August 19, 2025 • 44 mins
Pam was a member of National Service League, where moms and daughters do service projects. But she's got 3 sons, so she thought why not start something for moms and sons to do this too?! 24 years later, Young Men’s Service League has 199 chapters with 33,000 moms and sons serving together!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
I clearly distinctly remember thinking about, gosh, you know, this
is so popular, what are we going to do? And
I had a whisper. My little whisper said build it.
And like I say, in the field of dreams, and
they will come. It is a build it and they
will serve you know, like they people will do this
(00:24):
if you make it duplicatable. You can make this so
that impacts communities across the country.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Welcome to an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney.
I'm a normal guy. I'm a husband, I'm a father,
I'm an entrepreneur, and I've been a football coach an
inner city Memphis.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
And the last part, somehow, well, it led.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
To a film about our team and that won the Oscar.
It's called Undefeated. I believe our country's problems are never
going to be solved by a bunch of fancy people
in nice suits using big words that nobody ever uses
on CNN and Fox, but rather by an army of
normal folks. That's us, just you and me saying hey,
(01:12):
maybe maybe I can help. That's what Pam Rosner, the
voice you just started, has done. Pam and her friends
wanted to volunteer with their sons, and so they started
a whole movement to do that. Today, the Young Men's
Service League has one hundred and ninety nine chapters across
(01:32):
the country and with over thirty thousand moms and sons
volunteering together. I can't wait for you to meet Pam
and hear all about this amazing story right after these
brief messages from our general sponsors.
Speaker 3 (02:12):
Pam Rosner, Welcome to Memphis.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
Hi, how are you doing today?
Speaker 3 (02:15):
I'm groovy. You just flew in, didn't you.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
I did crack a dawn, quick.
Speaker 2 (02:20):
American flight up to Memphis, and quick American flight out
of Memphis.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
I guess I thought I was going to get a
little work done. And by the time I got LAP
logged in and on the internet, they said, shut your
computers and set your trades up.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
Well, thanks for coming, everybody. Pam Rosner is the founder
and national president of Young Men's Service League, headquartered out
of Plano, Texas. Started in Plano, Texas, and you'll learn
soon that it's gone farm beyond Plano, Texas. But when
I first read it heard about you, I thought that's
(02:54):
a strange name for a man. Pam the founder and
president of the young Man's Service League, you know, or
why was the young Man Service League being led by
a lady named Pam.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
And good question.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
It was kind of interesting and that's going to be
revealed to us soon enough. First, tell me a little
bit about you where you come from.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
I was actually born in Texas, lived there a couple
of years, and then my mom and dad divorced when
I was very young, and I moved back to live
with my grandparents in Maryland, and my mom remarried military guy.
Speaker 4 (03:32):
And we lived.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
He was out out of the military by the time
I was about seven or eight, and so we lived
in the DC area as he pursued careers my dad
was involved in. He was a Navy pilot, then a commander.
Then he went to work for the NSA and he
went Yeah, then he went to work for the CIA, and.
Speaker 4 (03:55):
Then he went to work for the Defense Department.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
He served under George Bush Senior, and so I had
led a different life up there in the Washington world.
But then he retired and got into private industry. But
it was some interesting things, and he did things I
never knew. I won't ever know that he did, but
I think it gave me a different perspective on life
(04:18):
obviously from a young age to be involved in that
kind of stuff. And then I went to college in
New Hampshire, which is kind of crazy, and they had
a through program when I graduated. If you went had
a certain grade point average, you could get automatic acceptance
into the University of Dallas. So I went home spring
break into my roommate and I said, what are we
going to do after college? Let's go get our MBA.
(04:41):
And so we came down to Texas sight Unseen and
started the adventure here and that's how I ended up
in the Dallas area.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
Wow, that's a cool story.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
And wow, your dad was a Navy palette and then
did all that stuff.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
That's interesting, very interesting. Dynamic man spoke me to get
us six or.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
Seven around and find out really what the deal was
with Jack Ruby and some of them.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Yeah, I don't have all that stuff. He was not FBI,
though the CIA does different things, right, So he was
involved in he played a major role in the first
Golf World or securing airspace over Turkey. Really he was
a Middle Eastern specialist. Yeah, that is.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Very very cool. That was not in the prep at all.
But I think that's a really cool thing. So you
get to Dallas and you get your MBA because that's
what you do.
Speaker 3 (05:31):
What you do there, it is, and.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
Your story for the purposes of the young Man's Service
League starts.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
Really not just.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
One man, men's man.
Speaker 3 (05:46):
You're more than one persons, the young man.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
I didn't want to correct, Absolutely correct me. I'm a
big dufist. If I say something stupid, feel free to crepy.
So your story for the purposes of the Young Men's
Service League pits up when you're forty, but you've graduated,
So I assume you meet mister Reich, get married and
all that.
Speaker 4 (06:11):
Yeah, get married.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
I started a career in real estate and did that
until I had my second child. Then I went pretty
much full time mother for the next ten or fifteen years.
I have four kids and they range, yeah, they range
in age from forty to thirty one, and three of
them are boys. Are men now, yeah, And so that's
(06:34):
kind of where I got started with Young Men's Service League.
Was trying to figure out something to do for my son,
my oldest boy, Clark, when he was in ninth grade.
I had been doing National Charity League, which is a
women's organization.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
In the Awes in ninth grade.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
Your oldest, My oldest was in ninth grade.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
So they were all kicking at that time.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Oh yeah, we were crazy. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
Our children are thirty, twenty nine, twenty eight, and twenty seven.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
You were crazy too, crazy, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
My wife is a saint to just imagine having three
in diapers and be pregnant.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:10):
Crazy.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
All right.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
So I've read that you were with some moms, some
friends and there was a thing for some girls that
was great, and you were like, why isn't something like
this for the boys, And I'll kind of let you
take it from there.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Is that a decent that's a great setup. Yeah. We
were at a lunch with some friends celebrating somebody's birthday,
and we were just talking about how much we'd enjoyed
serving with our daughters, and we were like, well, you know,
there's nothing, there's nothing out here for that's a thing
for the daughters called National Charity League.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
What I don't even know what that is.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
It's actually a hundred it's either one hundred year old
organization that started in California. It's girls sixth grade to
twelfth grade that served their communities in a very similar
structure structured ourselves similar to National Charity of the NEAT League.
They focus on one other thing that which we do
is culture. We don't do cultural activities, and they have
(08:10):
things like teas and senior presentations and all of that.
So we decided.
Speaker 4 (08:16):
It's a little bit that way, and so we decided
to take.
Speaker 1 (08:20):
This the service part of that idea and just organize
an organization for young men so that they can get
out and learn how to serve those in our communities.
Because we were living in a you know, a fairly
you know, well established neighborhood, middle class to upper class.
These kids had not seen, they've not seen what the
(08:40):
other side of the world looks like, and so we
really wanted to give them some exposure so that they
would have a heart of compassion for other people instead
of sustaining in their little bubble where they you know,
they just go through life and not ever have that
heart tug of helping somebody.
Speaker 3 (08:57):
So literally you're saying how many friends are at launch?
Speaker 5 (08:59):
Still one thing for contexts, I think we heard about
your originally Pam from Stacey Horst with friends, So I
think you guys and National Service League are both volunteers
for her charity as for friends. So I heard her
talk about that, like a lot of our volunteers come
from these two places.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Yes, And then I looked at it. National Charity League
has I think about close to three hundred chapters two
hundred and eighty maybe something chapters now oss the country. Yeah,
and they've been there one hundred years. We started in
two thousand.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
H Okay, you can't blow that. Ye.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
Okay, I'm not going to blow that yet. All Right, we'll
talk about.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
That in two thousand and one. And okay, I'm going
to go back.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
So we decided.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
But there's seven of you. Seven, But see what I'm
trying to do is get into that moment. I mean,
there's seven of you living in middle to upper middle
to upper class lives with kids, having lunch, having lunch,
probably a forty dollars lunch, you know, maybe a thirty
do lunch. But you're not sitting at McDonald's, right, and
(10:05):
you just kind of come up with this idea that
our boys need to learn a little bit about service
and get out of their vacuum and their shell and
their bubble and we should do something fut it.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
I mean, that is the most.
