March 21, 2024 • 21 mins
We are joined by: Amanda Bomfim, Director of Marketing & Program Initiatives for The Community Foundation of Harrisonburg & Rockingham County; Emani Morse, and Russell Leary, Co-CEOs of On the Road Collaborative.
Great Community Give is a community wide giving day for local partner nonprofit organizations, April 17, 2024 from 6:00am to 8:00pm. All online donations this day will be through www.greatcommunitygive.org and/or given directly via cash and check gifts. All donations are tax-deductible.
The traditional school day is no longer enough to fully meet the needs of all of our youth, especially those experiencing a learning gap. Underserved youth need more time for academic practice, more connection to a network of caring adult mentors, and more access to quality learning experiences outside of the school day. At On the Road Collaborative, they believe it’s about meeting every young person where they are. By offering additional out-of-school learning opportunities and connecting them to resources and caring adults, we can journey with them as they go after their biggest goals.
Great Community Give is a community wide giving day for local partner nonprofit organizations, April 17, 2024 from 6:00am to 8:00pm. All online donations this day will be through www.greatcommunitygive.org and/or given directly via cash and check gifts. All donations are tax-deductible.
The traditional school day is no longer enough to fully meet the needs of all of our youth, especially those experiencing a learning gap. Underserved youth need more time for academic practice, more connection to a network of caring adult mentors, and more access to quality learning experiences outside of the school day. At On the Road Collaborative, they believe it’s about meeting every young person where they are. By offering additional out-of-school learning opportunities and connecting them to resources and caring adults, we can journey with them as they go after their biggest goals.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Shanando A Valley Business Break is apodcast about local business and community happenings and
and around the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. I'm Chris Carmichael and we are joined
by Amanda Bomfam. She is withthe Great Community Give which is coming up
on April seventeenth, and in ourlast episode we talked about reasons to give,
(00:21):
but there are a lot of reasonsto give because you're going to get
stuff back to possibly you could winsome stuff, yes, yeah, So
the Community Foundation works with generous sponsorsand individuals who contribute to this prize pool
that we then allocate into the differentkinds of prizes we give out during GCG
(00:42):
day of and afterwards. So we'vegot a lot of exciting prize opportunities for
nonprofits to motivate them to work hardduring the campaign and motivate our greater community
to give back to those causes thatmean a lot to them. So we've
got prizes like the Power Hours,the Leaderboard, Born Memory, Golden Tickets.
There's a whole list of them youcan see on the website. I
(01:04):
jumped right in because it was soexcited that there were prizes. I guess
we should explain what Great Community Giveis and why you should donate. True,
that's a really good point. GreatCommunity Give is a giving day event
for Harrisonburg and Rockingham nonprofits. Soif they are a five oh one C
three tax status nonprofit located in andserving Harrisonburg and Rockingham County, they can
(01:30):
participate in this Giving Day event wherewe highlight the work that they do and
just shine a light on the servicesand programs that they provide. And this
is your seventh year. This isthe seventh year that we're hosting it.
Yes, So if you haven't experiencedone of the previous six Great Community Gives,
it's an amazing day. What Ilove the most, Amanda, is
(01:52):
if you come down and visit inperson, you will meet people from all
different organizations, lots of different peoplefrom within the community that love living here.
They love that this is our homeand they want to help out.
Yeah. Yeah. The Community Foundationis the proud and happy host of Great
Community Give and that's where we serveas the headquarters for Great Community Give on
(02:16):
the day of so our volunteers arethere, We invite the sponsors to come,
We invite participating nonprofits to come andcheck out the excitement for themselves and
see the topeboard that you mentioned withthe vine and the milestone leaves, and
we share updates on social media allday long, and it's kind of just
(02:36):
a revolving door of community members andI just absolutely love the energy that we
give throughout the entire day. Andthat is on Wednesday, April seventeenth.
Wednesday, April seventeenth. Yeah,And it's also really special because nonprofits might
host events of their own right,so this is an online given day event,
but we also encourage nonprofits to hostevents of their own to either think
(03:01):
the supporters they have or invite peopleto come and learn more about what they
do. So you will see eventskind of spread out throughout the county and
it's really special. Do I needto wait until April seventeenth and make a
donation, No, actually, soif you are impatient like me, or
if you don't want to procrastinate,or you might be busy on April seventeenth,
(03:22):
whatever that reason may be, youcan go ahead and give starting April
third all the way up until theend of the event on April seventeenth.
And your goal this year is twomillion dollars. It's two million for those
one hundred and fifty seven local causes. And the website is Great Community Give
dot org. Great Community Give dotorg. You got it, Chris,
(03:44):
Just point click and give. Yes, it's easy as that. Can I
give multiple times? You can giveas many times as much as you want.
