Support for this program is provided by the Weldon F Osborne Foundation.

The Schillhahn-Huskey Foundation.

And viewers like you.

Thank you.

Today we're featuring two nonprofits committed to making generational and community change.

One empowers youth with life and leadership skills.

The other supports families and at risk youth, offering a new direction and purpose for a brighter future.

We're Stronger together Chattanooga.

Stay tuned to learn more.

Welcome to Chattanooga.

Stronger together.

I'm Barbara martyr.

Sandy Price, president and CEO of rise.

IT cooperative, is with us today.

This organization is dedicated to developing a responsible generation by equipping youth with the tools to becom confident, productive leaders.

Sandy, thank you so much for coming in today.

I really, really love what you're doing with your nonprofit, and I can't wait for our viewers to learn more about it.

So tell me why you started this and when you started it.

Yeah Thank you so much for having me.

I'm always loved to share about what we do.

So we start.

I started when I say we, my husband and I, Joe, we co-founded Rise Up Cooperative in September of 2020.

Together we have six kids.

Three.

We adopted a foster.

We foster two adopted siblings out of three.

Yeah.

And we noticed in our home with the difference between our biological and our adopted kids the need that we knew was there.

But it was evident when it was in our home of the different skill that are lacking that you take for granted when you're raising your kids in your home.

Things that they mirror, they watch.

They know just from having two parents or a good parent there.

So the kids from foster care, when they came into our home, from those rough beginnings, it was evident that we wanted to do more for other kids, too.

We couldn't parent more kids.

Six is a lot, us personally.

So years later, I decided that it was time to start our nonprofit and we provide life and leadership workshops because I feel strongly that if we don't give them the tools today for their tomorrows, that they are not as capable to be successful in the different things they want to do in life.

A lot of it can be learned along the way, but it's always nice to hav that extra tool in the toolbox, so to speak, that they can gain from our workshops.

It we're celebrating our five year anniversary coming up.

So I'm excited about that.

It was a long road to get where we're going, but being able to see the difference that we're making in kids lives has been amazing.

So let's talk about, who do you actually serve?

So excuse me.

We target 13 to 23 year olds.

Middle school, high school, early college.

Those youth right in the thic of what you are talking about, because they're in school and they're on their devices more than ever before, and they can hide behind those screens.

Right?

But we go into schools and organizations locally.

a lot of times they're one offs.

We'll go in and provide like an online safety class, because maybe that group's having trouble with their group with cyberbullying, or maybe it's budgeting or healthy relationships.

We've been called in to do vaping, tobacco use, substance abuse prevention.

So we bring volunteers from the community to lead these workshops.

So it's not I do that some of them, but it's not just me, because I know that I am not the expert in most things, but there are many people that are.

So we leverage our connection within the community to provide their expertise, their training, and their experience to pour into the next generation to help them with things like that.

So basically, what you're doin is you are providing resources and workshops.

Some of the training you'll actually do yourself, but you're actually saying, how do we make this a collaborative effort and bring others in because you're vetting all those consultants and all of those, and I love this other thing that you do in trying the trainer certificatio so that you can get more people involved and interested.

And I think that's where some of mayb our volunteers in the community, after hearin your story, will really want to this will resonate with them and really want to say, I think there's something I can do where I have a heart for that.

And then they could come through the training the trainer and get that certification, and then work with you.

Do you focus mainly on young ladies or do you do young men to young men too, across the board, whatever the group has in their in their client base that they need help with will go in and do it.

Speaking of just girls, we do do a collaborative effort of Girls Leadership Summit.

We're planning our fourth annual annual one right now.

We partner with TCC, Tennessee Commission on Children and Youth, And we teach them things like confidence, how to, advocate for yourself, empower their voices, teach the that they are worthy of respect and healthy relationships and love.

So, this year, because of the data collected from TCC, we'r focusing on suicide prevention.

Last year it was human trafficking.

So depending on what data they collect for the year before, whatever numbers show, the greater need is what we focus on.