Speaker 2 (10:21):
Innocuous thing to just be having a conversation at lunch
and decide to go act on it.
Speaker 3 (10:25):
Why were you you.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
Know, at first it was it got a lot of excitement.
Everybody was like, yeah, well we should do that, We
should do everybody does that Challets exactly. And so then
a core group of us, probably four of us went
back and said should we do this? Yeah, and we're like, well,
let's give it a try, you know, why not. And
so we had the experience of serving both probably three
(10:50):
of us had served in National Charity League, so we
knew how they there set up with the girls, right,
so we knew how their setup was, but you know,
we didn't have a clue know what it took to
get from that point to actually going to serve in
a philanthropy and being successful in it. And so we
just you know, just did a grassroots effort and started
(11:11):
recruiting people and we had a meeting at one of
our houses and said, anybody who has a son that's
in eighth or ninth or tenth grade, I can't remember
which ones because we were doing two classes at that point,
come to this meeting. And we got sixty people to
show up you're kidding. The first time we opened the doors, y'all, moms,
y'all showed up to say they wanted to be they
wanted to hear about what we were going to do,
(11:33):
and then they were like, we're in. Let's do it.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
And now a few messages from our general sponsors. But first,
we're hosting two live interviews that I want to share
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(12:04):
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Speaker 3 (12:06):
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(12:34):
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with Peter Mudubazi.
Speaker 3 (12:43):
And then on August twenty eighth, we're doing one in.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
Oxford, Mississippi with one of my mentors and I dare
call him Dear friends, Sparky Bridon Ole.
Speaker 3 (12:54):
Miss was.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
So lucky to have Sparky as the dean of students
when I was there, and many others. And he's now
authored a new book, The Dean Menoirirs and Missives. Guys,
I'm telling you this is something you don't want to miss.
I think we can just turn on the microphone and
I can say, hey, everybody, this is Sparky and shut up,
(13:17):
and he will entertain, inspire. He's a phenomenal guy. To
RSVP to that one visits sparkyreardon dot event, Bright dot com.
That's sparkyrearding dot event, Bright dot com and Oxford August
twenty eighth. I hope you'll come to both. We'll be
(13:38):
right back.
Speaker 1 (13:48):
And so we just started. We formed a board and
started making decisions, you know, on everything under the moon
and writing bylaws and do you know just how to
become a nonprofit and ever done anything like that. None
of us had, none of us had any experience in it.
Speaker 2 (14:04):
That kind of speaks to the power, the untapped power
of the mom.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
I say that, and somebody asked me about this last week,
and I call our moms the secret sauce of young
Men's servicely because they are so talented and amazing, and I.
Speaker 3 (14:26):
And often overlooked.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Yeah, And I encourage women who especially who haven't been
in the workforce, who you know, are looking for things
to do when they come and start a chapter, for instance,
and they've never done anything like that before. It's like,
you can use this as a launch pad to go
anywhere you want in life, you know. And I said that,
say that at our conferences. I was forty two. I
hadn't held a real job, you know. I was still
(14:48):
in real estate kind of, you know a little bit,
not like I do now. And I didn't work for corporation.
I didn't have any background in any of that. And
I have been able to, you know, grow and learn
and develop, and I feel like I'm coming into my
own now, you know, at my age and not. So
I want them to know, you know, if your mom
(15:09):
at forty forty two, forty six, forty eight, fifty, whatever
it is, it's not too late to do something great,
you know. And I really like to encourage our our
women in that capacity.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
So I absolutely love that.
Speaker 2 (15:23):
I mean, it's never too late as long as the
sun's up and there's are in your lungs and you
have a passion and an ability and see an area
need you got a chance to go to work and
do something. Right, So sixty of you show up at
this house.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
I guess you.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
I don't know how you got around. I guess text emails,
flowers with them out.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
We didn't have texting back then, that's right, I guess not.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
What did you do?
Speaker 1 (15:49):
We barely had email.
Speaker 4 (15:50):
It was just coming out, right, had been out. I
don't know when the email started.
Speaker 3 (15:54):
Yeah, how'd you get sixty people?
Speaker 1 (15:56):
We just called people and started talking old fashion right right? Hi?
Speaker 4 (16:00):
You know we're doing this And it's interesting.
Speaker 2 (16:03):
Though there were sixty moms there to get young men
to start engaging. Were the young men aware that you
guys were colluding against their saturdays? They had no idea,
did they They're.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
Like, we're doing what you signed me up for?
Speaker 2 (16:22):
What That's exactly what my kids would have done. Like,
are you out of your mind? You know, this is
my life?
Speaker 3 (16:30):
What are you doing?
Speaker 1 (16:31):
Yeah, I'm sleeping on Saturday or you know, whatever it is.
And so, yeah, we had a little resistance at first,
but as they got involved, it really that kind of
melted away. And we always tell the moms who were
thinking about joining our organization. Your son's not going to
jump up and down and.
Speaker 3 (16:46):
Go can we do this? Can we can?
Speaker 1 (16:48):
We? You know, like you have to talk to him
about it and explain to him the benefits of it,
and you're probably going to have to model how to
do this.
Speaker 3 (16:55):
You might have to pull their hair and you.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
Have to pull them out of bed by their arms
or their sometimes to go where they need to go.
Speaker 4 (17:02):
But in the end we talk about it's the ride home.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
Okay, So sixty moms and tell me what you first do.
Speaker 1 (17:14):
So the first thing we did, which we can't do anymore,
we've outlawed it, is to help with a golf tournament
that was going on at the local country club. It
was supporting a philanthropy and so the boys got to
drive carts around and fill up water bottles and do
all the things to manage the golf tournament. They had
a ball. They thought this was the greatest thing ever.
(17:36):
And so that was our very first philanthropy event. And
then we expanded and we had to beg people.
Speaker 3 (17:43):
To let us why did you outlaw?
Speaker 1 (17:45):
We want them to be actually serving the people in
need and that and not handing out a water bottle.
Speaker 2 (17:53):
I kind of figured that's what you're going to say,
because that's nice.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Yeah, it's nice, kind of soft that they don't need
us to do that, you know, like, let's use our time.
Speaker 4 (18:04):
We don't take that much time of the boys.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
We want each hour to be as impactful as possible,
so we much rather have them serving food or building
ramps for you know, people to get out of their homes,
or working in food pantries, or playing with children who
have physical handicaps that playing sports. You know, I think
they get so much more out of that than they
(18:28):
do just going to some major, huge corporate event where
they're not they're just a mass number.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
Okay, so after that they had a big time, but
you're still just moms and a bunch of kids.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
Yes, So then we had to go convince some philanthropies,
real philanthropies that we could go and we will show
up for them, because that's what happens.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
You know.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
Most of the philanthropies have bad experiences with volunteers, and
so they're like, okay, we'll give you a try.
Speaker 3 (18:53):
Oh so you had to beg.
Speaker 4 (18:55):
Yeah, to get opportunities to.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
Go because they've heard of been done that.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
Yeah, and they didn't know anything about us, and they probably.