I love it. Great Community Givedot org. The Great Community Give
is coming up on Wednesday, Aprilseventeenth. One of the organizations would love
for you to select their little checkboxnext to their name is the On the
(04:05):
Road Collaborative. And I'm excited thatwe have e Monnie Morse and Russell Leary.
They are co CEOs up on theRoad Collaborative. Hi Chris, thanks
for having us. Yeah, solet's just start off first by maybe giving
the mission statement for your organization sowe can understand what you do. Yeah.
(04:26):
So, On the Road Collaborative ourmission is to provide equal access to
educational opportunities and hands on experiences,especially for low income families. We've been
an organization in Harrisonburg for about nineyears now, and we recently expanded to
being Shnandoah Valley because we're now servingtwo schools in Waynesboro. Virginia as well.
(04:49):
So is this like an after schoolprogram or how how are those students
interacting with your organization? Yes?Great question. So we often say youth
Empowerment organization because we do a littlebit of everything that we can. We
do run after school programming at fivesites right now, but we also run
(05:11):
summer programming as well as we provideprograms for the families of the youth in
our program to engage them in theirchild's learning, so offering workshops that really
support them in supporting their student.So what would the after school program look
like? Yeah, so every schoolhas a slightly different culture, but I
would say our two main parts areour academic support. We're really focused on
(05:35):
supporting the students through what they're goingthrough at school, whether it's need whether
they need a one on one tutoror just general homework assistance where they're four
days out of five, to helpthem improve their grades, set goals,
do grade conferencing to really just makesure that they understand the importance of academics
(05:55):
but also know that they have someonethere to help them. The second part
of our program at the middle schoollevel are our career enrichments and these are
a really special piece of our programmingthat I adore. This is where we
bring in people from the community,professionals of all types. We try to
bring in different careers so that waythe youth can experience what does a doctor
(06:21):
do, what does a teacher do, but expanding that even further to show
them what are other opportunities they couldhave that maybe they haven't seen before.
And that is all volunteer based.We call them our community teachers, and
we love them, We love thework that they do, and I think
they really add that special piece toour programming. When I was a kid,
(06:43):
we took a field trip to thehospital and they did a sort of
a class like that for us.We all got to choose between the whether
that little magnifier thing that doctors usedto wear on their head, you know,
so they could see, or youcould get a nurse's head. And
my grandmother was a nurse, soI chose the nurse's head. I ended
up for a little bit of timeworking in a nursing home and it was
like, I don't know if Iwould have had the interest and desire to
(07:06):
do that if I hadn't been sortof brought into that environment to see at
first person when I was a kid. Yes, Yes, I love that
you shared that story because I thinkit hits on a very important piece of
what we're trying to do with onthe Road, which is just that exposure
piece. We want them to notonly be exposed to different careers, but
(07:26):
also people in the community. Yournetwork can be everything, right, and
it truly does take a village toraise a child. So the more caring
and trusting adults we can bring intoour use lives, I think the better
they'll be and hopefully they'll feel thatimpact in their future. And I'm sure
there are within portions of our communitykids that would never even know that they
(07:47):
had an opportunity to go into thatline of work if they hadn't seen it.
Yes, absolutely, And that's somethingthat I think we've really identified through
the years is that we are notnecessarily an organization that pushes you need to
go get a four year degree.We really want to open all opportunities to
our students. So when we're bringingin these career enrichments, we're looking for
(08:09):
jobs that they could get straight outof high school, but we are also
bringing in things that maybe you doneed a doctorate's for and those professionals that
are coming in are explaining like,this is the pathway that I took to
get here. Here are other pathwaysyou could choose as well, but really
showing them the way that they sothat they can see themselves in that position.
(08:30):
What age group are we talking about. So we serve six through twelfth
grade. So we have our middleschool program and then our high school programming
is very similar to what I describedbefore, but we try to level it
up a little bit. So insteadof community teachers coming in to teach their
career enrichment, we actually have ourhigh school youth going out into their community
(08:50):
and doing more of like a jobshadow or apprenticeship model, so that way
they can be in the workplace,see what they're doing on a daily basis,
and really get that first person experience. I imagine for the high school
kids that haven't decided what they wantto do with their life and they're like,
I know college isn't for me.This can be really exciting for them
(09:13):
to be able to get some handson experience and go, oh, this
is it now, I know righthere, this is what I want.
That's what happened to me. Iwanted to be an architect, and my
high school put me in the radioprogram because if I was going to take
a study hall and I said,I don't want to sit in a study
hall, and they said, whatdo you like to do? I was
(09:35):
being a smarter like I said,I like to talk, and say put
me in the radio program. Andhere I am thirty five years later,
still doing it. And so yeah, it's pretty exciting when when you get
to actually put your hands on somethingand realize I didn't know that I love
this, but yeah I do.And yeah, I think that that's such
an empowering thing that you're doing forthe youth here in our community. Absolutely,
(09:58):
thank you so much. Yeah,so, if we could go back,
you mentioned the after school program.Are the teachers reaching out to you
or is it the youth's family that'sreaching out? How are you getting connected?
