’s Opportunity Classes. “I learned how to budget. I had never made a budget before coming to CEF; now I plan… I had never done that before. Demonte graduated months ago at this point, but he still continues to go to class every week to keep learning and also share with others there what he has learned, “Just to give back, plus I like helping people.

“CEF, it’s just been a lifesaver for so many people. It helped me out a tremendous amount. I just love the people here. I have a lot of friendships here… It is great to have people who you can call your friends, sit down and talk to when something is on your mind. I advise anybody that needs help with finding a house or a job or writing a resume to come check it out.”

Demonte was in a car accident in 1995 and suffered brain damage. As a result, Demonte is permanently disabled and not able to work formally, but he certainly still works hard. He got ordained as a minister and has served churches as their music director, volunteering locally with Love Chapel Hill church. Music is a long-time passion for Demonte from his time in the church as a kid, where he and several other youth started the “Seven Jewels Youth Choir.”

Out of the woods and now in an apartment, Demonte says he is “more restful now, because when I was out in the tent I would always wake up and it was hard to sleep.” Being in an apartment has also allowed him to get a long-awaited knee surgery that was not medically possible when his circumstances were different, as his doctors could not in good practice discharge him from the hospital to rehabilitate in a tent.

So what’s next for Demonte? “Basically all the goals that I had set for myself, I reached them all. The only goal I haven’t reached is the goal for my Safe Savings Account and my goal to get a laptop, but I’m working on that right now. Everything else I set as a goal is pretty much done, mostly from the help of CEF.”

Education + Housing

By Jonathan Young on 10/5/15 in General, Highlight, Member Story, Research + Publications, Story, Videos

Made for the Orange County Commissioners as they weigh the value of housing in Orange County, NC.
“The risk of having all the funding support education but not support housing means that you are going to be cutting certain children off from access to that education, and those are the children that are already facing greater challenges. Those are the children that need it most; those are the children that are already at risk for not developing the education they need to live a full and healthy life when they grow up.”
Jennifer De La Rosa

The Music Man — Jay Miller Helps CEF Sing

By Andrew Franklin on 9/23/15 in Donor Story, General, Story

The following is a profile of a CEF donor/partner who was kind enough to sit down with us and talk about his life, his motivations, and his experience with CEF. We’re happy to introduce him to the CEF community and to thank him for his support, in all of its forms. We hope to continue to feature partners and donors in our newsletters to thank them and to help tell our story.

To create a musical harmony, the artist stacks pitches on top of each other to produce a chord — a simultaneous sound that is pleasing to the ear. As a result, harmony has come to be used as a descriptor of symbiosis, a relationship where elements work and exist well together, in many different forms.

CEF donor Jay Miller understands intimately the difficulty and beauty of harmony. A Duke graduate (‘80), Jay spent his undergraduate years as a “gopher,” or administrative helper, for famous jazz musician and Duke “artist-in-residence” Mary Lou Williams. Jay, a bass player entering college, happened into Williams’ “The Beginning of the Blues” class in his freshman year.

“I was so taken with that,” he remembers fondly, “I was totally into jazz.” Williams was Jay’s inspiration to start playing the saxophone, and, referencing the time spent working for Williams, he admits, “I was willing to do anything because I could sit in there [Williams’ office] and listen to her practice.”

Music, both playing it and selling instruments, turned into a profession for Jay upon graduation. He opened a small music shop off of Ninth Street in Durham, which he spun into a chain of very successful music stores that spanned North Carolina (“Winston-Salem to Wilmington”).

However, Jay noticed a dissonance in his early post-graduate years while he was playing music professionally, a sound was out of place in his life: “I developed a drug and alcohol addiction.” He explains, “I don’t mind talking about it because I think the stigma is really unfortunate around a lot of mental health issues and I would rather just talk about it and maybe it will help somebody.”

Fortunately, Jay sought help early, consulting a substance abuse counselor in Durham and starting to attend regular Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous meetings at the age of twenty-five. He is quick to note, although he maintains sobriety, “I have not really moved past my addiction issues, they are with me every day — it’s something that has to be managed for life for most of us.”

Ever cognizant of the value of the help he received from Durham County, and grateful for his good fortune, Jay wants to give back, “That’s kind of formed my basis in mental health interest.” Helping others, he says, has the added benefit of keeping him “on track” in his daily effort to manage his addictions.

Jay has given back in a big way since selling his music business in 2002. He and his wife Ebeth Scott Sinclair — a visual artist herself (http://ebethscottsinclair.com/) — started the Shared Visions Foundation to help non-profits in Durham and Orange County, especially those that serve individuals with mental health issues.

