TakeCharge Ambassadors
Meaningful change comes from within communities, not from outside it. We believe that healing and restoration is possible for black Americans and that it must happen on a personal level. This is why we are creating a group composed of exemplary mothers and grandmothers to take charge of leading this transformation.
Why Mothers?
Mothers are a catalyst for change locally and nationally.
For example, the tough DUI laws we have today did not originate from politicians. They were initiated by heartbroken mothers (Mothers Against Drunk Drivers – MADD) who were angry about losing loved ones at the hands of repeat offenders that returned to the roads after little or no punishment for their crimes.
In the same manner, TakeCharge will enlist the support of black mothers and grandmothers who can no longer tolerate watching their children and grandchildren suffer under the calamity of crime-ridden streets, joblessness, and poor schooling, all intensified by the absence of fathers in homes.
Remembering Our Family History
In recent history, the black community had little in regard to tangible wealth or full rights as citizens of the U.S., but the black community was rich in its heritage of faith, family, and a keen desire for a good education for their children.
When Martin Luther King, Jr., marched for Civil Rights in the 1960s, roughly 75 percent of black children were raised in two-parent homes. King’s sacrifices and the changes in America resulted in prosperity for many including black politicians but, it ushered social welfare programs that destroyed the black family.
For the first time in American history, the government financially incentivized women to have children out of wedlock and to remain unmarried. Today, only 25 percent of black children live in two-parent families at the national level. In north Minneapolis nearly 90% of black children live without a father.
At TakeCharge, we plan to reverse that trend, with your help, by returning the culture to its historical roots of faith, family and education with marriage as the standard for relationships between men and women.
Our Ambassadors’ Mission
TakeCharge Minnesota will work with mothers in grandmothers in the black community, along with academic professionals and business leaders to ignite a transformation within the black community of the Twin Cities by embracing the core principles of America, not rejecting them.
These principles are embedded in the belief of hard work, education, faith, family, and free enterprise in the personal pursuit of dreams that can be realized by anyone regardless of race or social standing.