Yeah, so at each of oursites, we have a site coordinator
who has an office in the schoolbuilding. Of course, being called on
(10:18):
the road. Collaborative collaboration is ahuge piece of what we do. So
whether it's collaborating with the school andtheir staff, their admin, or the
community members how I described before,I think that's the piece that really makes
it all work. So we arein the school day time, even though
that's not when we're operating, butwe have people in each site where they're
(10:39):
going to lunches and talking to studentsand seeing what is it that you need,
what do you need help with?And if we identify them as someone
who had benefit from our program,we try to enroll them. But then
on the other front, we're alsogoing to open houses and some of those
early school events where parents are comingin and we're really just sharing what we
do do and if they think thattheir child would benefit from it, that's
(11:03):
where that sign up happens. Andthen we also work with admin to kind
of identify students and it might bethey might be identified because of grades and
needing academic support, but other timesthey're identified because of maybe they just need
an extra mentor or a place tobe where they feel safe and feel supported
by people in their community, andso that's another reason to recommend them to
(11:26):
us. Amani Moore, So youare co CEO of On the Road Collaborative.
The other co CEO is Russell LearyRussell. The reason we're sitting here
talking today is because the great CommunityGive is just around the corner, and
that means you're looking for support fromthe community for your organization. Can we
(11:46):
talk a little bit about the organizationalyou know, the operational aspect of you
know, working with the youth herein the Shenandoah Valley. Yeah, sure,
so I think Amani's covered it reallywell. One thing that's really important
to us is accent and equity,and that's why our programs take place on
school grounds and they're always free,so there's no cost to being in our
(12:07):
programs, and we also provide transportationhome so that there's no burden on the
parents to get to get the youthhome after the end of the day.
And so obviously those are really important. They're core commmits that we have to
our youth. But there's also obviouslya lot that goes into making that happen,
and finance is a huge part ofthat and that's why the great Community
give. It's important day for everynonprofit, but especially for us on the
(12:30):
road. It's a chance to Iwould say, first and foremost, you're
continuing to get your name out there. You know, you get up on
the leader board, on the dashboard, and people who are on that website
that day they're saying, oh,hey, here's a cause that kind of
aligned with my interests. So you'realways hoping to invite new folks to support.
And I think one thing I loveabout the Greek community give is that
(12:50):
ten bucks can be huge on thatday. And obviously ten bucks is always
amazing. A thousand bucks. Obviouslywe can go bigger and bigger, but
that day, you know, ifyou're in a power hour and you get
the most ten dollars donations and inpower Hour, like that's one of those
prizes that a man has been talkingabout. So for us, we're always
(13:11):
hoping to continue to take the costonto ourselves so that our youth don't and
their families don't have to bear anyof that. So part of your job
is not just making sure that you'reopen today, but looking forward, what
does the future look like for onthe road collaborative. Yeah, that's an
awesome question. Obviously, sustainability isat the forefront of every nonprofits mind,
(13:35):
especially their development officers, and soyou know, we're continuing to think about
how can we be sustainable with whatwe're doing now, but be ready to
perhaps expand again. Twenty twenty twowas a huge year for the organization as
we moved into Waynesboro Public schools.I think I should mention now that the
school divisions that we partner with areI mean, they're amazing partners and it
couldn't happen without them inviting us intothe school of really letting us have folks
(13:58):
in the building during the school day, having an office there. It can't
work without that type partnership. SoI would say we're continuing to think about
what does it look like to bethe best partners we can be with our
Chris current divisions, and also whomight be ready or interested or willing to
have on the Road come to theircommunity, and how can we be ready
to do that when the time isright? All right, So I'm sort
(14:20):
of a geek when it comes tothis stuff. How does it work being
co CEOs? Yeah, who's incharge? It's a great question. I
mean, obviously let him money shareher perspective as well. But one of
the things about On the Road collaborativebeing just culturally being who it wants to
(14:41):
be in this community. It's alwaysbeen about like Shaer leadership, doing things
together. And so when when thefounder and president guy named Brent Holsinger stepped
away. He was really clear withthe board that he wanted that to be
continued to reflect on how that organizationis led and so pursuing a Coco model.
