Blog 185: The Males’ Place

By C. Maria Macon

Guest Writer

It is all too often that one gets an opportunity to tell someone else’s story and doesn’t.

I am thankful for the opportunity and can ill afford not to speak on behalf of our young Black boys. Not to mention the fact that President Obama did an outstanding job of tackling this issue from the vantage point of being in the highest position Americans can offer, the Presidency.

I’d like to bring to your awareness, The Males’ Place. You may have been introduced to the Males’ Place some 15 years ago, because they have been around that long. Others may have passed by and failed to pay attention and too few have made tax-deductible donations listening to the brief tug on their hearts. Well:

The Males’ Place was founded in 1981 as a clinic. In 1993 it was transformed by Reggie Singleton and incorporated as a nonprofit organization in 2013. Mr. Singleton and the board of directors have embarked upon community youth outreach projects that have already changed the lives of young men in Charlotte, NC. The projects have played a major role in expanding young minds toward community and civic involvement. Operating from a prospective of intervention through self-awareness, the organization’s byproduct is the reduction of the percentages of youth delinquency and gang involvement in Charlotte and surrounding counties.

The mission of the Males’ Place is to serve as a guided journey for young African American boys ages 12-18 as they transition into manhood. While at the same time we are providing a comprehensive and prevention-based behavior-health educational program of mentoring and life skills training necessary for manhood development; thus creating a safe environment for young men to grow experientially in community settings in North Carolina and abroad. Our focus is on working with economically disadvantages youth by offering programs that promote youth development, encourages citizenship awareness, enhance leadership skills and involve family interactive dialogue.

The project for which they are currently seeking funding involves 20 young men and their chaperones traveling to Senegal and Gambia, West Africa in search of answers to their cultural heritage. These answers will help them to gain historical cultural awareness tools. The tools, both visually and hands-on, will allow the young men to unlock their paths and equip them in taking on leadership roles and dispelling poverty thinking patterns that currently hold them in poverty situations.

This project is important because young boys are not seeing a way out of the poverty-stricken neighborhoods where they live. While they are learning about the meaning of Sankofa (“Go back and fetch it”) from the Males’ Place after school training; the connection is not being made by them toward a means of moving forward. The most feasible option is to go back to Africa, which is many of our ancestral cultural beginning.

Because of the life-changing experience that was gained in 2010 when they took a group of our young boys to Ghana, West Africa; they are re-establishing their World Travel Exchange Program (WTEP) as a moral fiber launching pad for young men who complete their programs.

This program is slated to become an annual world excursion as funding and chaperones are available. The WTEP program offers males an opportunity to extend and broaden their learning and cultural awareness outside of the United States, which also encompasses learning coping skills and exploring the knowledge of farming on a universal scale.

 The Males’ Place will impact the lives of approximately 248 youth African American males over a period of five (5) years. They are equipping these young males with the needed skills that will enhance their social and interpersonal abilities and augment their academic performances state-side.

Approximately 85% of the program’s participants are from low-income, low wealth, disenfranchised communities and in need of fee subsidy.

There are few or no places in Charlotte for men to gather and assimilate information which creates male bonding; such as women had in their kitchens or quilting rooms where young women were able to acquire “elder” wisdom and guidance.

Now, we have the Males’ Place, a structure where we can monitor and foster self-sufficiency which will correct identifiable unaccepted community behavior and provide a road map early in a young man’s development

The programmatic vision to help combat youth delinquency and adult apathy issues was established to respond to the lack of community parenting in several disenfranchised areas of Mecklenburg County with Charlotte being the largest municipality where 70% of its low-wealth children are from single-parent households and/or families with one income.

We should recognize that today’s urban (and rural) families face an increasingly difficult struggle to survive and thrive amidst a myriad of social and economic problems.  These social and economic realities have potential implications that we can no longer afford to ignore.  There are disturbing increases in the incidence of family stress and crises in isolated areas of Charlotte (i.e. single parenting, parental unemployment and underemployment, insufficient childcare, increase in behavior health issues – drug activity and alcohol abuses, parental incarceration, teen pregnancy, and violence).  The proportion of children who are undereducated, underachieving, and involved in criminal activities continues to grow at an alarming rate.

