Meet Jerome, a Public Innovator Who Embraces the Three A’s
Flint Michigan native Jerome Threlkeld attended a Public Innovators Lab in his community years ago and now uses the principles of Turning Outward in his current role as Community Engagement Coordinator at the Sloan Museum in Flint. Introduced to the Harwood approach by a former supervisor at United Way Genesee County, Jerome said that the experience “transformed the way I see community and work with community.”
Watch to learn how Jerome uses the Harwood approach in his work today.
One Part of a Chain Reaction
“United Way became the home of this work and even when Rich left, we kept it going. We kept it alive. The things you learn in the Public Innovators Lab, they stay with you. It’s in the fabric of our community.”
Jerome’s story with Harwood began with United Way in the early 2000s. Rich and his team had been working in the city for several years and the story about Flint was finally beginning to change—from despair and being stuck to hope and progress. At the time, the United Way was rethinking its role as a traditional funding agency that simply raised dollars for the same local organizations year after year.
After working through the Harwood approach, they created a more dynamic and open strategy to bring the citizens and community groups of Genesee County to the table to share their voices and needs. This change at United Way was just one part of a chain reaction of events that strengthened civic culture in Flint as more and more groups adopted the Harwood approach, creating better lives for themselves and their neighbors.
Read the full story of Flint Michigan Turning Outward in Rich’s latest book, Unleashed.
Building a Lifelong Connection
Since leaving United Way, Jerome’s passion for working with communities has only grown stronger and he maintains ties with that initial team to this day. Turning Outward, as Jerome learned, is an orientation—a mindset—of using the community, not our conference rooms, as our reference point for creating change. That mindset is something that Jerome and all of our public innovators infuse into their lives and their communities.
Step Forward. Take Action. Transform Your Community and Your Life.