I'm only six months into my tenyears Coco alongside of many, but
(15:03):
who's in charge is like it reallyis both of us. But we're organizationally
just so flat like our core leadershipteam and like our broader leadership team,
Like we make decisions together, andobviously it takes a ton of communication and
obviously you have to really be onthe same page and we have clear like
distinct sets of responsibilities and money isreally in the impact and making sure that
(15:24):
we're delivering day and day on ourpromises. And then I'm kind of more
on the fund development side and thoserelationships making sure we're prepared to make that
we have the resources we need todo that. But it's always, you
know, there's give and take.Like we hear a lot there's kind of
people joking about like the spouse atwork or whatever. You really have to
approach it in that way and likehave that high level of agreement on like
(15:46):
your values and then like live intothem. But yeah, I'm curious to
hear what you're gonna say the money, Yeah, I definitely agree, And
I think Russell touched on the spousetype setup, like it truly is in
a very professional way, like momand dad, Like two people can run
a household. So then I feellike it's a natural shift towards an organization,
(16:08):
and again that communication needs to bethere. However, I think the
beauty of it is that all ofthe pressure, all of the responsibility,
all of the expectations is not seton one person. If I'm having issues
or need to work something out,I can go to wrestle and same for
him, and I think we havethat trusting relationship where we can figure that
out together. And two minds isalways better than one, right, So
(16:33):
as we bring that together, Ithink that just further pushes our organization forward
and really allows us to have thatsolid work life balance where we're here,
we're making an impact, we're makinga difference. But I am not one
of the typical CEOs that is spendingninety hours a week doing something. Because
it is shared and we can worktogether well, I to share, and
when you have that moment where youhave to make a really difficult decision,
(16:59):
it's great to have somebody else togo. Am I seeing this right?
Am I thinking correctly? I meanmy wife does that for me. It's
like, I hope I'm doing thatfor her, because I'd make some really
stupid decisions if it was left upto me. Well, you know,
I really do appreciate what you aredoing here in the community for our youth.
(17:22):
It's I guess more than saying juststudents, because you're talking about well,
you're talking about development in so manydifferent levels. It's really exciting to
hear about your organization. What isthe one thing you always want to make
sure somebody knows about the on theRoad Collaborative When you meet them and you're
trying to tell them about your organization, the first thing that comes to mind
(17:44):
is that it really does take acommunity, and you are a part of
that community. So there are somany different ways that you can feed into
our youth, even other organizations,but specifically through ours, Like we ask
for community teachers, those professionals thatare coming into the school and teaching the
youth about what they do. Thatis an awesome opportunity, and I think
(18:06):
so many people might enter it beinga little shaky, like, eh,
do I want to go back tomiddle school. Not really, but I
think time and time again we seeif they take that leap of faith and
they do it, oftentimes they're gettinga lot of benefits. They didn't even
intend they went to help the youth, and yet they start to discover stuff
about themselves or their own career thatmakes them refall in love with what they're
(18:27):
doing. But that is a commitment, right, and so not only can
you do that, but we alsohave other short term volunteer opportunities where you
can tutor. Obviously, you cangive financially and that is a huge help
to us, but ultimately there aremany different pathways that you can do to
do something for someone, and wetry to work with you as much as
(18:51):
we can to make that happen andmake it work for your lifestyle. Then,
yeah, I just want people toknow that that they really do matter,
and that's something that we try toteach the kids as well. RULs,
Well, what's what's your goal?How much would would be a nice
fundraising goal during the Great Community toget for your organization? Yeah, well,
obviously a million dollars would be amazing, but realistically we would love to
(19:14):
raise forty thousand dollars in that dayand how will you use that? Yeah,
great question. Those those funds willprimarily be used to maintain kind of
this infrastructure of transportation for our youthas well as ensuring that like our programs
are funded and their youth never haveto take on that cost. So it's
really just a part of maintaining oursustainability and making sure that you know,
(19:38):
every career in Richmond teacher has allthe resources they need to have a great
experience. You know, we takekids on field trips, we do overnight
college visits for them, So there'sall these kinds of ways that you're helping
to open up those opportunities because really, you know, no one else is
going to pay for them. There'swe we do have grant funding, and
(19:59):
that's really restricted about what you're doingwhen you give to us as you're opening
up opportunities for youths in the community. Give a website we can go to
to learn more. One hundred percenton the Road Collaborative dot com. We
talked through our mission and our approachand our vision for the community there and
yeah, we'd love to have youvisit and imany I loved you said it
takes a community, and that's thegreat community to give right now, and
(20:21):
so you can go to Great CommunityGive dot org after you visit the On
the Road Collaborative website. And thisyear the minimum donation is seven dollars because
it's a seventh anniversary of Great CommunityGive. But do not feel like that's
the top limit. You can giveas much as feels comfortable in your situation.
I know it's tough right now fora lot of people, but if
(20:44):
you're comfortable giving seventy dollars, that'dbe great. To seven hundred, I
believe the website will allow you tomake a donation that large as well.