Speaker 5 (19:03):
Haven't talked about this too much on the show, but
you're probably aware of this, Pam. There is like a
big movement moving away from volunteers or a lot of
these nonprofits like won't even deal with it and they
just want to work with professional staff and just forget
about volunteers.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
I think that's bad. I think that's I think that's
I think that pulls away an integral fiber and the
DNA of what PHILANTHROI is supposed to be, which is
volunteering as part of it. So I hate that we
need to we need to not talk about that anymore. Okay,
(19:38):
go ahead.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
Well, I will say on one note that the philanthropies
would rather have money than time sometimes, but once we
can prove that we are an asset to them, then
they like our time. Bet So you bagged, yeah, and
we got So. The next one we got was the
plane I was Senior Community Home, which is a low
income senior living for facility. And so we started going
(20:01):
in there and playing bingo with the members and or
the resident.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
High school kids.
Speaker 2 (20:07):
Boys boys playing bingo, yeah, and a low income old
folks on.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
And they love it and they fight over who gets
to call the numbers?
Speaker 3 (20:16):
Are you kid? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (20:17):
And then so this we're still serving that philanthropy twenty
four years later, and to the point where the seniors
in the senior in that in that residence every year
at the end of the year have a graduation party
for our seniors who are.
Speaker 4 (20:30):
Moving on and going you kid college.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
Yeah, it's a very sweet, sweet story.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
That's yeah, fantastic and I cannot imagine the lessons.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
Oh yeah, we have, We have some great stories. My
favorite story there is there's a man. There's not many men,
there's a lot of women in this and one of
the young men who lived down the street from me
started up a relationship with this man who was in there,
and he loved baseball, and so does this kid. He
loved baseball, and so his name was Lou, and Lou
(21:01):
and Jason just talked, you know, every time they got together,
they talked about baseball. And Lou said, you know, when
I was young, I wanted to be a major league player,
but I couldn't because my family needed me to work
and I couldn't go play.
Speaker 4 (21:14):
And he was able to.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
He would have made the team, but he couldn't because
of money, and so Jason went and told his dad
this story, and his dad was just like, well, we
got to do something wonderful for him. So he arranged
for Lou to go to the Texas Rangers game and
throw out the first pitch of one of the games.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Yeah, are you kidding that hadn't been one of the
highlights of Lou's life.
Speaker 4 (21:38):
Yeah, yeah, he just I mean it was really really powerful.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
That's that's enough. I mean we could wrap that is
the feel good story of the week.
Speaker 3 (21:50):
That's awesome. And was Jason o he was?
Speaker 4 (21:53):
He was great?
Speaker 1 (21:54):
Yeah, oh yeah, well the whole bunch of people went
with him.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
But yeah, that is fabulous. Okay, so you are doing
this all right? And how long does it go on
before you say? We could have chapters more.
Speaker 3 (22:08):
Than just this.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
So we the first couple of years. We started our
second chapter in two thousand and four, so three years. Yeah,
three years. We had such demand we had to turn
people away because we tried were in one chapter. So
we try to do twenty five young men per class.
So you know, so the classes aren't too big is
if they get too big, then they become invisible. You know,
boys can disappear into the woodwork really easily and not
(22:32):
you know, not communicate, not play a role, not feel
safe in the environment. And so we don't want that.
We want them to feel like they're really part of something.
So we started our second chapter and probably about that
time I share in my stories that I had a whisper,
you know, I was I work. I used to work late,
like I would get go to start working at ten
(22:54):
o'clock and figuring things out and be good to bed
at one and get up at you know, six to
get the family going again. And I clearly distinctly remembering
thinking about, gosh, how could you know this is so popular?
Speaker 4 (23:07):
What are we going to do?
Speaker 1 (23:08):
And my little whisper said, build it And like I say,
in the field of dreams and they will come, but
build it and they will serve, you know, like they
people will do this if you make it duplicatable. You
can make this so that impacts communities across the country.
So it's like the next day I woke up and
I was like, well, this is what we got to do.
(23:29):
You know, we got we got to build this. We
need to make it a system that's duplicatable, and then
we need to go and take it forth.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
When you're at the kitchen table and you tell your
unsuspecting husband that is beautiful wife and mother of has
four children, who's making his happy home, has decided now
to take this little idea that started at lunch over
a solid and some wine. You haven't said that. I'm
just guessing and scale it. And you're already working from
(24:00):
ten at night to one because you're being mom from
six am to ten. What is his reaction with that?
Speaker 3 (24:08):
You know?
Speaker 1 (24:09):
I think he at first just didn't really worry about it,
you know, because you know, he didn't really kind of
quote cute, yeah, less or hardy what he thought? You know, Yeah,
they can grow in Dallas. You know that's I can
see that. That's great, but you know, don't take time
away from too much time away from your family or
you know, the you know other things. And so ironically,
(24:30):
he is a lawyer, and he's the one who helped
us craft our bylaws and do the things to get
us started right.
Speaker 3 (24:36):
Good for him, so he's helping.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
He's still doing pro bono for us twenty four years later,
starting the new chapters and everything. So at first I
think he just he was so wrapped up in everything
he was doing.
Speaker 4 (24:47):
He wasn't too worried about it.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
But when it got bigger, it yeah, he was like,
are you are you doing that again?
Speaker 2 (24:56):
You know, we'll be right back. So two thousand and
four you felt called in some way or another. You
saw the success of the last three years and you said,
(25:19):
build it. But again you had never built anything really now,
So what does build it look like? And how did
that unfold for you?
Speaker 1 (25:30):
I think that initially the first thing we did is
once we got all our rules and systems in place,
we used to make this is so funny.
Speaker 4 (25:37):
We used to make notebooks.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
So we would make a master notebook for every new
chapter that had like all the job descriptions and the
timelines and what you have to do a to Z
to start the chapter. And these binders were like this thick,
and the chapter presence would be so excited to get them,
you know, because then they could go and do it.
And then our board would just support those chapters like
one by one, like our new babies. And really we
(26:01):
carried that process in place for another six seven years
before we got onto a website.
Speaker 4 (26:08):
We didn't even have a.
Speaker 1 (26:09):
Website until twenty ten or twenty twelve something like that,
and so we just really did it one at a
time and we didn't do any advertising. It was all
word of mouth. It was primarily focused in Dallas initially.
And then we started our first out of state chapter
in Atlanta, and that was from a mom who had
lived in Plano who moved to Atlanta with twin boys,
(26:30):
and she says, we're going to do this for my boys,
and so she started the whole thing. We have I
think twenty chapters in Atlanta.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Now you have twenty chapters in Atlanta alone, Right, we
jumped too far? Yeah, yeah, that's okay. So two thousand
and four you start your second chapter. I mean, well,
I guess now's the time. How many chapters do you
have today?
Speaker 1 (26:54):
We have one hundred and ninety nine chapters officially as
of today.
Speaker 3 (26:59):
And how many cities we.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
Go by states, so we're in twenty three states. I'd
have to count the city.
Speaker 3 (27:05):
Believable. In how many members.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
About thirty three five I think thirty three thousand something members?
What is boys, boys and Moms? Yeah, the mom is
actually the member, but officially, but total people participating in
the program. And then we have about twenty twenty some
thousand alumni.
Speaker 2 (27:26):
Now, okay, with that little reveal, which is unbelievable to me,
I'll ask you the question I just want to ask
you later. But so when does this thing become two
chapters to like ten to like twenty to like you're saying,
(27:46):
holy crap, I have a full time job.
Speaker 3 (27:48):
Now, how did you understand?
Speaker 1 (27:49):
I'm saying, yeah, you know, I think it just happened.
We started that first second chapter two thousand and four.
I think in two thousand and six we added five,
so we went from adding one to adding and so
we've gradually increased that number as we've grown and grew
a bigger staff. And this past year we started twenty five.