And this is a it's a one day, a one day full day event, completely free.

As is all of our workshops, completely free.

And they get t shirts and lunch and all kinds of things.

We bring in vendors that also give them little giveaways and share with the resources that are available for them in the community.

So five years, and so no you have a program called Ali.

Who participates in that?

What is that all about?

Yeah.

So that is focused for we started with juniors and seniors, but we are opening it to all high schoolers.

Really if a freshman or sophomore applies and it can be anywhere within China Nagar surrounding counties.

We've got a loose relationshi with the mayor's Youth Council where we're they're helping u understand this worked for us.

This didn't work for us so that we build it on a solid foundation.

Utilizing also the list of students that for whatever reason, they can't accept.

Many times they can't accept a student because they either don't go to a city school or don't live in a city, but we can.

So they'll refer them to us.

And it is a school year, so we'll start in September.

We will graduate in May and we're teaching them to be up standards, in their communities and their schools, in their homes.

With empathy, leadership, Really relationships, health, relationships That's what I was thinking of.

But there's a team of steering committee, so to speak.

Some of the Family Justice Center employees.

I partner heavily with the FGC to do this.

This survey found Asian and young and wiser, and we just come in and we pour in our experience, our knowledge, and we also bring in a couple different, individuals from different organizations that the students pick.

Let's say they maybe want to learn more about communication or budgeting or whatever it is that cohort wants to learn more about.

We'll bring in another exper from the community to do those.

How many is usually in a cohort?

We asked our last cohort what they suggested, and they think seven is a good number.

And that's really small.

So space is limited.

We've already had several applications come in for the school year so we might grow from there if.

But seven they think is a very good intimate group where they can learn the bes and they learn from each other.

Yes.

And then it's sort of almost like a one on one with the the trainer, the teacher, the mentor, whoever's working with them and everything.

What are the five pillar of your topics that you work on?

Yeah.

So there's, mental health, financial literacy, job readiness, health and safety.

And there are dozens of smaller kind of micro topics under there, but those are the large umbrella of them.

So if somebody is looking for mental health within, that could be the healthy relationships that I've mentioned.

It could be online safety because of the cyberbullying aspect of that.

It could be a whole host of different things under financial literacy, like budgeting, goal setting, needs versus wants.

So we break it up.

But it's easier for organizations instead of being overwhelmed to see the five pillars and to know which direction that they might need and want to go for their group.

And I think when I was looking and I love your website, it's wow, there's a lot of information there.

You have a workshop workshop section.

And I actually kind of clicked into some of those and everything.

Any those are free.

Yes.

Anybody.

Everything.

Yeah.

It could use those for their students, like if they're homeschooling or even if they're seeing some kind of an alarm, not an alarm, but just, a red alert and you're like yeah, I don't understand this.

So let me kind of go see.

And then there could be a workshop that addresses that, and it could be this, like, all right, to this cyberbullying.

I need to get on top of that.

I need to find out what's going on.

Not just take the phone awa from the child and everything, but go to that child and say, here are some tools to make you be in control of the situation, because they don't know how to do that themselves.

The child don't.

And one of the things I think that has hurt us the most is the internet.

Yes.

And the texting.

And you've got 12 and 13 year olds with cell phones, and you've got six and seven year olds with cell phones and my husband, Joe and I went in to one of the schools and di a parent online safety workshop.

We were there for an hour after, just from parents asking us questions because they didn't.

They don't, they don't you don't know what you don't know, right?

So we were helping them learn how to help their child by putting parental restrictions in place, setting up different tool on the devices and within their, online network.

So, we have about a minute left.

Okay, let's recap it.

Let's just talk about wha are the volunteer opportunities.

We talked about trying the trainer certification.

The volunteers could come in for tha if they really want to help out.

What others are out there for you that you really need?