The Great Community Give is coming upon Wednesday, April seventeenth. You can
go to Great Community Give dot orgto learn a lot more information about not
only the the Road Collaborative, butall the other great organizations here in the
Harrisonburg and surrounding Rockham County area.I think you can start making donations since
(21:07):
early as April third. So if, as Amanda said early, if you're
forgetful or you get busy and thingsslip your mind, you don't have to
wait until Wednesday, April seventeenth.But I already have it on my calendar,
so I won't forget again. Greatcommunity. Give dot org is where
you go if you'd like to learnmore information. Russell Leary and Imani Morse
co CEOs of On the Road Collaborative. Thank you for joining us today.
(21:30):
I'm business Break. Thanks for havingme. Thank you. This has been
Shenandoah Valley Business Break. If youhave an idea for a future show,
reach us at the contact tab atNewsRadio WKCY dot com. Find all past
episodes by searching business Break on theiHeartRadio app
Shanando A Valley Business Break is apodcast about local business and community happenings and
and around the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. I'm Chris Carmichael and we are joined
by Amanda Bomfam. She is withthe Great Community Give which is coming up
on April seventeenth, and in ourlast episode we talked about reasons to give,
(00:21):
but there are a lot of reasonsto give because you're going to get
stuff back to possibly you could winsome stuff, yes, yeah, So
the Community Foundation works with generous sponsorsand individuals who contribute to this prize pool
that we then allocate into the differentkinds of prizes we give out during GCG
(00:42):
day of and afterwards. So we'vegot a lot of exciting prize opportunities for
nonprofits to motivate them to work hardduring the campaign and motivate our greater community
to give back to those causes thatmean a lot to them. So we've
got prizes like the Power Hours,the Leaderboard, Born Memory, Golden Tickets.
There's a whole list of them youcan see on the website. I
(01:04):
jumped right in because it was soexcited that there were prizes. I guess
we should explain what Great Community Giveis and why you should donate. True,
that's a really good point. GreatCommunity Give is a giving day event
for Harrisonburg and Rockingham nonprofits. Soif they are a five oh one C
three tax status nonprofit located in andserving Harrisonburg and Rockingham County, they can
(01:30):
participate in this Giving Day event wherewe highlight the work that they do and
just shine a light on the servicesand programs that they provide. And this
is your seventh year. This isthe seventh year that we're hosting it.
Yes, So if you haven't experiencedone of the previous six Great Community Gives,
it's an amazing day. What Ilove the most, Amanda, is
(01:52):
if you come down and visit inperson, you will meet people from all
different organizations, lots of different peoplefrom within the community that love living here.
They love that this is our homeand they want to help out.
Yeah. Yeah. The Community Foundationis the proud and happy host of Great
Community Give and that's where we serveas the headquarters for Great Community Give on
(02:16):
the day of so our volunteers arethere, We invite the sponsors to come,
We invite participating nonprofits to come andcheck out the excitement for themselves and
see the topeboard that you mentioned withthe vine and the milestone leaves, and
we share updates on social media allday long, and it's kind of just
(02:36):
a revolving door of community members andI just absolutely love the energy that we
give throughout the entire day. Andthat is on Wednesday, April seventeenth.
Wednesday, April seventeenth. Yeah,And it's also really special because nonprofits might
host events of their own right,so this is an online given day event,
but we also encourage nonprofits to hostevents of their own to either think
(03:01):
the supporters they have or invite peopleto come and learn more about what they
do. So you will see eventskind of spread out throughout the county and
it's really special. Do I needto wait until April seventeenth and make a
donation, No, actually, soif you are impatient like me, or
if you don't want to procrastinate,or you might be busy on April seventeenth,
(03:22):
whatever that reason may be, youcan go ahead and give starting April
third all the way up until theend of the event on April seventeenth.
And your goal this year is twomillion dollars. It's two million for those
one hundred and fifty seven local causes. And the website is Great Community Give
dot org. Great Community Give dotorg. You got it, Chris,
(03:44):
Just point click and give. Yes, it's easy as that. Can I
give multiple times? You can giveas many times as much as you want.
I love it. Great Community Givedot org. The Great Community Give
is coming up on Wednesday, Aprilseventeenth. One of the organizations would love
for you to select their little checkboxnext to their name is the On the
(04:05):
Road Collaborative. And I'm excited thatwe have e Monnie Morse and Russell Leary.
They are co CEOs up on theRoad Collaborative. Hi Chris, thanks
for having us. Yeah, solet's just start off first by maybe giving
the mission statement for your organization sowe can understand what you do. Yeah.
(04:26):
So, On the Road Collaborative ourmission is to provide equal access to
educational opportunities and hands on experiences,especially for low income families. We've been
an organization in Harrisonburg for about nineyears now, and we recently expanded to
being Shnandoah Valley because we're now servingtwo schools in Waynesboro. Virginia as well.