Speaker 2 (28:09):
So started twenty five one year. That has to be
an enormous amount of work.
Speaker 1 (28:16):
It's an enormous amount of work, but because we have
the system, the system really makes it.
Speaker 4 (28:23):
Easier to do.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
And our people who start the new chapters are just
blown away by the resources that we provide them. I
mean they were just like, we had no idea when
we jumped on this webinar to hear about this thing
that you would hand us this gift of an organization
that we just had to plug and play, and so
that is that we've started that in the very beginning,
(28:45):
and we've carried it on and gotten it better, you know,
as time and technology has moved along.
Speaker 2 (28:51):
So when you started this thing, your oldest was in
ninth grade. How many boys do you have?
Speaker 3 (28:58):
Have? Three? Three boys?
Speaker 1 (29:00):
How was the So the next one he was in
sixth grade, and then the next one was in second grade,
second grade. So I didn't do it your way. Four
I had two years apart, three years apart, four years apart.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
We didn't plan to trust me, third, fourth, fifth, sixth,
and then six So that's twelve years. At the end
of twelve or thirteen years, your kids are done done?
Why to keep going at that?
Speaker 1 (29:31):
Yeah? I think I am an entrepreneur at heart, I
think and I love the I love the idea of
expanding it and growing it to touch as many communities
as possible. And then I've uncovered a lot of things.
I've learned a lot of things about myself in the process.
Speaker 3 (29:46):
What have you learned about yourself?
Speaker 1 (29:49):
I've learned that I am a good leader. I've learned
that I am a good visionary. I think that I
have a lot of people in my organization who are
great at you know, governance or finance or marketing or
whatever or legal right, yeah, but there's really nobody that
has the vision to push it forward that I have
(30:11):
right now anyway. And I'm sure there's people out there.
And that is a little founder syndrome maybe, but I
think that that has My gifts have come out as
I've gotten older, and I can utilize those to help
grow this organization. You know, I'm moving from day to
day things now to you know, getting more exposure to
corporations and you know, starting to do fundraising, just really
(30:35):
elevating the knowledge of our organization out in the communities
that haven't heard of us before. And so my role
is changing and and I don't see myself stepping away
anytime real soon. I think that right now it's still
relevant and to keeping the organization going and moving forward.
And we've had hiccups, trust me, we have had some hiccups,
(30:56):
but nothing.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
Yeah, no, it's nothing, nothing worthwhile.
Speaker 4 (31:00):
There's been a couple of times I want to quit,
but you know I didn't.
Speaker 3 (31:03):
So so is there chapter in Memphis? There is not
change that. That's right. We got to change that for sure.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
I just need one.
Speaker 4 (31:14):
Eighth grade mom to talk to.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
That's all.
Speaker 3 (31:16):
I need one eighth grade mom to talk to.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
I think there's probably at least one hundred listening to
us right now from this area.
Speaker 3 (31:25):
Expect a call.
Speaker 2 (31:26):
Okay, all right, so explain to me kind of what
a chapter looks like and what the year looks.
Speaker 3 (31:35):
Like for them. Okay.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
So we start out our calendar year runs April one
to May. It May one to April thirtieth, and we
so we recruit in the spring, so for anybody starting
a chapter, they'll get their incoming ninth grade class. Unless
it's a new chapter, then we let them do two classes.
But existing chapters will recruit in the spring and then
kick off their year May first, And we do that
(31:57):
so that kids can serve some hours during the sum
you know, when they have a little bit more free times.
But we we offer two parts to our program. We
do the service component and they have to do a
minimum of twenty hours a year, and most a lot
of them do more than that. We have some kids
doing one hundred and fifty hours, you know, a year.
We really have a passion for it. And then they
(32:18):
can do their service hours whenever they want to, but
they do them with their mom. And that's what makes
us different than a lot of organizations. I think that
is our key differentiator is that you go serve with
your mom. Your mom doesn't sign you up and kick
you out the door, and she actually goes and does
the work with you. So they start serving during the
summer and then in the fall we start a set
of meetings that the young men have to attend and
(32:40):
they have to attend seven out of five out of
seven meetings that are offered a year. And the meetings
are like once a month on a Sunday afternoon for
an hour and a half, and they will do a
variety of life skills that we teach them. And so
we have a set curriculum in place and we cover
things from you know, like how to change a tire?
Speaker 4 (33:00):
You know, how do you shop at the grocery store?
Speaker 2 (33:03):
Mom based organization teaching boys how to change a tar
now that I love.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
What's what's the car maintenance?
Speaker 2 (33:11):
You know?
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Well, we get we bring in speakers for the grade level,
or they may go to an auto shop right and
learn the ten things they need to check on their car,
or we will teach them about insurance and why it's
important not to mess up your insurance, or we teach
them about things. I say, the one of the big
things that we do is making good decisions, and we
bring in speakers who will speak to them. Moms tell
(33:33):
the kids all the time, don't drive and drink, don't
take drugs, don't do this, don't do that. But when
somebody else comes in and talks to them and shares
the real life consequences of some of those bad decisions,
it's far more impactful.
Speaker 4 (33:46):
So we have a very relevant story.
Speaker 5 (33:48):
Why is it Sean speaks story?
Speaker 1 (33:51):
Yeah, okay, so one of the most impactful ones that
I have had. We actually did this as a multi
chapter meeting in play so I think we had fifteen
twelve hundred people there, I think. And this young man
got up to speak and he's in a motorized wheelchair
when he comes up to the stage and he doesn't
his entire presentation. He has presented and created himself with
(34:15):
his index finger because he can't speak, but he can
type and he so use a voice.
Speaker 3 (34:20):
Paralysis has taken his.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
Voice too, and so he was paralyzed by being a
rider in a friend's car who was drunk and had
an accident and he lost everything, and you know, except
for his actual life, and he was making people's changing
people's lives by doing these presentations.
Speaker 4 (34:40):
And I remember I was with my youngest son.
Speaker 3 (34:43):
How did he do a speech with his finger?
Speaker 1 (34:45):
It was voice activated through the so he.
Speaker 2 (34:47):
Could type on a keypad and the computer would read
what he had had would speak what he's typing. And
he would tell the story of a rider in a
drunk accident and could.
Speaker 4 (35:00):
Hear a pindra right?
Speaker 1 (35:01):
And my son turned to me, goes, I'm never going
to drink alcohol.
Speaker 4 (35:05):
Of course you know that changed but later, but.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
Drinking alcohol and drinking and driving or two different things.
Speaker 1 (35:11):
Yeah, And so we really try to we do that.
We've had another family in Plano, Taylor Hooton Foundation. I
don't know if you've heard of them, but this young
man took his life because he had been taking steroids,
and so they came in and teach taught the kids
about steroid use about you know, a lot of these
kids are into pre pre workout things. They're very dangerous.
(35:35):
We've had moms come in and talk about how they
lost their son because they had a massive heart attack
by taking the the pre workout stuff. So there's a
lot we try to bring in things that will educate
the young men. Sometimes we educate the young men and
the moms. You know, we were we were right on
the bandwagon with a vaping thing that when it came
out and talking about that about the fentanyl.
Speaker 4 (35:57):
You know that's out there in the world.
Speaker 2 (35:59):
So we education around practical life experience stuff as well
as service.
Speaker 1 (36:05):
Those are two focus.
Speaker 3 (36:06):
I mean, that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (36:11):
My So, I do not believe in having able bodied
children in your house while you are working and they
are doing nothing.
Speaker 3 (36:27):
It infuriates me.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
So one of the things Lisa and I did at
a very early age, when the kids were eight, they
started learning how to do yard work edging, weed eating,
mowing clip and ivy, picking up leaves, whatever. And it
was a typical I mean, you're for planos. So you
know what, early August is hot. It's hot and.