The two collaborative programs that we mentioned with the Alli Ambassador and the Girls Leadership Summit, we always need volunteer to help plan and execute those, whether it be the different sessions of Alli ambassadors behind the scenes planning it, Girls Leadership Summit, the execution of it, day of or the planning of it there's so much that's involved and a lot of times you don't when you're on the outside or you're a participant, you don't understand what all goes behind the scenes.

You just need worker bees.

We just need where cookies help us make sure it's a successful event.

It's going to be successful either way, but it can be more successful with more hands helping us.

Do you need like office help?

Always a secretary, something?

You know, I just hired our first employee, actually, so.

Thank you.

I have been for the last five years, until now, a one woman show.

We're wearing all the hats so always need behind the scenes with just the day to day the scheduling, the workshops.

They're sending, reminders, social media.

We have a blog and we have a YouTube.

So we record all of our virtual workshops and there put raw footage on our YouTube.

So being able to, maybe edit some of those or go in and fix it where it can be searchable more easily.

Some of that I don't know ho to do website, some high school and some college kids that are just so tech savvy.

Yeah, they could come in, they whipped up and just like, girl, you're done, right, you know, and over less than they would do in less of time.

Right.

Half the time I would take a quarter of the top.

I mean, I take my phone to my grandson and go fix it.

Yeah, it's Facebook, I mean, my iPad fix six, you know, because once again, I'm like, I don't know, just fix it, you know?

So yes, I can kind of get away with that.

Something to say.

Any Thank you so much for coming in.

This has been so helpful.

So education, educational.

And I really want our viewers when they see the show come out to your website.

Thank you so much as they ca and check out those workshops.

Awesome.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Up next we'll have Gary Davis, the second from Changing Directions for success.

Stay with us.

We want to know how you serve your community.

Send us photos or videos of you or your family volunteering, and we may feature it on a future episode.

Email stronger@wtcitv.org or use the hashtag STRONGERWTCI on social media.

Welcome back.

We're joined by Gary Davis, the second founder and executive director of Changing Direction for success.

This organization offer at risk youth and their families guidance towards a path of hope and transformation.

Gary, I'm so glad you're here with us today.

I want you to tell me the story and the reaso why you started this nonprofit.

Yes.

So let me start from the beginning.

Born and raised here in Chattanooga.

To a single mother.

Didn't know at the time that God was preparing me for the path that I'm on currently.

But, had a lot of problems in school.

A lot of it was due to poor choices.

And so, in and out of school, getting suspended in and out of juvenile things like that.

I had a run in with the la my first time at 12 years old.

Took a firearm to a middle school and was expelled.

And so, long story short, I, I had become what I needed in my life.

And so, after having a family very early, getting married, I lost my brother du to a fentanyl overdose in 2021.

And at the at the funeral, my pastor said that my brother had lived 14,000 and 582 days, and I had never heard life in that scope before.

So when I heard that I realized that God was calling, putting a calling on my life to do something different.

And so I wanted to pour my energy and time back into young people and helping them avoid what?

I had a front row, a seat, and seeing my brother go throug and ultimately losing his life.

And what what year did you.

How long has this, nonprofit been in existence where we got our 501 C3 in January of 2022.

So we're going into year four right before this year.

Wow.

Let's tal about what schools are you in, because I think that's primarily where your focus area is.

Yeah.

So originally we started with elementary, and then our goal was to not only start with elementary fifth grade specifically, but we also wanted to get into the feeder schools because our goal was to begin our relationship and mentorship in the fifth grade and follow them through high school.

So we began at Whitmore Elementary and then got in a partnership with Dale Wood Middle School so we could catch those students as they leave Whitmore and go to their world and then the opportunity was open up to start now at Hardee Elementary.

So then obviously we went to Archie, not middle school, and then we're in, East Spring Elementary as well.

Wow.

That's amazing.

So when you say you're in the schools, what are you doing in the schools?

What services are you providing?

Yes, ma'am.

So we we heavily lean on the teachers and faculty.

We ask for a mixture of students.

They can tier so we get some tier ones, tier 2 to 3.

