“This is not a job for me, it is a mission.” These are the words Shon Brown, our case manager who works with our Pickens, Bartow and Gordon county houses, closed our interview with. The stories she told me one afternoon are both touching and illustrate how committed Shon is to helping her families become self sufficient.
Shon joined the Action Ministries Transitional Housing team after working for DFACS. She made the change because her passion is working with people, not numbers. So her answer to the question “What is the best part of being a case manager?” is no surprise. It is working with her families and seeing them change right before her eyes. Her favorite story of change was working with Vanessa and her family. She described Vanessa as “tough”. She had tattoos and her English was laced with curse words. Vanessa’s dad was in prison and her mom was in a gang. When she entered the program she had not graduated from high school, she had no job, she had no car, she had no furniture and she brought a lot of drama from her “baby daddy”. Vanessa’s grandma was trying to support all of her grandkids, but there wasn’t room for everyone in her two bedroom apartment. Vanessa became homeless with her three kids.
Vanessa’s journey towards self sufficiency was long. Shon remembers that when Vanessa first entered the program, Vanessa even resisted getting on TANF because she didn’t want her children’s father to have to pay child support. Nothing seemed to be getting through to her. So Shon told her the truth: “You’re broke; you’ve got no place to go; no job; no GED. Your mom is in a gang and your dad is in prison. Are your three kids important to you? Do you love them? Because you are going to have to turn things around. Having your ex-boyfriend pay child support is just the first step.” Vanessa listened to Shon and began to make changes.
At first, Vanessa had no transportation. Shon remembers Vanessa putting all three kids in the stroller and walking to “do what she needed to do”. She got a job at DFACS and began to study for her GED. Shon remembers that Vanessa was the first person in her family to receive her GED. “There had been other family members who tried, but Vanessa was the first to succeed.” After she got her GED, Vanessa even started at Dalton College. When she graduated from our program, she used her savings to move into her own place and Action Ministries was able to get her a donated car. Shon still keeps up with Vanessa and is proud to report that she is still working and is now engaged. Shon remarked, “I saw the whole change and it was beautiful. Mom was there to do homework with her kids. Mom had a schedule, a job, her relationships improved. She flipped it around.”
Sometimes it is hard to get a sense of how much our case managers do. Vanessa’s first language was not English. Shon knows how important good communication skills are, so Shon had Vanessa write her letters every week so that she could practice her English. Shon would then correct them so that Vanessa would learn from her mistakes. Vanessa also didn’t have conflict resolution skills. Shon remembers practicing with her how to deal with conflict at her job. Shon taught her to “think with her brain” and not let her emotion get out of hand. These skills have enabled Vanessa to stay employed.
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