The grad class I teach starts next Tuesday but in the meantime, I thought it would be good to acquaint ourselves with one another. Post a bio, tell us where you are based and the areas of adolescent development that you are involved in.
My name is Ron and I grew up in North Philadelphia which was considered a poor working class African-American neighborhood at the time. (It has been gentrifying over the last 20 years.)
A local church reached out to me during my teen years in a time of crisis. Through the help of my church community, I graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Graphic Design (the first in my family to get a college degree). I have worked with at-risk youth as a Christian youth minister and youth advocate in various capacities over the last 20 years in Philadelphia, Lancaster, PA and Wilmington, DE. In Delaware, we started an elementary after school program in a distressed community and I ran the character development component. As the students moved on to middle and high school, I built initiatives around their needs and desires. My goal was to start young and help give young people the tools to navigate through their teen and adult life. I mentored youth in their schools and in their communities. Every summer, I would take middle and high school students on weeklong camping trips. I gave them the ability to lead some aspects of my programs and recruited board members, volunteers and donors. Three years ago, I received a Master’s Degree in Urban Studies with a Youth Leadership concentration. One my crowning achievements is seeing some of the youth I have known since elementary school make good choices as adults. We are still connected. I have also used the arts to connect with youth. Right now, Prophetik Soul tees is my latest venture.
Two years ago, I traveled to South Korea and observed their youth culture and their culture in general. Seoul is a great city. (I also traveled to Ethiopia, Uganda and Kenya 20 years ago which changed my whole approach to adolescent development.)
Presently, I teach high school students part-time during the day and teach adjunct college classes at night. I am based in Philadelphia.
I specialize in youth leadership development, mentoring, character development and media education.
This class will have a strong faith-based approach to adolescent development but I am open to hearing about other methodologies and best practices. Whether you are a scholar or from the school of hard knocks, anyone who is crazy enough to work with youth today is important. 
Feel free to comment on each other’s posts.
What’s your story?
That’s me, second from the right.
My name is Jared.
I grew up in Southern California, Ventura County (mostly White demographically) [edit: maybe I'm mentioning race because Ron did, but there it is at any rate]. I’ve been in church my whole life. I started helping in the jr. high group while I was in high school. I ran the jr. high group while I attended community college. I transferred to Biola University and earned my undergrad degree there. I lived on campus then moved off campus for my last semester (White and Hispanic, mostly). I got married about a month before I graduated. After graduation I began substitute teaching in Norwalk/La Mirada (Hispanic and White, respectively). I substitute taught throughout earning my MA in Spiritual Formation (also at Biola). While earning my MA, my wife and I attended church in Whittier CA. We both were involved with the high school youth group there. I was employed as an assistant to the HS pastor for a while, then stayed on as a volunteer. Later we helped out in the college ministry a little.
After graduation my wife and I moved to Indiana because I took a job as a Resident Assistant at Indiana Wesleyan University.
I’ve learned a lot here as I have tried to put my Christian Higher Education into practice ministering to and developing the residential students in my building. I try and show them what it means to be open to God in the ups and downs of life (while also fining them for having a toaster in their room…or whatever).
I’ve learned a lot about interacting with those of other races through circumstances here and through a personal desire to understand how people interact with one another. IWU is predominantly White, while the area around it is significantly more diverse. In my opinion, we as an institution are taking halting, baby steps toward becoming more culturally aware/sensitive/diverse. My own journey in this area has also occurred through reading various books and talking to various people, including Ron. Gracious dialogue with people like Ron has been priceless to me.
As mentioned above, I am interested in how people interact. This spills into many areas of interest other than race. I am interested in Media and communication (Neil Postman’s works have been quite formational). I am interested in how (and IF) the modern evangelical Church lives the spiritual life. I am interested in wisdom, what it is, how to seek it, how to see it, and if i have any.
My wife and I completed the adoption of our first son a little over a year ago. He is from India and my wife is Hispanic, so I’m the happy minority in my family.
Our son is pretty awesome.
I usually blog at:
http://metamorpha.com/