Tori Parham, a senior at Mt. Vernon High School, said the Center for Leadership Development has given her a roadmap for success while guiding her path into engineering.
Parham has been involved in the center since elementary school and says those tools “show what should be the standard for Black children because a lot of us aren’t encouraged to do well in school, and I think CLD is trying to show that you can be Black and successful.”
Since its founding in 1977, the center has helped thousands of minority youth in Central Indiana become professional, business and community leaders.
Now, the nonprofit’s longtime president and executive director, Dennis Bland, says a $200,000 grant the organization received in December from Bank of America’s Neighborhood Builders program will allow the center to expand to help children in neighborhoods with the most need on the east and west sides.
The center also will use the grant money to ensure the price of its programs remains as low as possible. Classes such as the center’s 13-week Self Discovery program, which asks youth, “Who am I, where am I going, and how will I get there?” cost $25 for families to sign up their children.
Bland wants to put “the charity back into charity” by providing exceptional experiences for young people while ensuring that price is not an obstacle.
“Put the charity back in charity says, I know how much this would cost out in the market,” Bland said, “but we want you to have this exceptional youth development, youth leadership training experience without someone saying, ‘Oh, man, you just had that for the people who were rich and who can pay for this.’”
Why is the center expanding?
The center wants to expand to the east and west sides so youth living there can more easily attend programs.
According to Bland, the Community Alliance of the Far Eastside will be one of those satellite locations. The westside location in Haughville hasn’t been announced.
The center plans to expand through satellite locations that will offer center programs such as Self Discovery or Project MR., a mentorship program for Black young men, to children in those ZIP codes regardless of what school they attend.
Another expansion plan is to partner with schools to create what Bland calls in-school experiences. These experiences will involve taking center programs in class during the day, covering topics such as academic excellence or literacy building.
Bland says the center is partnering with George Washington High School, Arsenal Tech High School, and some elementary schools for these initiatives.
“If you don’t know about CLD, if you have heard of CLD but can’t travel, or quite honestly, if I have people in my life who don’t see the value of transporting me to CLD, we’ve said we will bring CLD to where you are. We just want you to have an enriching experience,” Bland said.
Angela Crawford learned about these keys to success through the center’s college prep programs. As a lawyer with over 25 years of experience who started her own firm in 2019, she said the lessons still stick with her, even if she doesn’t remember every detail of her classes.
A center motto is still stamped in her mind — in time, on time, every time, even a little ahead of time, is better time.
“Now, as a lawyer, I bill my time in six-minute increments, so the respect for time and the value of time still sticks with me and resonates with me today, as simple as that is,” Crawford said.
Crawford also remembers how dedicated her instructors were to teaching these skills and making sure her entire class understood them.
When will the new locations open?
It’s unclear specifically when the new locations will open. Bland says the center is sorting that out.
“Some of these efforts have been in play for about three years now, so it’s really just ramping up and trying to solidify some of the efforts,” Bland said.
Now, as Parham enters the next stage of her life, she hopes the center continues to expand and give young Black children tools that have already impacted her life.
“I hope that it continues because I grew up with CLD, and it’s given me so many opportunities,” Parham said. “At CLD, they expect you to go to college, they expect you to succeed, and it’s really comforting to know that someone believes in me.”
Garrett Simms is a Mirror Indy freelance contributor. You can reach him at garrettsimm22@gmail.com.
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