Speaker 3 (36:53):
In Memphis is humid.
Speaker 2 (36:54):
And so my nine year old daughter, or at that
time she would have been eleven year old daughter comes
around the corner, red face, sweaty, angry, and eleven or
twelve year old girl has a little level of sassiness
that starts to burble up. I think is the precursor
to becoming a woman anyway. So she comes around the
(37:19):
corner and looks at me with a bag of grass
over her shoulder and says, why can't we have a
yard man like normal people? And I said, honey, the
very question is the reason you're out here in this yard.
My kids, my girls had stilted boots and worked on
the lumber yard before they had make up.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
My boys, that's impressive because I can't say I did
the same.
Speaker 3 (37:45):
Well, they didn't have a loveyard, so I did.
Speaker 4 (37:50):
All those things.
Speaker 2 (37:51):
But my kids, my boys, learned how to weld and
change tires and do all the Here's the reason I'm
telling you all this is my son. My first son
went to college and by his senior year, in his
fraternity of one hundred and eighty people, any single time
(38:11):
somebody had something as simple as a white or blade
that didn't work, a blinker light out, a flat tire,
a switch on the wall of their dorm that didn't.
Speaker 3 (38:22):
Work, they called will that's great. Well, these idiots didn't
even know which side of a screwdriver to hold. Yeah,
you know, yeah, And it.
Speaker 2 (38:32):
Does speak, in my opinion, to a little bit of
a loss among our young men coming up that they
stuff that I took her granted that a male needed
to know to do.
Speaker 3 (38:50):
They don't don't.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
And so I hear what you're talking about about how
to change a tire and finances and basic practical responsibility stuff.
I mean, that seems so simple that there's stuff we
had to be teaching, but you're putting it into almost
a practical curriculum.
Speaker 1 (39:12):
Yeah. One of the things that I've I've gone after
and said to our ninth grade moms when they're helping
plan the meetings, is that you need to have a
class and teach them how to paint, because you know,
we go to all these places to paint for the
the you know, shelters and things like that, and they're
they make a hot mess.
Speaker 4 (39:27):
And then when somebody has to come in and clean
up after them.
Speaker 1 (39:31):
And so I was like, first we need to take
them to Low's or hum depot or something like that
and teach them how to paint at least simply, you know.
And so they were like really, and I was like, yes, really,
because we don't have the energy to go back and
clean up your mess. So, you know, if you're going
to do a paint project. Make sure you have a
class that teaches them how to paint a wall.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
The only manage if you do something right to it right,
the first right right. I remember a friend of my
kids coming over when Will was cutting the grass, and
the kid was looking at this lawn mow as if
he was looking at an alien. And he said, mister Bill,
I said. He said, where's the button? And I said
what button? I said, the button? The button story started,
(40:13):
and I'm like, come here, boy, and I made them
hold the thing and I told him to lean over
and pulled the cord and he pulled it three times
and he was like, wow, that's hard.
Speaker 3 (40:24):
And I'm like, what your parents should be flogged.
Speaker 4 (40:29):
Now they have electric ones, so yeah, we're.
Speaker 2 (40:34):
Still a methis. We have electricals run here. So it
looks like in May they're serving. And then throughout this
time you have these practical classes. You have meetings, and
and the moms are with the boys.
Speaker 1 (40:51):
The moms don't meet with the boys. There's only when
they do the service. The moms actually have meetings also,
but we teach different things we actually try to and
things that are interesting for moms, like elder care. You know,
where do you where do you start with that, or
bringing in a philanthropy speaker, you know, to talk about
one of the philanthropy partners that we have, or you know,
(41:11):
talking through you know, how to communicate with your son.
So we try to give them different types of things
that are we call it feeding the mom. So she
wants to come to the business meeting and hear what's
going on with the chapter. And she lanced at ten
three a year, so both both ends get a little
bit of a curriculum.
Speaker 2 (41:28):
And then this really cool. So I want to I
want you to tell this story and why it matters.
We highlighted probably a year ago, Sleep and Heavenly Pace. Yeah,
it's still one of my favorite stories. And it actually
connected us to another story in is It Jamaica Haiti
in Haiti, where we now have a Haitian orphanage that
(41:55):
has beds that now are working with sleep and have
only piece and the because the orphanage has a woodworking shop,
orphans at the woodworking shop are building beds for Haitian
kids who are not orphans, who don't have beds.
Speaker 1 (42:10):
Oh, I love that.
Speaker 3 (42:11):
Yes, we think about.
Speaker 2 (42:12):
Well, that's the power of an army and normal folk yes,
it's that connectivity in the bottom up work.
Speaker 3 (42:17):
But anyway, I know you guys.
Speaker 2 (42:19):
Have done something Sleep and Heavenly Peace, but you had
a really creative idea to make sure that the kids
understood why these bets are important.
Speaker 1 (42:27):
Oh yeah, yeah, ye. So we actually work with Sleep
and Heavenly Peace and many of our chapters because they're
all over the country too, and one of the chapters
this year for their ultimate gifts, they do an education.
Speaker 3 (42:39):
My ultimate gift. First, I jumped it. I should that's okay.
Speaker 1 (42:42):
Well, we serve Sleep and Heavenly Peace for regular hours
and for Ultimate Gift hours, so it could be either one.
So let me skip the ultimate gift and I'll finish
this story and then we'll talk about that because that's
a bigger subject. That's cool, okay. So Sleep and Heavenly
Peace they were going to go do their projects. So
they decided to take all the kids who are going
to participate in the project dender moms and go sleep
like in a gym floor overnight without you know anything,
(43:06):
but maybe I think they were allowed to bring a pillow.
And so these kids then they got up the next
morning and they're like, so, how do you feel today
and they're like, not so great. How did you sleep?
Not so great? Yeah, my body hurts. And then they
were like, well, how do you think it would feel
like if you had to do that and then you
didn't get breakfast, and then you had to go to school,
you know, and how would you feel in school? Would
(43:26):
you be able to be the best student that you
could be? And they were just like, oh my gosh,
how do people do this? I did it one night,
you know, and and it made them understand why they
were building these beds at the project. And so when
they actually build the beds and they deliver them, they
they connect with the children who are receiving it and
understand that this is making their life better.
Speaker 4 (43:48):
And it's just a power.
Speaker 1 (43:49):
It's so powerful.
Speaker 2 (43:53):
And that concludes part one of my conversation with Pam Rosner,
and you don't want to miss part two. Now we'll
be able to listen to together, guys, we can change
this country.
Speaker 3 (44:05):
It's going to start with you. I'll see in part
two
I clearly distinctly remember thinking about, gosh, you know, this
is so popular, what are we going to do? And
I had a whisper. My little whisper said build it.
And like I say, in the field of dreams, and
they will come. It is a build it and they
will serve you know, like they people will do this
(00:24):
if you make it duplicatable. You can make this so
that impacts communities across the country.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Welcome to an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney.
I'm a normal guy. I'm a husband, I'm a father,
I'm an entrepreneur, and I've been a football coach an
inner city Memphis.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
And the last part, somehow, well, it led.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
To a film about our team and that won the Oscar.
It's called Undefeated. I believe our country's problems are never
going to be solved by a bunch of fancy people
in nice suits using big words that nobody ever uses
on CNN and Fox, but rather by an army of
normal folks. That's us, just you and me saying hey,
(01:12):
maybe maybe I can help. That's what Pam Rosner, the
voice you just started, has done. Pam and her friends
wanted to volunteer with their sons, and so they started
a whole movement to do that. Today, the Young Men's
Service League has one hundred and ninety nine chapters across
(01:32):
the country and with over thirty thousand moms and sons
volunteering together. I can't wait for you to meet Pam
and hear all about this amazing story right after these
brief messages from our general sponsors.
