My team and I agree that we've accomplished more than we ever could have imagined over the past year getting The Jordan Morgan Foundation up and running.
Our first year has been full of a TREMENDOUS amount of support and we finished our summer off with a number of purposeful and productive community events. We officially launched JMF to the public back in March and received an immediate outpouring of encouragement and support. We connected with many gracious donors that were willing to contribute their resources to further our vision. What was more impressive was the number of people that reached out just to be involved in the work that we were doing.
We kicked our summer off with a wonderful reception hosted by Jolly Pumpkin Detroit. We enjoyed great food and drinks and even live music while we were able to connect with many of our biggest supporters. At the close of the event I was able to personally share my story, which inspired me to start JMF, as well as our vision for the future of JMF. It was great to celebrate with everyone but it was time to get to work!
Our first community outreach event was a neighborhood cleanup with the Morningside Community Association. We partnered with Merit and the Jalen Rose Leadership Academy students from their Fate Program. We had about 40 people contribute to boarding up two open, vacant houses and clean up two vacant lots in the area. It was special to experience the deep gratitude from that community for donating our time and effort to improve their home.
JMF hosted its first basketball camp at U of D Jesuit. This camp allowed for 18 campers ranging from 6th to 9th grade to receive daily basketball training from coaches and players with college basketball experience. More important than the drills and games were the daily life skills sessions that the campers received from JMF partners. The campers learned valuable skills in areas including academic achievement techniques, financial literacy, and even entrepreneurship. Each camper left the camp with a JMF jersey, JMF backpack with school supplies, and signed Jordan Morgan picture.
Our final community outreach event of the summer was a back-to-school backpack and haircut giveaway at the Heilmann Recreation Center in Detroit. Backpacking For Success was able to donate 100 backpacks for the cause. The Backpacks were filled with school supplies and raffled off to attendees. JMF recruited five barbers to cut hair for the event. They were able to give haircuts to cut all 55 children who showed up to prepare them for their first day of school. I left this event and went directly to the airport to catch my flight to France!
A big thank you to all of our sponsors who made this year possible through your donations in some capacity:
Jolly Pumpkin, Ann Arbor State Bank, U of D Jesuit, Wolverine Human Services, the Meet Up and Eat Up program, Body Armor, Optiminds, Merit, Buddy Moorehouse, Underground Printing, Backpacking for Success, and our barbers Quincy Robinson, Henry Douglas, Kenneth Brooks, and Terrence Hopson.
While in France, I will be focusing even more on JMF so that we can continue to accomplish more! We are working on building the right team to help us develop a vision for the future of JMF.
If you would like to get involved with JMF please do not hesitate to reach out to us at info@jordanmorganfoundation.com.