And typically what are tier one, tier two, tier three for our audience, tie one to 2 to 3 are just the tiers that they put students on in terms of 2 or 3.

Being a student that needs a lot of hands on.

Okay.

Time he's having some issue at home, some issues at school.

Tier ones are typically the students that are kind of thriving, doing well in school.

And so we asked to make sure because we're big on accountability.

So we want it to be able to have the students creat some accountability throughout, the school year and within themselves.

So what we've done is, we lean on the teachers, as I said before, and they will recommend students.

And so what we would do was find a day in a time where we typicall would go in for about an hour, and then we would, have a group session.

I written a curriculum based off of, first Corinthians chapter 16, vers 13 and 14, where the Bible says we should act like me and stand firm in the faith and operate in love.

So those observations in that verse is kind of like the objectives of our, curriculum.

So just for instance, if we say stand firm, we talk about respect.

We talk about integrity.

We talk about discipline.

And so what we do is we meet with those students one hour each week.

And one of the things that we learned was we wanted to mak sure that we would be effective.

So we started scheduling outings outside the school on the weekend.

So that would force us to connect with the parents.

The parents can get to know us, and so obviousl we would have to pick them up.

And that was a great opportunity to build trust with the families.

And then once we get that bird's eye view into the families, we figure out how we can support them, whether it's financial, whether it's school clothes, whether it's groceries, whether it's Thanksgiving, a lot of different services that we offer.

We're able to do tha by connecting with the parents, which ultimately comes from meeting wit the students outside of school.

So when you started meeting, like in Hardy, your very first goal, and you started working with the students, and I guess for each school that you enter into and you've got the tier one, tier two, tier three and everything, and you from the time that you walk in and you have that first meeting with the to the end of the school year, are you able to see a change?

Absolutely.

In their attitude.

Are the teachers able to se because these kids are bringing so much outside influence into the school, they're going through thing that I would not even dream of, that their God on their little shoulders, and they're bringing into the classroom.

And so you're taking that and helping them to in your hour, hour and a half that you've got with them to start breaking those down so that they understand that's not in control of them, but they're in control of it.

Yes, ma'am.

So, unfortunately, a lot of parents, grandparents, transfe our traumas to their children.

And this is not intentional, is unintentional, but a lot of traumas are transferred to children.

And I'm a big believer that it's hard for kids to be what they can't see.

So our ultimate goal is to allow them to see how we live our lives and let them understand and know that I com from a single parent household.

I've had a lot of financial issues.

I made a lot of poor decisions.

I lost my freedom very early in life, but God has brought me a long way, so the goal is ultimately for them to see someone who's going through what they're going through.

And so the changes that we se is just very refreshing because students begin to open up, because a lot of times, us as individuals we believe that we're suffering and going through things by ourselves.

And so a lot of times when young people understand that even though I'm almost a 50 year old man and I still go through struggle and I still go through trials, they realize, number one, they're not alone and they're number two.

I'm speaking with someone who's been through and knows how to get through.

And so you see their eyes light up there.

They get way more involved.

It gives them something to look forward to.

There were times was, you know, school can closed.

School is actually closed today.

School closed for the the smallest reason.

And then when I would show up, they were like, Mr.

Gary, you wasn't here last week.

And I was like, well, nobody was here.

The school was closed.

So it creates an incentive for them to get involved.

And one thing that I'm big on is accountability.

I hold them accountable.

They hold me accountable and with accountability.

To me that is the beginning of change.

And we can hold each other accountable when we make great decisions, we make bad decisions.

And one thing that we do is when we do the outings on the weekends.

I don't believe in rewarding bad behavior, so they have to do some things within the classroom their grades, their attendance, their conduct that makes them eligible to go on outings on the weekends.

So what does an outing look like?

So we've been in several places.

A lot of kids are fascinate with the jump park, urban air.

We've gone to the Civi Rights Museum and, Birmingham.

We have done, volunteer opportunities.

