Welcome to WUFT’s Greater Good.

Florida's storytelling series about the organizations and people in our communities truly making a difference.

From a program creating a safe and fun environment for children of all abilities, to a church supporting and serving the Gainesville community.

To an organization providing child welfare services for local families, and a group committed to shaping young men into future leaders.

We highlight all the greatness found around North Central Florida, so get ready WUFT’s Greater Good.

First, we'll visit an afterschool program where children of all abilities are given a safe place to play, learn, and connect.

Let's take a look.

Limitless Adventures is an after school program and a summer camp for children with special needs in Alachua County.

So with our DCF license, we're able to work with five year olds transitioning into kindergarten and beyond.

We don't have an age limit.

We're able to support various children, ages, abilities.

So our goal for students to staff ratio is one adult for four campers.

We benefit from that very small environment so we can meet the individual needs so we can monitor behavior supports.

So we can just be in a safer environment for our special needs friends.

We have an afterschool program as well as a summer camp.

We are also offering spring break camp this year.

And we do have a winter break camp as well.

So this allows our kids when they're outside of school or the parents need to work, they have a safe place where they can go play and have fun and be kids with the supports that they need.

For after school, it's more decompression time.

Some friends come in and they just need time to decompress, after a long, structured day of school.

We also incorporate emerging skills, so if they're working on toileting, we can support that.

If they're working on social interaction, we play games, puzzles, and we have a wonderful playground outside.

So friends can also continue to work on communication, social skills, just peer interaction all through play.

We have 2 12 passenger vans, so we pick up from four local elementary schools as well as one ADA center.

We're really hoping to buy another van this summer so that we can pick up from schools that are a little bit further away from our current location at the North Central Florida Community Center.

Summer camp is an eight week long program.

We're sponsored through the Children's Trust.

We have scholarship opportunities through them.

And so it's a structured day.

We want to mimic something similar to school, but also enjoy the summertime.

So we go on weekly field trips, we have water day, we have visitors come in from the community for enrichment programs.

We do have math and reading just to maintain some of those structured skills.

So definitely incorporating academics into the mix.

We are the only program of this kind in Alachua County.

If any child has special needs and they go to a public school in Alachua County, there are no other afterschool programs available for them to attend.

And that's a big problem.

There's a huge need for this in our community.

We need to be able to meet the needs of all of our kids.

And right now, it falls to the families to find either a private babysitter, to stop working, to find a work from home job.

And it's something that we recognize is very valuable for our families.

And we really need to make sure that we keep showing up every day so that our families have a place where their kids are safe and loved and healthy.

For years, it's been very hard to get him into an after school program.

Because he has a little bit of additional needs that a lot of the programs they say they aren't equipped to handle or they don't have the staffing to handle it.

So this has been really great for us.

I'm able to work more instead of having to plan my day around picking him up from school at 1:30.

So that's been really good for us.

Children, especially those with special needs, depend on routine.

They need consistency.

They need consistent adults in their lives and supports and structure in their daily schedules.

And we're excited to know that he has one space that he can be over the summer, and that can provide that sense of security and routine for him as well.

Organizations like Limitless create those wonderful opportunities for children to have the experiences that all children have, right?

They get to go to camp.

They have an after school, and while they're abilities may be unique and they may need some unique accommodations, they’re children.

And we want them to have all of the opportunities and all of the access that every other child has in Alachua County.

It can be a very lonely situation if you are facing all of this alone or with minimal support.

And I really like the fact that Lisa and many of the others that are involved also have that community.

It isn't just the kids, it's the parents.

It's the whole family that's involved.

We absolutely welcome volunteers to come just have that one on one interaction with our kids.

Having that special someone that connects with them is really important.

I think it's a great opportunity for students who might be going to school for occupational therapy, physical therapy, speech therapy, behavioral therapy, any of those UF students or Santa Fe students who might be interested in coming out and working with these kids.

I think it would be a great opportunity for both the students and our kiddos.

If you'd like to learn more information about Limitless Adventures or donate, you're welcome to reach out to us at limitlessadventures.org.

We accept donations such as toys, snacks, sensory equipment, arts and crafts activities, you name it.

We also go to marketing events, community events just to share and spread the word of who we are as an organization.

I think our next steps for our organization is we'd like to serve more kids in our community.

