Personal Statement

For the past several years I have been a servant leader fully committed to eradicating social and economic injustice for diverse populations in marginalized rural and urban communities in Tallahassee. While working the front-lines of child welfare, I dedicated time behind the scenes volunteering numerous hours traveling to multiple dependency youth camps to assist with developing leadership and self-esteem among foster-care youth through mentoring. My desire to impact more youth made it imperative for me to go back to school and learn how to integrate research with my practitioner background so that I may serve in a greater capacity. While matriculating through graduate school I have volunteered nearly 30-40 hours a week as a National Executive Director with Distinguish Young Gentlemen of America, Inc., (DYG) an organization that services minority high school youth throughout three Florida counties. The knowledge I gained in graduate school assisted me in structuring and implementing the curriculum and program development components of the program with measurable outcomes such as academic support, mentoring, development workshops and community services which produced nearly $83,824 in grants to support DYG. This organization has helped young minority males graduating as seniors earn more than $1.7 million in college scholarships.