Jay’s musical ability to listen for missing notes and fill that space, creating harmony, has equipped him well in the non-profit sphere. To him, creating harmony means offering essential business advice and financial counseling to non-profit organizations and leaders, “I feel like a lot of non-profits suffer from not paying attention to the business of the business, if that makes sense. And so my original idea is that was how I would help non-profits.”

A perfect match for CEF, Jay has already participated in Opportunity Classes and will be assisting with training our volunteers in financial coaching. We are so grateful for the gift of his time and energy, in addition to his generous financial contribution through the Shared Visions Foundation. We’re looking forward to continuing to make music together!

Staff Voices: An Exit Interview with Durham Program Coordinator Anne Yeung

By Andrew Franklin on 9/21/15 in Advocate Story, General, Staff Story, Story

Interview conducted by Ayana Sadler, CEF Summer Intern

Anne Yeung was a one-year Community Engagement Fellow working full-time out of the CEF Durham Office, helping foster CEF’s relationship with the Duke Office of Durham and Regional Affairs, building CEF programs, and supporting volunteer advocates. She chose to work with CEF because she was seeking a professional experience that ethically and impactfully addressed systemic problems in the community.

How long have you been with CEF?

I’ve been with CEF for about three years now — two years as a volunteer while I was at Duke and this past year working as full-time staff.

What did you study at Duke?

I graduated from Duke in 2014. I was a public policy major, pre-med, with an interest in public health and social medicine.

What are your job responsibilities with CEF?

I work full-time as the Durham Program Coordinator. I would say the work is like three “buckets,” though they aren’t really buckets because they all kind of work together. The three categories are advocate support — supporting our wonderful student volunteers to do both the direct service work that they do and the administrative back end support they do to make CEF run; community partnerships — being out in the community and talking to other partners out in the area and getting CEF’s name out there and figuring out how we can best work together to support our members; and then the third category is program development — putting the previous two things together and thinking about, what do our programs need to be, where do they need to be to best support our members. How do we improve them? How do we grow them?

How has your position evolved since you first started?

I would say that the biggest difference about my position is that I really don’t support students as much anymore. The reason is that they’re all supporting themselves, they’re all supporting each other. And, they have grown tremendously our capacity for leadership and the structure where people have their purview of responsibility and decision-making, then take it and run with it. So, I kind of find myself sitting back and watching a lot more, which is really awesome.

What are some challenges you faced while working for CEF?

The biggest challenges are probably moments of helplessness. We all live within these systems and we are subject to the faults and failures of these systems; so, despite people’s incredible resilience and resourcefulness and creativity, sometimes you just bump up against the system and there’s not much you can do about it. Whether it’s lack of affordable housing or the way our criminal justice system works or something else…just moments where you are just one person and no matter how amazing you are as a person, you are just one little person in this giant system and that can feel very helpless and really hard.

What is your most memorable moment with CEF?

My most memorable moment with CEF is the first time we had “House Course,” which is our Duke for-credit, semester-long, academic course that is our training for all of our advocates in Durham. That was fall 2014, and it was the end of the semester and we were doing reflections, so everyone was going around talking about some high or low that they had or a memorable moment during the semester, working with a member, or during Office Hours. And, I felt like I heard 30 times what had happened for me, and I was watching it happen for 30 other member-advocate pairs. That was just astounding and so awesome, and I almost cried — I didn’t cry, but I almost cried — because I think the coming together of two people and the magic that can happen there where you learn about yourself and you learn about somebody else’s story and where you help each other in different ways is really beautiful. And I will never forget that moment.

How has CEF inspired you? Either a member, advocate, peer, co-worker, etc.

This is a hard one because there’s a lot you could say. There’s two things I would say. I’m inspired by people’s enormous capacity for growth: just watching someone be over here, and then a semester later, or a year later, or even a few weeks later be totally over there, and just have changed fundamental parts of themselves. And I think the second thing that really ties into that is people’s commitment to wanting to learn and grow continuously, and to always evolve and not be complacent about where you are. I’ve seen that in our members, our advocates, staff around me — that has definitely been really inspirational.

What’s next for you?

I’ll be going to Georgetown School of Medicine in August. Actually, my first day of classes is August 10th. I’ll be going into medicine, and I hope to practice for some of my time and spend the rest of my time leveraging the direct physician caretaker perspective to work on more of a systems level.

I don’t know if that will mean working for a non-profit, or working in medical academia, or working as medical director of a state health department, or something like that. I’m not sure yet, but I look forward to it whatever it is. And, one thing that CEF has taught me is that life can change dramatically in a very short amount of time; so, that’s my answer for now, but who knows?