That means we need to be able to hire more staff, which means we need more funding.

Our staff right now has expertise in the behavioral side of things, and the emotional support side of things in autism and ADHD and other developmental delays.

We just don't have the expertise right now on staff to meet those medical needs.

And we'd love to hire a full time nurse to provide those families an opportunity to attend our afterschool and summer camp programs.

One of the things I was concerned about because my son is in a wheelchair, I wasn't sure if he was going to be able to get out and interact and engage with all of his friends, but staff gets him out of his wheelchair, climbing on the playground, going down the slides with them.

So they really did not view him based on his limitations, but saw a room and a playground full of opportunity for him.

Hi, I'm Valerie Dailey, broker and owner of Showcase Properties.

It's been an honor to support Greater Good.

Now in its fifth year, because it shines a light on the incredible work of more than 200 nonprofit organizations.

Their stories remind us of the compassion, commitment, and quiet strength that make our communities so special.

At Showcase Properties, we believe in lifting each other up, and we are proud to stand behind WUFT’s Greater Good.

We hope this week's episode inspires you as much as it inspires us.

Next up, we highlight a local church supporting the Gainesville community through service and outreach.

We have an amazing history here at First United Methodist in Gainesville.

We were established in 1857.

We exist in the heart of Gainesville to share Christ's love with open hearts and open minds and open doors.

We have been on Northeast First Street for a very long time, and it's just so amazing to be a part of that history here in the community.

We worship every Sunday morning at 10:30.

We also live stream all of our services.

We have five wonderful strengths: inclusivity, our congregation in general, we're a really warm place that is welcoming, our music ministry, facilities and our location, and of course, missions.

We have a lot of need around us.

This is a very mission minded, mission hearted congregation and always has been.

We became a reconciling ministry congregation in 2019.

We are very glad that folks in the LGBTQ community have come here and felt completely beloved.

The Community Outreach Ministry is a really unique ministry.

Every Monday, a few counselors that our volunteers meet with folks that have had appointments, listen to their stories and see how we can help them.

If someone is behind on their utilities, if someone is going to be evicted, folks who are right there on the edge, just need a little help, can cross that finish line and be in a better situation for the future.

You will often hear the phrase in our church, under our roof and beyond our walls.

We feel like it's important for us to show the love of God and the love of Christ with our neighbors, who are in our community around us.

If you lose your house or you get cut off, it's even harder to get back on track.

People that have been served in the prior year, they felt like it had really helped them just get over a hump in their life.

When the music ministry in particular.

We do a lot of outreach, not just to the community, but bringing the community in here through concert series, through making sure that we also do good music that has a good message.

Arts express that which we cannot say.

No matter what your abilities are, no matter what community you belong to, everyone is welcome here.

And that's the same in the music ministry.

You don't have to be a professional singer.

We have hand bells for beginners and advanced people.

We have instrumental ensembles.

We have children's groups.

We have a lot of different ways to express ourselves.

And even through theater, we have a dramatic arts ministry.

It's a really great place to come together to show our community the love of God and to bring the arts to our community.

And it's just so nice to come here and be together with people who all have the same mission, and to have a creative outlet as well.

I sing, with the choir and as a solo.

It makes me feel like really excited to be part of church and help people through singing.

In 2021, we commissioned Heather Sorensen to compose a new Requiem, and in 2023, we premiered that Requiem right here in the sanctuary.

The following November, we premiered it in Carnegie Hall, and it has since been performed all over the world.

That was in remembrance of people we lost through the pandemic.

It was a way that we could have a creative outlet and also show our community some love and care.

[Music Plays] We continue to grow our children's ministry, youth ministry and bring in some of our younger families so that we can celebrate baptisms and confirmations.

Church for us is like part of our family here in Gainesville.

My wife and I got married here in 2013 and been here ever since.

Our daughters were baptized in this church.

One of the things that's really impactful to me is outreach, knowing that the things we're doing are having real impact in the community.

Holiday marketplace is one of our largest events.

It's all done so that we have money to give to missions and worthwhile causes to help other people.

What you will see is wreaths, trees, decorations that are all handcrafted by a group of ladies in the church.

And we also have a lot of wonderful gifts that have been donated.

It's located right next door in our fellowship hall the first week of November, Friday night, Saturday and Sunday.