(04:49):
So is this like an after schoolprogram or how how are those students
interacting with your organization? Yes?Great question. So we often say youth
Empowerment organization because we do a littlebit of everything that we can. We
do run after school programming at fivesites right now, but we also run
(05:11):
summer programming as well as we provideprograms for the families of the youth in
our program to engage them in theirchild's learning, so offering workshops that really
support them in supporting their student.So what would the after school program look
like? Yeah, so every schoolhas a slightly different culture, but I
would say our two main parts areour academic support. We're really focused on
(05:35):
supporting the students through what they're goingthrough at school, whether it's need whether
they need a one on one tutoror just general homework assistance where they're four
days out of five, to helpthem improve their grades, set goals,
do grade conferencing to really just makesure that they understand the importance of academics
(05:55):
but also know that they have someonethere to help them. The second part
of our program at the middle schoollevel are our career enrichments and these are
a really special piece of our programmingthat I adore. This is where we
bring in people from the community,professionals of all types. We try to
bring in different careers so that waythe youth can experience what does a doctor
(06:21):
do, what does a teacher do, but expanding that even further to show
them what are other opportunities they couldhave that maybe they haven't seen before.
And that is all volunteer based.We call them our community teachers, and
we love them, We love thework that they do, and I think
they really add that special piece toour programming. When I was a kid,
(06:43):
we took a field trip to thehospital and they did a sort of
a class like that for us.We all got to choose between the whether
that little magnifier thing that doctors usedto wear on their head, you know,
so they could see, or youcould get a nurse's head. And
my grandmother was a nurse, soI chose the nurse's head. I ended
up for a little bit of timeworking in a nursing home and it was
like, I don't know if Iwould have had the interest and desire to
(07:06):
do that if I hadn't been sortof brought into that environment to see at
first person when I was a kid. Yes, Yes, I love that
you shared that story because I thinkit hits on a very important piece of
what we're trying to do with onthe Road, which is just that exposure
piece. We want them to notonly be exposed to different careers, but
(07:26):
also people in the community. Yournetwork can be everything, right, and
it truly does take a village toraise a child. So the more caring
and trusting adults we can bring intoour use lives, I think the better
they'll be and hopefully they'll feel thatimpact in their future. And I'm sure
there are within portions of our communitykids that would never even know that they
(07:47):
had an opportunity to go into thatline of work if they hadn't seen it.
Yes, absolutely, And that's somethingthat I think we've really identified through
the years is that we are notnecessarily an organization that pushes you need to
go get a four year degree.We really want to open all opportunities to
our students. So when we're bringingin these career enrichments, we're looking for
(08:09):
jobs that they could get straight outof high school, but we are also
bringing in things that maybe you doneed a doctorate's for and those professionals that
are coming in are explaining like,this is the pathway that I took to
get here. Here are other pathwaysyou could choose as well, but really
showing them the way that they sothat they can see themselves in that position.
(08:30):
What age group are we talking about. So we serve six through twelfth
grade. So we have our middleschool program and then our high school programming
is very similar to what I describedbefore, but we try to level it
up a little bit. So insteadof community teachers coming in to teach their
career enrichment, we actually have ourhigh school youth going out into their community
(08:50):
and doing more of like a jobshadow or apprenticeship model, so that way
they can be in the workplace,see what they're doing on a daily basis,
and really get that first person experience. I imagine for the high school
kids that haven't decided what they wantto do with their life and they're like,
I know college isn't for me.This can be really exciting for them
(09:13):
to be able to get some handson experience and go, oh, this
is it now, I know righthere, this is what I want.
That's what happened to me. Iwanted to be an architect, and my
high school put me in the radioprogram because if I was going to take
a study hall and I said,I don't want to sit in a study
hall, and they said, whatdo you like to do? I was
(09:35):
being a smarter like I said,I like to talk, and say put
me in the radio program. Andhere I am thirty five years later,
still doing it. And so yeah, it's pretty exciting when when you get
to actually put your hands on somethingand realize I didn't know that I love
this, but yeah I do.And yeah, I think that that's such
an empowering thing that you're doing forthe youth here in our community. Absolutely,
(09:58):
thank you so much. Yeah,so, if we could go back,
you mentioned the after school program.Are the teachers reaching out to you
or is it the youth's family that'sreaching out? How are you getting connected?