CEF Member: Ms. Denise

By Jonathan Young on 9/12/15 in Highlight, Member Story, Story

Home health was the vocation for Denise Rush. Her upbringing shaped her to care for the elderly in ways that afford them dignity, but finding work with bene ts and regular hours had been a long-standing struggle. Denise moved her family into the shelter following an accident on black ice that caused her to lose her job and home.

Each week in the Genesis Home living room, Denise and her advocate Quinn Holmquist, a Duke student from Charlotte, NC, met to complete job applications. Their perseverance paid o when Denise was offered two positions, but they came with challenges: “People don’t know that you have to go through a lot to be a [Certified Nursing Assistant].” She worked 50-75 hour weeks, and spent time and gas driving to clients’ homes, which was uncompensated by her employer.

Denise’s kids worried, “Mom, we haven’t seen you for a week.” Even Quinn grew anxious over her lack of sleep. “So I started saying ‘no’ to the hours. My employer’s attitude was, ‘How dare you not want to work all these hours?’ They sent me an email saying, ‘Your services are no longer needed.’” Fortunately, Denise and Quinn had been applying to better-paying jobs. Shortly after her dismissal, Denise called Quinn, exclaiming,“Duke called me!” She had received an offer for a salaried CNA position at Duke Hospital, with benefits and consistent hours that made it a keeper.

Denise’s experiences have given her a powerful voice in Raise Up for 15, a national movement campaigning for a $15 minimum wage. She has given speeches in Durham, Chicago, and Atlanta, and was featured in the New York Times. “My mentality is that we come together and pull each other up. That’s how I was raised growing up in the Caribbean – there is unity.” At Raise Up for 15 events, she has met college professors who live out of their cars, and civil rights activists who marched alongside Dr. King. “Back then, their working conditions were horrible, and because they fought, conditions improved.”

msdenisetext

Member Story: Ricky Reams

By Jonathan Young on 7/26/15 in General, Highlight, Member Story

by Anne Yeung

“Family” is the word that comes to mind when I think of Ricky Reams— it means the world to him. When Ricky and I met two years ago at Housing for New Hope’s Phoenix House transitional housing program, the first goal we tackled was saving for housing. Ricky saved with remarkable fervor, stunning me by reaching his goal of $500 in just four months. But what I will never forget is that the only time he ever deposited less than planned into his Safe Savings Account, it was in the name of family: he wanted to give his grandchildren gifts for the holidays.

Family was also essential to Ricky’s ability to work. Two months after he successfully moved into his own place, we reconnected to work on job searches. After revamping his resume, drafting a cover letter, and practicing tricky interview questions, Ricky was able to find work – he just had trouble keeping it. He confided that ever since moving away from his hometown of New Haven, Connecticut, he had been struggling to hold a job: “I get depressed because my family always in Connecticut and I couldn’t go check on ‘em and see ‘em like I want to. So I just get isolated and shut the world down.” Knowing that being separated from his family made it difficult for him to maintain employment, my co-advocate Stephanie Colorado and I set about making sure he knew he could have “family” in Durham, too. Every Thursday morning, we met Ricky at Whole Foods to play cards, talk about life, share stories, and just spend time together.

Today, Ricky will have been employed as a Donations Ambassador at Habitat ReStore of Durham and Orange Counties for almost half a year and will proudly tell you, “Everything been going so good at that job! I love to go to work … I come in there smiling and happy every day.” He will also gush about the newest addition to his family, a childhood friend who he only recently found the courage to approach, “We gonna get married – I’m talking ‘bout we gonna jump the mop, we ain’t gonna jump the broom! Right now, we feel like we 40 years married. She’s a beautiful woman and I love her to death.”

Hanging out with Ricky was my small part in helping to make sure depression wouldn’t keep him from doing what he loves – but, selfishly, it was also my way of basking in his good nature. He’s the kind of person who, when I vented about people who I thought were being nasty, reminded me, “You know what you do to people who make you feel that way? You pray for them.” If you ask him his secret, he will shrug, “I’m like the same person every day, try to uplift people, ask them how their child doing, how’s your day – that’s just me.” It is infectious. Each time we met – whether it was to open an affordable credit union account, sign-up for e-statements to reduce fees, budget for his new housing expenses, file back taxes to avoid garnishment, stow the cash he had from selling his van into his Safe Savings account, or connect to Legal Aid for help dealing with an exploitative landlord – he uplifted me with his spirit. He became somebody I could call if stressed or angry. He became somebody who, when I share with him that I’m scared to head to medical school but am trying to be brave, he tells me “I’m proud of you, Anne” and I choke up. Ricky is family.

← Previous 1 … 9 10 11 … 18 Next →

Navigation