Speaker 3 (02:12):
Pam Rosner, Welcome to Memphis.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
Hi, how are you doing today?
Speaker 3 (02:15):
I'm groovy. You just flew in, didn't you.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
I did crack a dawn, quick.
Speaker 2 (02:20):
American flight up to Memphis, and quick American flight out
of Memphis.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
I guess I thought I was going to get a
little work done. And by the time I got LAP
logged in and on the internet, they said, shut your
computers and set your trades up.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
Well, thanks for coming, everybody. Pam Rosner is the founder
and national president of Young Men's Service League, headquartered out
of Plano, Texas. Started in Plano, Texas, and you'll learn
soon that it's gone farm beyond Plano, Texas. But when
I first read it heard about you, I thought that's
(02:54):
a strange name for a man. Pam the founder and
president of the young Man's Service League, you know, or
why was the young Man Service League being led by
a lady named Pam.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
And good question.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
It was kind of interesting and that's going to be
revealed to us soon enough. First, tell me a little
bit about you where you come from.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
I was actually born in Texas, lived there a couple
of years, and then my mom and dad divorced when
I was very young, and I moved back to live
with my grandparents in Maryland, and my mom remarried military guy.
Speaker 4 (03:32):
And we lived.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
He was out out of the military by the time
I was about seven or eight, and so we lived
in the DC area as he pursued careers my dad
was involved in. He was a Navy pilot, then a commander.
Then he went to work for the NSA and he
went Yeah, then he went to work for the CIA, and.
Speaker 4 (03:55):
Then he went to work for the Defense Department.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
He served under George Bush Senior, and so I had
led a different life up there in the Washington world.
But then he retired and got into private industry. But
it was some interesting things, and he did things I
never knew. I won't ever know that he did, but
I think it gave me a different perspective on life
(04:18):
obviously from a young age to be involved in that
kind of stuff. And then I went to college in
New Hampshire, which is kind of crazy, and they had
a through program when I graduated. If you went had
a certain grade point average, you could get automatic acceptance
into the University of Dallas. So I went home spring
break into my roommate and I said, what are we
going to do after college? Let's go get our MBA.
(04:41):
And so we came down to Texas sight Unseen and
started the adventure here and that's how I ended up
in the Dallas area.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
Wow, that's a cool story.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
And wow, your dad was a Navy palette and then
did all that stuff.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
That's interesting, very interesting. Dynamic man spoke me to get
us six or.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
Seven around and find out really what the deal was
with Jack Ruby and some of them.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Yeah, I don't have all that stuff. He was not FBI,
though the CIA does different things, right, So he was
involved in he played a major role in the first
Golf World or securing airspace over Turkey. Really he was
a Middle Eastern specialist. Yeah, that is.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Very very cool. That was not in the prep at all.
But I think that's a really cool thing. So you
get to Dallas and you get your MBA because that's
what you do.
Speaker 3 (05:31):
What you do there, it is, and.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
Your story for the purposes of the young Man's Service
League starts.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
Really not just.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
One man, men's man.
Speaker 3 (05:46):
You're more than one persons, the young man.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
I didn't want to correct, Absolutely correct me. I'm a
big dufist. If I say something stupid, feel free to crepy.
So your story for the purposes of the Young Men's
Service League pits up when you're forty, but you've graduated,
So I assume you meet mister Reich, get married and
all that.
Speaker 4 (06:11):
Yeah, get married.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
I started a career in real estate and did that
until I had my second child. Then I went pretty
much full time mother for the next ten or fifteen years.
I have four kids and they range, yeah, they range
in age from forty to thirty one, and three of
them are boys. Are men now, yeah, And so that's
(06:34):
kind of where I got started with Young Men's Service League.
Was trying to figure out something to do for my son,
my oldest boy, Clark, when he was in ninth grade.
I had been doing National Charity League, which is a
women's organization.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
In the Awes in ninth grade.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
Your oldest, My oldest was in ninth grade.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
So they were all kicking at that time.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Oh yeah, we were crazy. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
Our children are thirty, twenty nine, twenty eight, and twenty seven.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
You were crazy too, crazy, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
My wife is a saint to just imagine having three
in diapers and be pregnant.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:10):
Crazy.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
All right.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
So I've read that you were with some moms, some
friends and there was a thing for some girls that
was great, and you were like, why isn't something like
this for the boys, And I'll kind of let you
take it from there.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Is that a decent that's a great setup. Yeah. We
were at a lunch with some friends celebrating somebody's birthday,
and we were just talking about how much we'd enjoyed
serving with our daughters, and we were like, well, you know,
there's nothing, there's nothing out here for that's a thing
for the daughters called National Charity League.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
What I don't even know what that is.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
It's actually a hundred it's either one hundred year old
organization that started in California. It's girls sixth grade to
twelfth grade that served their communities in a very similar
structure structured ourselves similar to National Charity of the NEAT League.
They focus on one other thing that which we do
is culture. We don't do cultural activities, and they have
(08:10):
things like teas and senior presentations and all of that.
So we decided.
Speaker 4 (08:16):
It's a little bit that way, and so we decided
to take.
Speaker 1 (08:20):
This the service part of that idea and just organize
an organization for young men so that they can get
out and learn how to serve those in our communities.
Because we were living in a you know, a fairly
you know, well established neighborhood, middle class to upper class.
These kids had not seen, they've not seen what the
(08:40):
other side of the world looks like, and so we
really wanted to give them some exposure so that they
would have a heart of compassion for other people instead
of sustaining in their little bubble where they you know,
they just go through life and not ever have that
heart tug of helping somebody.
Speaker 3 (08:57):
So literally you're saying how many friends are at launch?
Speaker 5 (08:59):
Still one thing for contexts, I think we heard about
your originally Pam from Stacey Horst with friends, So I
think you guys and National Service League are both volunteers
for her charity as for friends. So I heard her
talk about that, like a lot of our volunteers come
from these two places.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Yes, And then I looked at it. National Charity League
has I think about close to three hundred chapters two
hundred and eighty maybe something chapters now oss the country. Yeah,
and they've been there one hundred years. We started in
two thousand.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
H Okay, you can't blow that. Ye.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
Okay, I'm not going to blow that yet. All Right, we'll
talk about.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
That in two thousand and one. And okay, I'm going
to go back.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
So we decided.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
But there's seven of you. Seven, But see what I'm
trying to do is get into that moment. I mean,
there's seven of you living in middle to upper middle
to upper class lives with kids, having lunch, having lunch,
probably a forty dollars lunch, you know, maybe a thirty
do lunch. But you're not sitting at McDonald's, right, and
(10:05):
you just kind of come up with this idea that
our boys need to learn a little bit about service
and get out of their vacuum and their shell and
their bubble and we should do something fut it.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
I mean, that is the most.
Speaker 2 (10:21):
Innocuous thing to just be having a conversation at lunch
and decide to go act on it.
Speaker 3 (10:25):
Why were you you.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
Know, at first it was it got a lot of excitement.
Everybody was like, yeah, well we should do that, We
should do everybody does that Challets exactly. And so then
a core group of us, probably four of us went
back and said should we do this? Yeah, and we're like, well,
let's give it a try, you know, why not. And
so we had the experience of serving both probably three
(10:50):
of us had served in National Charity League, so we
knew how they there set up with the girls, right,
so we knew how their setup was, but you know,
we didn't have a clue know what it took to
get from that point to actually going to serve in
a philanthropy and being successful in it. And so we
just you know, just did a grassroots effort and started
(11:11):
recruiting people and we had a meeting at one of
our houses and said, anybody who has a son that's
in eighth or ninth or tenth grade, I can't remember
which ones because we were doing two classes at that point,
come to this meeting. And we got sixty people to
show up you're kidding. The first time we opened the doors, y'all, moms,
y'all showed up to say they wanted to be they
wanted to hear about what we were going to do,
(11:33):
and then they were like, we're in. Let's do it.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
And now a few messages from our general sponsors. But first,
we're hosting two live interviews that I want to share
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(12:04):
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Speaker 3 (12:06):
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(12:34):
dot eventright dot com for August twentieth a live interview
with Peter Mudubazi.