Yeah, so at each of oursites, we have a site coordinator
who has an office in the schoolbuilding. Of course, being called on
(10:18):
the road. Collaborative collaboration is ahuge piece of what we do. So
whether it's collaborating with the school andtheir staff, their admin, or the
community members how I described before,I think that's the piece that really makes
it all work. So we arein the school day time, even though
that's not when we're operating, butwe have people in each site where they're
(10:39):
going to lunches and talking to studentsand seeing what is it that you need,
what do you need help with?And if we identify them as someone
who had benefit from our program,we try to enroll them. But then
on the other front, we're alsogoing to open houses and some of those
early school events where parents are comingin and we're really just sharing what we
do do and if they think thattheir child would benefit from it, that's
(11:03):
where that sign up happens. Andthen we also work with admin to kind
of identify students and it might bethey might be identified because of grades and
needing academic support, but other timesthey're identified because of maybe they just need
an extra mentor or a place tobe where they feel safe and feel supported
by people in their community, andso that's another reason to recommend them to
(11:26):
us. Amani Moore, So youare co CEO of On the Road Collaborative.
The other co CEO is Russell LearyRussell. The reason we're sitting here
talking today is because the great CommunityGive is just around the corner, and
that means you're looking for support fromthe community for your organization. Can we
(11:46):
talk a little bit about the organizationalyou know, the operational aspect of you
know, working with the youth herein the Shenandoah Valley. Yeah, sure,
so I think Amani's covered it reallywell. One thing that's really important
to us is accent and equity,and that's why our programs take place on
school grounds and they're always free,so there's no cost to being in our
(12:07):
programs, and we also provide transportationhome so that there's no burden on the
parents to get to get the youthhome after the end of the day.
And so obviously those are really important. They're core commmits that we have to
our youth. But there's also obviouslya lot that goes into making that happen,
and finance is a huge part ofthat and that's why the great Community
give. It's important day for everynonprofit, but especially for us on the
(12:30):
road. It's a chance to Iwould say, first and foremost, you're
continuing to get your name out there. You know, you get up on
the leader board, on the dashboard, and people who are on that website
that day they're saying, oh,hey, here's a cause that kind of
aligned with my interests. So you'realways hoping to invite new folks to support.
And I think one thing I loveabout the Greek community give is that
(12:50):
ten bucks can be huge on thatday. And obviously ten bucks is always
amazing. A thousand bucks. Obviouslywe can go bigger and bigger, but
that day, you know, ifyou're in a power hour and you get
the most ten dollars donations and inpower Hour, like that's one of those
prizes that a man has been talkingabout. So for us, we're always
(13:11):
hoping to continue to take the costonto ourselves so that our youth don't and
their families don't have to bear anyof that. So part of your job
is not just making sure that you'reopen today, but looking forward, what
does the future look like for onthe road collaborative. Yeah, that's an
awesome question. Obviously, sustainability isat the forefront of every nonprofits mind,
(13:35):
especially their development officers, and soyou know, we're continuing to think about
how can we be sustainable with whatwe're doing now, but be ready to
perhaps expand again. Twenty twenty twowas a huge year for the organization as
we moved into Waynesboro Public schools.I think I should mention now that the
school divisions that we partner with areI mean, they're amazing partners and it
couldn't happen without them inviting us intothe school of really letting us have folks
(13:58):
in the building during the school day, having an office there. It can't
work without that type partnership. SoI would say we're continuing to think about
what does it look like to bethe best partners we can be with our
Chris current divisions, and also whomight be ready or interested or willing to
have on the Road come to theircommunity, and how can we be ready
to do that when the time isright? All right, So I'm sort
(14:20):
of a geek when it comes tothis stuff. How does it work being
co CEOs? Yeah, who's incharge? It's a great question. I
mean, obviously let him money shareher perspective as well. But one of
the things about On the Road collaborativebeing just culturally being who it wants to
(14:41):
be in this community. It's alwaysbeen about like Shaer leadership, doing things
together. And so when when thefounder and president guy named Brent Holsinger stepped
away. He was really clear withthe board that he wanted that to be
continued to reflect on how that organizationis led and so pursuing a Coco model.
I'm only six months into my tenyears Coco alongside of many, but
(15:03):
who's in charge is like it reallyis both of us. But we're organizationally
just so flat like our core leadershipteam and like our broader leadership team,
Like we make decisions together, andobviously it takes a ton of communication and
obviously you have to really be onthe same page and we have clear like
distinct sets of responsibilities and money isreally in the impact and making sure that
(15:24):
we're delivering day and day on ourpromises. And then I'm kind of more
on the fund development side and thoserelationships making sure we're prepared to make that
we have the resources we need todo that. But it's always, you
know, there's give and take.Like we hear a lot there's kind of
people joking about like the spouse atwork or whatever. You really have to
approach it in that way and likehave that high level of agreement on like
(15:46):
your values and then like live intothem. But yeah, I'm curious to
hear what you're gonna say the money, Yeah, I definitely agree, And
I think Russell touched on the spousetype setup, like it truly is in
a very professional way, like momand dad, Like two people can run
a household. So then I feellike it's a natural shift towards an organization,
(16:08):
and again that communication needs to bethere. However, I think the
beauty of it is that all ofthe pressure, all of the responsibility,
all of the expectations is not seton one person. If I'm having issues
or need to work something out,I can go to wrestle and same for
him, and I think we havethat trusting relationship where we can figure that
out together. And two minds isalways better than one, right, So
(16:33):
as we bring that together, Ithink that just further pushes our organization forward
and really allows us to have thatsolid work life balance where we're here,
we're making an impact, we're makinga difference. But I am not one
of the typical CEOs that is spendingninety hours a week doing something. Because
it is shared and we can worktogether well, I to share, and
when you have that moment where youhave to make a really difficult decision,
(16:59):
it's great to have somebody else togo. Am I seeing this right?