Charlotte’s urban demographics pattern the national trend. Children from poor and crises families are at double jeopardy.  They are the least healthy and the most likely to live in unhealthy communities (low education, high drug usage and crime rates); they are at the greatest risk of school failures; and their family life is the most stressed.  According to the latest national polls, Charlotte ranks 47 nationally in child well being with 27% of its children living in poverty. These children are the most vulnerable and as President Obama recently stated in his State of the Union Address, “I believe the continuing struggles of so many boys and young men – the fact that too many of them are falling by the wayside – this is a moral issue for our country. It’s also an economic issue for our country.”

Early on we acknowledged that we are allowing young African American boys to grow up without having a clear sense of who they are and what is really expected of them. And, they are not seeing examples of it in the poverty-stricken neighborhoods where they live. Providing for the opportunity, within the program, to travel the world equips them with a starting place – their ancestral cultural beginning. WTEP also serves as a natural expansion of the Males’ Place.

This year’s WTEP program will continue from Dec. 18-28, 2014. The training process will begin Stateside and extend from an itinerary package that involves learning the process of getting a passport to the pre-preparations required for foreign travel. They will travel by bus to the Douglas Airport and by air to be met in West Africa on the ground by a pre-arranged host group. They will be assigned living quarters and exposed to structured tours, schooling and academic & farming exchanges between the Males’ Place group and young boys who are residents of Senegal and Gambia.

They will have a complete offering of holistic curriculum of programs incorporating educational, spiritual, social, civic, recreational, and cultural enrichment for the young boys. The Males’ Place will integrate artistic expression as a means of broadening the learning aptitudes of young men, while in West Africa.

Through collaborations with local businesses, community centers, churches and the school system, it is our desire to help the entire family progress and solidify a foundation based on hands-on learning from a cultural perspective. It has been found that this program along with other components of the Males’ Place will instill self-pride which translates into civic responsibility.

As they engage the young men in their year-end “classroom without walls” World Travel Exchange Program, they believe that they are redirecting energy within young men and fully equipping them through their self-awareness and discovery to take on leadership responsibility in the 21st century arena and beyond.

The Males’ Place, Inc. is an approved 501c3 tax-exempt organization.  The Males’ Place has an operating budget comprised of Grants 33%; Earned income and fees 20%. The World Travel Exchange Program (WTEP) Budget and operating budgets can be submitted upon request.

The Males’ Place is currently querying funding sources for grant and/or corporate support. They are involved in fundraising activities and establishing an on-going vehicle for individual giving for this project. In addition, parental contribution collectively will equal 1% of our total budget

The Males’ Place has a nine-member board of directors with diverse corporate affiliations. You can visit them online at www.themalesplace.org or simply make a phone call to Reggie Singleton 704-713-3824.

About the author: CHARLÉON MARIA MACON

Ms. Macon’s background is in theology, finance and literary arts. She has spent 20 years in the insurance industry and is a Certified Financial Planner (CFP), a Certified Grants Specialist (CGS), and a Certified Nonprofit Management Consultant (CNPOC). She entered the insurance industry in 1976 and became a member of the Women’s Leader Round-Table 1977 and Star Club President in 1978. In 1981, she became a Regional Director with Capitol Life Insurance Companies and in 1985 moved her successful insurance agency to Charlotte, North Carolina to head up the North and South Carolina regions. Ms. Macon retired from the insurance industry in 1990.

In the Interim, Ms. Macon founded the International Black Writers’ Charlotte (IBWC) and served as its President and executive director for four (4) years (1986-1990 and 1990-1995 respectively). Her work in the nonprofit arena propelled her into the advocacy role for nonprofits in the arts and in 1992 she won the Spirit Award for Arts presented by Spirit Square Center for the Arts and Royal Insurance Company.

In 1994, she combined her background skills in religion, the arts and writing to form Polish, Inc., a business & nonprofit consulting, training and technical writing corporation; currently known as Polish, I.N.C. (International Nonprofit Consulting). Currently, Ms. Macon is in Law School to become a certified Paralegal.