This past year, we raised almost $15,000 that we could put back into the community, and it grows every year.

We also have a community worship service that happens on Mondays for our hungry and unhoused population, and anyone else who wants to come.

We have a worship service that starts at 3:30.

Music and communion followed up by a meal.

We serve about 60 people, both here on our campus and over and Helping Hands Clinic.

We've had a relationship with them for over 30 years.

We give out clothing.

We give out tents.

We give out some food, medical care, of course, psychiatric care.

We're very proud of what this community has accomplished in terms of helping the poor and homeless.

We've gone from over 2000 homeless in 2013 down to about 600, 500 in current times.

It's due to churches like this, Helping Hands Clinic.

We believe in treating people like an equal here, and I think we've made them feel good about themselves.

A new ministry that we're excited about is Stephen Ministry.

Stephen Ministers are laypeople, hairdressers, the people who work in restaurants, lawyers, counselors.

We are people who give one on one counseling to persons who are going through difficult times.

We're just being present for them.

We're being good listeners.

We offer training here at First United Methodist Church.

We do offer it to people from the community at large as well, if they would like to become a Stephen Minister.

It's so important for us to give back to the community, because that's what we're called to do.

If that's something that folks want to be a part of, we would love to have them.

We are always needing donations to help make these ministries real.

One of the things I am very passionate about is just the spirit in this congregation.

We want to draw the circle wide.

Bring people in and then also go out.

It just continues to be a blessing as we've been blessed.

WUFT Amplified is an opportunity to invite local bands, bring them in for an intimate performance.

Kind of Gainesville's Austin City Limits, if you will.

I mean, that was kind of one of the ideas that we had when we put it together was an opportunity to invite local bands, musicians, singer songwriters of various genres in from not just Gainesville, but North Central Florida and the whole state.

Bring them in for an intimate performance and conversation where we get to hear some of their songs and talk to the members of the band.

Find out a little bit about them and their music.

You know, music, arts culture is part of the story of public media, and music is a big part of the North Central Florida community.

From the Allman Brothers Band and of course, Tom petty and the Heartbreakers out of Gainesville.

One of the things that's important about the show that viewers aren’t going to get are the hard work that goes on behind the scenes.

The talented students, as well as the professionals that are putting the show together.

This desire to tell a story through music.

In class, we learn how to use a microphone or how to use a camera.

But for this type of production, it's like every form of microphone and every type of camera, and you really get to be immersed in the whole production of it.

It's like everything we learn in the major coming together into this one huge production that everyone like, puts in a really important piece of the puzzle.

I worked on WUFT Amplified during my last few months of my masters with the College of Journalism and Communications.

It was a really rewarding experience introducing me to live production and honestly, like I'm part of something bigger that like a lot of people are going to see.

I hope the listeners are entertained, you know, I hope they enjoy the music.

I hope they'll recognize the talent and the musicianship and the enthusiasm, you know, the authenticity that these artists have and the passion for what they're doing.

I think that's what I hope that comes across, is that they recognize the passion and the hard work that they're putting into this.

Now, we meet an organization working to find children safe and permanent homes.

Partnership for Strong Families was established about 20 years ago as a response to community based care child welfare in 13 counties.

Partnership provides a very important service array for children who are in the child welfare system, or families who we want to prevent from entering the child welfare system.

So we start out with a really heavy layer of prevention that really focuses on family resource centers and families’ access to services, and their ability to thrive and live in a healthy community.

With our in-home services that we provide, those are more tailored, more case managed, and more specific.

And then it moves into even a higher level of care for children who can't remain safely in their home.

There we provide foster care services, behavioral health services, medical services, all of the services that a family would want to access to have a healthy sort of normal family experience.

Children enter foster care due to abuse, neglect, abandonment.

And if it's decided by the investigators that children need to be removed from their home to keep them safe, that's when Partnership for Strong Families steps in.

So we look for temporary safe homes.

It could be with a relative.

It could be a family friend, a teacher, a neighbor, or it could be with one of our licensed foster homes.

The goal of foster care is reunification.

We want children to be able to go back home to their biological families, but we know their reality is that can't happen every single time and we have to keep children safe.

So if parents aren't progressing in the case plan, then it changes the goal to adoption.