Am I thinking correctly? I meanmy wife does that for me. It's
like, I hope I'm doing thatfor her, because I'd make some really
stupid decisions if it was left upto me. Well, you know,
I really do appreciate what you aredoing here in the community for our youth.
(17:22):
It's I guess more than saying juststudents, because you're talking about well,
you're talking about development in so manydifferent levels. It's really exciting to
hear about your organization. What isthe one thing you always want to make
sure somebody knows about the on theRoad Collaborative When you meet them and you're
trying to tell them about your organization, the first thing that comes to mind
(17:44):
is that it really does take acommunity, and you are a part of
that community. So there are somany different ways that you can feed into
our youth, even other organizations,but specifically through ours, Like we ask
for community teachers, those professionals thatare coming into the school and teaching the
youth about what they do. Thatis an awesome opportunity, and I think
(18:06):
so many people might enter it beinga little shaky, like, eh,
do I want to go back tomiddle school. Not really, but I
think time and time again we seeif they take that leap of faith and
they do it, oftentimes they're gettinga lot of benefits. They didn't even
intend they went to help the youth, and yet they start to discover stuff
about themselves or their own career thatmakes them refall in love with what they're
(18:27):
doing. But that is a commitment, right, and so not only can
you do that, but we alsohave other short term volunteer opportunities where you
can tutor. Obviously, you cangive financially and that is a huge help
to us, but ultimately there aremany different pathways that you can do to
do something for someone, and wetry to work with you as much as
(18:51):
we can to make that happen andmake it work for your lifestyle. Then,
yeah, I just want people toknow that that they really do matter,
and that's something that we try toteach the kids as well. RULs,
Well, what's what's your goal?How much would would be a nice
fundraising goal during the Great Community toget for your organization? Yeah, well,
obviously a million dollars would be amazing, but realistically we would love to
(19:14):
raise forty thousand dollars in that dayand how will you use that? Yeah,
great question. Those those funds willprimarily be used to maintain kind of
this infrastructure of transportation for our youthas well as ensuring that like our programs
are funded and their youth never haveto take on that cost. So it's
really just a part of maintaining oursustainability and making sure that you know,
(19:38):
every career in Richmond teacher has allthe resources they need to have a great
experience. You know, we takekids on field trips, we do overnight
college visits for them, So there'sall these kinds of ways that you're helping
to open up those opportunities because really, you know, no one else is
going to pay for them. There'swe we do have grant funding, and
(19:59):
that's really restricted about what you're doingwhen you give to us as you're opening
up opportunities for youths in the community. Give a website we can go to
to learn more. One hundred percenton the Road Collaborative dot com. We
talked through our mission and our approachand our vision for the community there and
yeah, we'd love to have youvisit and imany I loved you said it
takes a community, and that's thegreat community to give right now, and
(20:21):
so you can go to Great CommunityGive dot org after you visit the On
the Road Collaborative website. And thisyear the minimum donation is seven dollars because
it's a seventh anniversary of Great CommunityGive. But do not feel like that's
the top limit. You can giveas much as feels comfortable in your situation.
I know it's tough right now fora lot of people, but if
(20:44):
you're comfortable giving seventy dollars, that'dbe great. To seven hundred, I
believe the website will allow you tomake a donation that large as well.
The Great Community Give is coming upon Wednesday, April seventeenth. You can
go to Great Community Give dot orgto learn a lot more information about not
only the the Road Collaborative, butall the other great organizations here in the
Harrisonburg and surrounding Rockham County area.I think you can start making donations since
(21:07):
early as April third. So if, as Amanda said early, if you're
forgetful or you get busy and thingsslip your mind, you don't have to
wait until Wednesday, April seventeenth.But I already have it on my calendar,
so I won't forget again. Greatcommunity. Give dot org is where
you go if you'd like to learnmore information. Russell Leary and Imani Morse
co CEOs of On the Road Collaborative. Thank you for joining us today.
(21:30):
I'm business Break. Thanks for havingme. Thank you. This has been
Shenandoah Valley Business Break. If youhave an idea for a future show,
reach us at the contact tab atNewsRadio WKCY dot com. Find all past
episodes by searching business Break on theiHeartRadio app
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