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“To inspire and enable all young people, especially those who need us most, to reach their full potential as productive, caring, and responsible citizens” - The mission statement of the Boys & Girls Club I was recently sworn in as the new Board Chair of the Boys & Girls Club of the Tar River Region, which encompasses all of Edgecombe and Nash counties. It is the honor of a lifetime. I wanted to tell you about why this organization is so important and compel you to get involved with what I believe is the premiere youth development organization in this region and in this country. The Boys & Girls Club’s mission is to serve young people in a way that helps them grow and imagine and realize their full potential. Especially those who need us most who are unfortunately dealing with things that are not their fault and are born into situations that are baffling and unfair to an innocent child. This organization looks at children of our communities not as a circumstance or a situation, but it looks at them and reminds them that they are great from the day they opened their eyes and that their circumstances do not define them but that how they come out of their circumstances will. The Boys & Girls Club for me has been such a mirror to society in reminding us how we are all culpable in the conditions of our communities and how it affects the lives of people. The young people who come to this organization can grow up to be anyone that they want to be, but the Boys & Girls Club gives them a safe place to be around people who care about them and reinforces what they learn in school and pushes them in leadership development and soft skills development. It teaches them about healthy lifestyles and financial management and shows them a pathway forward that they may not have even imagined for themselves. For us, it isn’t enough that we want them to just be athletes or celebrities; we want them to aspire to be leaders. We want them to understand that what they need to grow up believing is that they have a responsibility to serve and give to others. The Boys & Girls Club is there not just to help “those kids.” It is there to be a resource in our communities and to show people that we have the responsibility of the children in our communities. If we would just step up at least just an hour a month to serve the children of our community, we would impact our community greatly. The best thing that we can do is to be there to catch children, the innocent, and remind them that they are the future. That they can reshape the world. That even though they may have gone through the most deplorable things that no one should go through, that that does not have to stop them. We just had a meeting with our Youth Of The Year candidates. The first question that one of the kids asked is, what do you do to get past the difficult things in your life? My friend Chris Cheong told her simply that you win. The best way for them to make themselves proud of who they are and let that chapter close that may be painful is to commit themselves to succeeding and to say that that will not be the measure of who they are. That is what the Boys & Girls Club does. That is what I am asking you to engage with and support. Even if it is $20 a month. Take a moment to hold yourself accountable and help invest in an organization that is on the front lines of developing some of the next leaders and greatest people who ever walked the face of this earth. Go to bgcnec.com and find a way to give and donate and go visit a club in your own community. Thank you so much to everyone in the Boys & Girls Club in this country and especially those that we are happy to serve with here in Nash and Edgecombe Counties and the Tar River Region. Visit www.bgcnec.com to donate and get involved now! Also, check out how you can attend and become a sponsor of our Youth of the Year Celebration on March 11, 2017 by contacting Abby Hines at: ahines@bgcnec.com or 252-9779924. Click Here to watch the latest Joyner TV Episode!
“To inspire and enable all young people, especially those who need us most, to reach their full potential as productive, caring, and responsible citizens” - The mission statement of the Boys & Girls Club I was recently sworn in as the new Board Chair of the Boys & Girls Club of the Tar River Region, which encompasses all of Edgecombe and Nash counties. It is the honor of a lifetime. I wanted to tell you about why this organization is so important and compel you to get involved with what I believe is the premiere youth development organization in this region and in this country. The Boys & Girls Club’s mission is to serve young people in a way that helps them grow and imagine and realize their full potential. Especially those who need us most who are unfortunately dealing with things that are not their fault and are born into situations that are baffling and unfair to an innocent child. This organization looks at children of our communities not as a circumstance or a situation, but it looks at them and reminds them that they are great from the day they opened their eyes and that their circumstances do not define them but that how they come out of their circumstances will. The Boys & Girls Club for me has been such a mirror to society in reminding us how we are all culpable in the conditions of our communities and how it affects the lives of people. The young people who come to this organization can grow up to be anyone that they want to be, but the Boys & Girls Club gives them a safe place to be around people who care about them and reinforces what they learn in school and pushes them in leadership development and soft skills development. It teaches them about healthy lifestyles and financial management and shows them a pathway forward that they may not have even imagined for themselves. For us, it isn’t enough that we want them to just be athletes or celebrities; we want them to aspire to be leaders. We want them to understand that what they need to grow up believing is that they have a responsibility to serve and give to others. The Boys & Girls Club is there not just to help “those kids.” It is there to be a resource in our communities and to show people that we have the responsibility of the children in our communities. If we would just step up at least just an hour a month to serve the children of our community, we would impact our community greatly. The best thing that we can do is to be there to catch children, the innocent, and remind them that they are the future. That they can reshape the world. That even though they may have gone through the most deplorable things that no one should go through, that that does not have to stop them. We just had a meeting with our Youth Of The Year candidates. The first question that one of the kids asked is, what do you do to get past the difficult things in your life? My friend Chris Cheong told her simply that you win. The best way for them to make themselves proud of who they are and let that chapter close that may be painful is to commit themselves to succeeding and to say that that will not be the measure of who they are. That is what the Boys & Girls Club does. That is what I am asking you to engage with and support. Even if it is $20 a month. Take a moment to hold yourself accountable and help invest in an organization that is on the front lines of developing some of the next leaders and greatest people who ever walked the face of this earth. Go to bgcnec.com and find a way to give and donate and go visit a club in your own community. Thank you so much to everyone in the Boys & Girls Club in this country and especially those that we are happy to serve with here in Nash and Edgecombe Counties and the Tar River Region. Visit www.bgcnec.com to donate and get involved now! Also, check out how you can attend and become a sponsor of our Youth of the Year Celebration on March 11, 2017 by contacting Abby Hines at: ahines@bgcnec.com or 252-9779924.
Click Here to watch the latest Joyner TV Episode!