We work towards finding a permanent adoptive family for that child because we don't want children staying in foster care forever.

That is a very unknown place to be in and it can cause a lot of anxiety and stress.

We want children to have a permanent family.

I can't tell you how many caseworkers and people that I had when I was in the system, but my guardian ad litem team stayed the same from the first day of my case to the end.

They made it where we did not have to attend court, but our voices could still be heard.

If we didn't have this village of people in the state of Florida or any state, the people would never be able to make it.

The children wouldn't be able to make it.

It takes all different kinds of entities and programs for the children.

I think people really underestimate how traumatic removing a child from their home really is.

Their experience is a complete upheaval in everything they know.

And so for me, the foster parent, who is the heart of everything we do, is that relationship that has to be there immediately so that that transition really isn't as felt as deeply with the child.

The role of the foster parent is huge.

You're another parent to that child.

You're the one advocating for them for services that they need, supports.

You're putting them to bed at night, waking them up in the morning and taking them to school.

All the things you would do for your biological child, you're doing those things and more.

You get to be there for them when they needed you the most.

You get to see them grow and change during the one of the most hardest times in their life.

So yeah, it is hard, but it's always worth it.

Safety and love, I think, is our number one thing.

We want the kids to know this is what a family atmosphere is.

This is what a normal dinner looks like.

This is what normal family interactions look like.

We've been able to build the connections with bio parents.

Like the children that were adopted, we get invited to their birthday parties every year.

I didn't realize how many there were until we started doing it.

How many kids are in foster care.

And, everybody says, “How can you take them and then let them go?” But somebody's got to love them.

We currently have two sisters that went through three homes in three days, and we were the third home.

It was because one was really medical.

She has progressed amazingly.

She has such a bond with her, her older sister.

I'm so glad that even though it was challenging to find the right home, that they kept trying until they found one to keep the girls together.

I was adopted with my identical twin.

She is my best friend.

To be able to be with her, the person I had been with since I was born, it gave me so much security and a sense of I'm not alone right now.

Yes, fostering is a big responsibility, but through loving and through supporting those children, I believe that foster parents and kiddos, they benefit each other equally.

My advice to future foster parents is to say yes.

As hard as you think your life is right now, they're going through probably more than you are.

And you have the experience, the support, you have family yourself that can help them.

So why not?

If you even feel that this is pulling at you, just take that step forward to get some more information.

This isn't looking for perfect parents.

This is looking for folks who can step into this space on this child's journey and can be there for them.

And that support, love and nurturing is really what matters most.

If you know someone who's fostering and you want to offer a little bit more support to them, I think that's really needed as well.

Partnership also has two main donation drives during the year.

We collect school supplies around July, August, and then we do a holiday toy drive around the holidays.

So those are two ways community members can get involved too.

To teenagers in the foster system.

There is so much hope.

I love my life now.

There were years that I felt like I didn't have so much control over it.

I believe that the resilience I had and the resilience that so many foster youth exhibit, it makes us equipped to do anything we want to do.

To someone considering fostering or adopting, it is an amazing, important thing.

We need more homes in the system.

Every interaction you have where you say, I am here and I've got you and you are safe, it is healing and it is making an adult that will be a parent and have families and hopefully end the cycles that we see so often in foster care.

Hi, I'm Kim Smithers, co-founder and chief marketing officer with IQ Fiber.

IQ Fiber offers 100% fiber optic internet to residents in North Florida, delivering symmetrical speeds, along with whole home Wi-Fi service and a simple app to manage the ever growing number of Wi-Fi devices in the home.

Because we are a local Florida-based company, we're proud to support WUFT’s Greater Good TV series, which highlights organizations that are making a difference in the communities we serve.

Be sure to tune in weekly to hear the stories and how you can share and support the good things happening every day.

Finally, we learn about a group shaping the next generation of leaders through mentorship and life changing opportunities.

Mirror Image Leadership Academy is a three year leadership discovery experience for incoming seventh graders, and we're all about helping young men discover and to develop the leaders that God already made them.

The window in is at the end of their sixth grade year, going into their seventh grade year.

And the reason that is so important is because that is the age when they're developing their personality, that is the age where they're figuring out who they are, who they're going to become.

Our Mirror Image True Leader Model, that is our curriculum, which focuses on self image, purpose, faith, character, and work ethic.