Speaker 3 (12:43):
And then on August twenty eighth, we're doing one in.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
Oxford, Mississippi with one of my mentors and I dare
call him Dear friends, Sparky Bridon Ole.
Speaker 3 (12:54):
Miss was.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
So lucky to have Sparky as the dean of students
when I was there, and many others. And he's now
authored a new book, The Dean Menoirirs and Missives. Guys,
I'm telling you this is something you don't want to miss.
I think we can just turn on the microphone and
I can say, hey, everybody, this is Sparky and shut up,
(13:17):
and he will entertain, inspire. He's a phenomenal guy. To
RSVP to that one visits sparkyreardon dot event, Bright dot com.
That's sparkyrearding dot event, Bright dot com and Oxford August
twenty eighth. I hope you'll come to both. We'll be
(13:38):
right back.
Speaker 1 (13:48):
And so we just started. We formed a board and
started making decisions, you know, on everything under the moon
and writing bylaws and do you know just how to
become a nonprofit and ever done anything like that. None
of us had, none of us had any experience in it.
Speaker 2 (14:04):
That kind of speaks to the power, the untapped power
of the mom.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
I say that, and somebody asked me about this last week,
and I call our moms the secret sauce of young
Men's servicely because they are so talented and amazing, and I.
Speaker 3 (14:26):
And often overlooked.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Yeah, And I encourage women who especially who haven't been
in the workforce, who you know, are looking for things
to do when they come and start a chapter, for instance,
and they've never done anything like that before. It's like,
you can use this as a launch pad to go
anywhere you want in life, you know. And I said that,
say that at our conferences. I was forty two. I
hadn't held a real job, you know. I was still
(14:48):
in real estate kind of, you know a little bit,
not like I do now. And I didn't work for corporation.
I didn't have any background in any of that. And
I have been able to, you know, grow and learn
and develop, and I feel like I'm coming into my
own now, you know, at my age and not. So
I want them to know, you know, if your mom
(15:09):
at forty forty two, forty six, forty eight, fifty, whatever
it is, it's not too late to do something great,
you know. And I really like to encourage our our
women in that capacity.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
So I absolutely love that.
Speaker 2 (15:23):
I mean, it's never too late as long as the
sun's up and there's are in your lungs and you
have a passion and an ability and see an area
need you got a chance to go to work and
do something. Right, So sixty of you show up at
this house.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
I guess you.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
I don't know how you got around. I guess text emails,
flowers with them out.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
We didn't have texting back then, that's right, I guess not.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
What did you do?
Speaker 1 (15:49):
We barely had email.
Speaker 4 (15:50):
It was just coming out, right, had been out. I
don't know when the email started.
Speaker 3 (15:54):
Yeah, how'd you get sixty people?
Speaker 1 (15:56):
We just called people and started talking old fashion right right? Hi?
Speaker 4 (16:00):
You know we're doing this And it's interesting.
Speaker 2 (16:03):
Though there were sixty moms there to get young men
to start engaging. Were the young men aware that you
guys were colluding against their saturdays? They had no idea,
did they They're.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
Like, we're doing what you signed me up for?
Speaker 2 (16:22):
What That's exactly what my kids would have done. Like,
are you out of your mind? You know, this is
my life?
Speaker 3 (16:30):
What are you doing?
Speaker 1 (16:31):
Yeah, I'm sleeping on Saturday or you know, whatever it is.
And so, yeah, we had a little resistance at first,
but as they got involved, it really that kind of
melted away. And we always tell the moms who were
thinking about joining our organization. Your son's not going to
jump up and down and.
Speaker 3 (16:46):
Go can we do this? Can we can?
Speaker 1 (16:48):
We? You know, like you have to talk to him
about it and explain to him the benefits of it,
and you're probably going to have to model how to
do this.
Speaker 3 (16:55):
You might have to pull their hair and you.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
Have to pull them out of bed by their arms
or their sometimes to go where they need to go.
Speaker 4 (17:02):
But in the end we talk about it's the ride home.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
Okay, So sixty moms and tell me what you first do.
Speaker 1 (17:14):
So the first thing we did, which we can't do anymore,
we've outlawed it, is to help with a golf tournament
that was going on at the local country club. It
was supporting a philanthropy and so the boys got to
drive carts around and fill up water bottles and do
all the things to manage the golf tournament. They had
a ball. They thought this was the greatest thing ever.
(17:36):
And so that was our very first philanthropy event. And
then we expanded and we had to beg people.
Speaker 3 (17:43):
To let us why did you outlaw?
Speaker 1 (17:45):
We want them to be actually serving the people in
need and that and not handing out a water bottle.
Speaker 2 (17:53):
I kind of figured that's what you're going to say,
because that's nice.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Yeah, it's nice, kind of soft that they don't need
us to do that, you know, like, let's use our time.
Speaker 4 (18:04):
We don't take that much time of the boys.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
We want each hour to be as impactful as possible,
so we much rather have them serving food or building
ramps for you know, people to get out of their homes,
or working in food pantries, or playing with children who
have physical handicaps that playing sports. You know, I think
they get so much more out of that than they
(18:28):
do just going to some major, huge corporate event where
they're not they're just a mass number.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
Okay, so after that they had a big time, but
you're still just moms and a bunch of kids.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
Yes, So then we had to go convince some philanthropies,
real philanthropies that we could go and we will show
up for them, because that's what happens.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
You know.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
Most of the philanthropies have bad experiences with volunteers, and
so they're like, okay, we'll give you a try.
Speaker 3 (18:53):
Oh so you had to beg.
Speaker 4 (18:55):
Yeah, to get opportunities to.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
Go because they've heard of been done that.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
Yeah, and they didn't know anything about us, and they probably.
Speaker 5 (19:03):
Haven't talked about this too much on the show, but
you're probably aware of this, Pam. There is like a
big movement moving away from volunteers or a lot of
these nonprofits like won't even deal with it and they
just want to work with professional staff and just forget
about volunteers.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
I think that's bad. I think that's I think that's
I think that pulls away an integral fiber and the
DNA of what PHILANTHROI is supposed to be, which is
volunteering as part of it. So I hate that we
need to we need to not talk about that anymore. Okay,
(19:38):
go ahead.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
Well, I will say on one note that the philanthropies
would rather have money than time sometimes, but once we
can prove that we are an asset to them, then
they like our time. Bet So you bagged, yeah, and
we got So. The next one we got was the
plane I was Senior Community Home, which is a low
income senior living for facility. And so we started going
(20:01):
in there and playing bingo with the members and or
the resident.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
High school kids.
Speaker 2 (20:07):
Boys boys playing bingo, yeah, and a low income old
folks on.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
And they love it and they fight over who gets
to call the numbers?
Speaker 3 (20:16):
Are you kid? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (20:17):
And then so this we're still serving that philanthropy twenty
four years later, and to the point where the seniors
in the senior in that in that residence every year
at the end of the year have a graduation party
for our seniors who are.