We just and then we get we take a poll with the students to find out the things that they want to be interested in, because we don't want to give them something to work towards.

We want to get their ideas, places that they want to go, and then create a system or path for them to accomplish their necessary goals to be able to go.

So so you have the classrooms and everything like that is we have the outings.

Are there any other things that you do.

I think there's a once a month pizza party or something.

Yes ma'am.

What we typically do is my, my brother was a scholar.

He was a, he got a full scholarship to high school, full scholarship to college.

And so what we do every nine weeks is we have a charge of our sledge award ceremony to where each year, each nine weeks, we get the top female, top male and a mos improved student in each class.

And so what we typically d is we'll get a community speaker to come in.

My pastor, Pastor Tony has done it a couple of times.

And what we do is we give every kid a goodie bag with those students that win top female, top male, and most improve.

They get a certificate, they get a t shirt, and we intentionally give them a gift card enough for their family to go have dinner out somewhere.

Because one we want to create an incentive to where the parents would benefit from the production of the child.

And then we entered reintroduce family dinner, which is an opportunit for families to just sit down, cut the phones off, talk about what you're going through, and open up those lines of communication to kind of put the child in the best position to be successful.

so what you're saying is, and I love that research, and I hope everybody goe to your website and reads that, because that wa just an moment for me, because I'd never correlated those two things together.

Where do we give thes at risk students the opportunity to be just as successful as the middle income classes, a lot of low income student because they do not have access to vacations.

A lot of students, believe it or not, just stay at home, play the game.

what we learned is when we were in the schools, a lot of kids can read becaus I never struggle with reading.

I never was able to correlat reading and then comprehension.

So just because I can read what a word says, but if I don't know what that word means, then I'm literally going to struggle when it comes to reading.

So what we started is, well, once we realized that the students that we were mentoring on a regular basis, well behind academically, we started doing something during the summer to keep these students number one active, keeping them focused on learning.

And then what we've done, too, is because learning does not necessaril have to be dreadful or boring.

So we've created different ways to make learning exciting.

okay, so we've got about 45 seconds left.

Okay.

Talk to me about love through laundry.

Yes, I love that.

Love through laundry is an opportunity where we get to go into the community where, a lot of these kids and these parents struggle financially, and that's on every level.

So love to laundry is just an opportunity for us to bless a family in a small way to cover thei laundry, cover the drain, cover the detergent, and we offer prayer.

Prayer is not optional.

Prayer is optional.

Not here.

But you know, a lot of times you'd be surprised how you can connect.

And then I've seen many stores will people will come in and they were about to take their checking accoun into the negative to do laundry.

And you wouldn't think that.

But we was able to cover laundry and find out what they were going through in life and then pray for them specifically.

And it has developed some great relationships.

So we do that every last Saturday of the month, right now, currently we are a the tumble dryer on the highway, but the goal is to get in every laundromat that's in the vicinity of the school, so we could offer that program or service to the parents, grandparents of the students that we already mentor.

I love that, okay, in closing, volunteer opportunities.

Absolutely.

We definitely are in need of men to pour into young men.

I know there's not a lot o availability, but we're setting we're changing our motto.

Well, we're going to start doing bi weekly menta health and spiritual check ins.

And so just looking for men that are willing to pour into young men, number one, and if you do have any availability, you can go to our website.

We have CDs that I'm sorry, CDs H 13 16.org.

Or you can email us at Cascade H 13 16@gmail.com.

We'll have it on on our screen okay.

Gary, thank you so much for coming.

Thank you for this.

It's been a great pleasure.

Thank you.

And thank you for joining us.

We hope you've learned more about the amazing work being done by our local nonprofits.

We'd love to hear from you.

Email us at stronger at TCI, tv.org or use the hashtag stronger WTC.

On social media.

I'm Barbara Marder and from all of us here at WTC, we'll see you next time.

Support for this program is provided by the Weldon F Osborne Foundation.

The Schillhahn-Huskey Foundation.

And viewers like you.

Thank you.