And our vision is to positively impact the generational trajectory of families, right.

We're just choosing young men early on in their lives.

But what we're ultimately hoping for is that they will grow up to be responsible men, responsible husbands and loving husbands, and they will grow to be responsible and loving fathers, and they will do it in that order.

Many of the things that we are trying to change and move the needle on, that's how it happens, is by putting the design of the family back in place.

We use a progressive exposure model.

So in year one and throughout all the years of Mirror Image Leadership Academy is local exposure.

Then in year two, we get you out of Alachua County and we give you national exposure.

And in year three, as you're going into your ninth grade year, is international exposure, because we want them to know that the world is bigger than their neighborhood, their street in Gainesville and Alachua County, in Florida and the United States.

We live in a global society, and we want them to be able to see that as a part of their exposure.

Whether you're going to Ghana, West Africa or whether you're going to the Santa Fe Teaching Zoo, we want that experience to tie back to one of the five areas of our pillars, and we are very intentional about who we take them to see and what will be shared with them.

So at Mirror Image Leadership Academy, we have four programs that we run, which is our school year academy from September to May.

On the second Saturdays of every single month.

And then we have our summer academy, which is the entire month of June.

Then we have our extended day Academy, which is our afterschool program for academic support.

And then we also have our Evolving Leaders Academy, which is our MILA touchpoint for our scholars from 10th through 12th grade.

And with that, we have four retreats a year, and we also do one community service project with our evolving leaders a year.

And then we do our MILA Family Day.

All of our scholars and all of our families come together on Juneteenth to celebrate that particular holiday together.

Our biggest event a year is our annual gala to celebrate our cohorts that have been with us for three years, and we're so grateful to have all of our partners, our sponsors, and our families come together for an evening of celebration.

And we do that every single year.

Our story starts with the truth, and that is all mankind is created in the image and likeness of God.

But when you look at our community here in Alachua County, as it relates to African-Americans, 8 out of 10 kids are born into single parent homes.

1 in 3 black males goes to prison at some point, depending on what statistic you look at, it's a 40% poverty rate.

And it's not for a lack of effort.

There is mentoring, there is tutoring, there is outreach.

But the reality is, not only are the outcomes not getting better, they're getting worse.

So Mirror Image Leadership Academy was really, it is built around this hypothesis: there is already a leader on the inside of these young black males.

We just got to help them discover it.

Most organizations or efforts in this space, they use words like at risk, underprivileged, disadvantaged.

But it always starts with a liability.

Something is wrong and we have to make it right.

And we fundamentally reject that as an approach.

Being someone myself from a very small town with very low economic standards, I've seen the impact that it made on me myself directly as an adult.

And then being here for two years as a program facilitator beforehand, I've seen gentlemen in the sixth grade cohort that started with me grow, their grades improve, their visions, their dreams improve.

So they just start leading other young men and they start carrying other young men beside them and holding other young men accountable, the same way that we hold them accountable to our standard.

A lot of the growth that I've seen with my son is that he's becoming more vocal and coming out of his shell and being more comfortable around other individuals.

He's the only child at home right now.

So being a part of MILA gives him that extended family of brothers that he can talk to about various things.

At first, he was kind of set on maybe playing basketball or being one of the managers at a waste management type organization, but now he's talking about going off to college.

It’s exciting to be able to have those dialogs with him and to see that he's actually thinking outside of the box now.

If you want to find out more about Mirror Image Leadership Academy, you can go to our website, which is mirrorimageleadership.org.

One of the biggest needs for Mirror Image Leadership Academy outside of just prayer or support is your time.

We're always looking for new partners, new sponsors, new opportunities to expose our kids because exposure for us is our accelerator.

That's how we accelerate the discovery process.

The reality is, it took us 400 years to get into this situation, and it is a bit asinine to think that we're going to get out in 2 or 3 years.

It's going to take 2 or 3 generations.

So we're not trying to make better 12 year olds, we're trying to make better 62 year olds, because within that child is at least three generations.

To be able to see the life change and the impact, not just for our scholars, but also for their families and how they embody our daily affirmations.

That alone is worth being here and being connected.

And that is my why.

Thanks for watching WUFT’s Greater Good.

Be sure to visit wuft.org/greatergood to learn all about the organizations featured here.

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