Speaker 4 (20:30):
Moving on and going you kid college.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
Yeah, it's a very sweet, sweet story.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
That's yeah, fantastic and I cannot imagine the lessons.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
Oh yeah, we have, We have some great stories. My
favorite story there is there's a man. There's not many men,
there's a lot of women in this and one of
the young men who lived down the street from me
started up a relationship with this man who was in there,
and he loved baseball, and so does this kid. He
loved baseball, and so his name was Lou, and Lou
(21:01):
and Jason just talked, you know, every time they got together,
they talked about baseball. And Lou said, you know, when
I was young, I wanted to be a major league player,
but I couldn't because my family needed me to work
and I couldn't go play.
Speaker 4 (21:14):
And he was able to.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
He would have made the team, but he couldn't because
of money, and so Jason went and told his dad
this story, and his dad was just like, well, we
got to do something wonderful for him. So he arranged
for Lou to go to the Texas Rangers game and
throw out the first pitch of one of the games.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Yeah, are you kidding that hadn't been one of the
highlights of Lou's life.
Speaker 4 (21:38):
Yeah, yeah, he just I mean it was really really powerful.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
That's that's enough. I mean we could wrap that is
the feel good story of the week.
Speaker 3 (21:50):
That's awesome. And was Jason o he was?
Speaker 4 (21:53):
He was great?
Speaker 1 (21:54):
Yeah, oh yeah, well the whole bunch of people went
with him.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
But yeah, that is fabulous. Okay, so you are doing
this all right? And how long does it go on
before you say? We could have chapters more.
Speaker 3 (22:08):
Than just this.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
So we the first couple of years. We started our
second chapter in two thousand and four, so three years. Yeah,
three years. We had such demand we had to turn
people away because we tried were in one chapter. So
we try to do twenty five young men per class.
So you know, so the classes aren't too big is
if they get too big, then they become invisible. You know,
boys can disappear into the woodwork really easily and not
(22:32):
you know, not communicate, not play a role, not feel
safe in the environment. And so we don't want that.
We want them to feel like they're really part of something.
So we started our second chapter and probably about that
time I share in my stories that I had a whisper,
you know, I was I work. I used to work late,
like I would get go to start working at ten
(22:54):
o'clock and figuring things out and be good to bed
at one and get up at you know, six to
get the family going again. And I clearly distinctly remembering
thinking about, gosh, how could you know this is so popular?
Speaker 4 (23:07):
What are we going to do?
Speaker 1 (23:08):
And my little whisper said, build it And like I say,
in the field of dreams and they will come, but
build it and they will serve, you know, like they
people will do this if you make it duplicatable. You
can make this so that impacts communities across the country.
So it's like the next day I woke up and
I was like, well, this is what we got to do.
(23:29):
You know, we got we got to build this. We
need to make it a system that's duplicatable, and then
we need to go and take it forth.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
When you're at the kitchen table and you tell your
unsuspecting husband that is beautiful wife and mother of has
four children, who's making his happy home, has decided now
to take this little idea that started at lunch over
a solid and some wine. You haven't said that. I'm
just guessing and scale it. And you're already working from
(24:00):
ten at night to one because you're being mom from
six am to ten. What is his reaction with that?
Speaker 3 (24:08):
You know?
Speaker 1 (24:09):
I think he at first just didn't really worry about it,
you know, because you know, he didn't really kind of
quote cute, yeah, less or hardy what he thought? You know, Yeah,
they can grow in Dallas. You know that's I can
see that. That's great, but you know, don't take time
away from too much time away from your family or
you know, the you know other things. And so ironically,
(24:30):
he is a lawyer, and he's the one who helped
us craft our bylaws and do the things to get
us started right.
Speaker 3 (24:36):
Good for him, so he's helping.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
He's still doing pro bono for us twenty four years later,
starting the new chapters and everything. So at first I
think he just he was so wrapped up in everything
he was doing.
Speaker 4 (24:47):
He wasn't too worried about it.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
But when it got bigger, it yeah, he was like,
are you are you doing that again?
Speaker 2 (24:56):
You know, we'll be right back. So two thousand and
four you felt called in some way or another. You
saw the success of the last three years and you said,
(25:19):
build it. But again you had never built anything really now,
So what does build it look like? And how did
that unfold for you?
Speaker 1 (25:30):
I think that initially the first thing we did is
once we got all our rules and systems in place,
we used to make this is so funny.
Speaker 4 (25:37):
We used to make notebooks.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
So we would make a master notebook for every new
chapter that had like all the job descriptions and the
timelines and what you have to do a to Z
to start the chapter. And these binders were like this thick,
and the chapter presence would be so excited to get them,
you know, because then they could go and do it.
And then our board would just support those chapters like
one by one, like our new babies. And really we
(26:01):
carried that process in place for another six seven years
before we got onto a website.
Speaker 4 (26:08):
We didn't even have a.
Speaker 1 (26:09):
Website until twenty ten or twenty twelve something like that,
and so we just really did it one at a
time and we didn't do any advertising. It was all
word of mouth. It was primarily focused in Dallas initially.
And then we started our first out of state chapter
in Atlanta, and that was from a mom who had
lived in Plano who moved to Atlanta with twin boys,
(26:30):
and she says, we're going to do this for my boys,
and so she started the whole thing. We have I
think twenty chapters in Atlanta.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Now you have twenty chapters in Atlanta alone, Right, we
jumped too far? Yeah, yeah, that's okay. So two thousand
and four you start your second chapter. I mean, well,
I guess now's the time. How many chapters do you
have today?
Speaker 1 (26:54):
We have one hundred and ninety nine chapters officially as
of today.
Speaker 3 (26:59):
And how many cities we.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
Go by states, so we're in twenty three states. I'd
have to count the city.
Speaker 3 (27:05):
Believable. In how many members.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
About thirty three five I think thirty three thousand something members?
What is boys, boys and Moms? Yeah, the mom is
actually the member, but officially, but total people participating in
the program. And then we have about twenty twenty some
thousand alumni.
Speaker 2 (27:26):
Now, okay, with that little reveal, which is unbelievable to me,
I'll ask you the question I just want to ask
you later. But so when does this thing become two
chapters to like ten to like twenty to like you're saying,
(27:46):
holy crap, I have a full time job.
Speaker 3 (27:48):
Now, how did you understand?
Speaker 1 (27:49):
I'm saying, yeah, you know, I think it just happened.
We started that first second chapter two thousand and four.
I think in two thousand and six we added five,
so we went from adding one to adding and so
we've gradually increased that number as we've grown and grew
a bigger staff. And this past year we started twenty five.
Speaker 2 (28:09):
So started twenty five one year. That has to be
an enormous amount of work.
Speaker 1 (28:16):
It's an enormous amount of work, but because we have
the system, the system really makes it.
Speaker 4 (28:23):
Easier to do.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
And our people who start the new chapters are just
blown away by the resources that we provide them. I
mean they were just like, we had no idea when
we jumped on this webinar to hear about this thing
that you would hand us this gift of an organization
that we just had to plug and play, and so
that is that we've started that in the very beginning,
(28:45):
and we've carried it on and gotten it better, you know,
as time and technology has moved along.
Speaker 2 (28:51):
So when you started this thing, your oldest was in
ninth grade. How many boys do you have?
Speaker 3 (28:58):
Have? Three? Three boys?
Speaker 1 (29:00):
How was the So the next one he was in
sixth grade, and then the next one was in second grade,
second grade. So I didn't do it your way. Four
I had two years apart, three years apart, four years apart.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
We didn't plan to trust me, third, fourth, fifth, sixth,
and then six So that's twelve years. At the end
of twelve or thirteen years, your kids are done done?
Why to keep going at that?
Speaker 1 (29:31):
Yeah? I think I am an entrepreneur at heart, I
think and I love the I love the idea of
expanding it and growing it to touch as many communities
as possible. And then I've uncovered a lot of things.
I've learned a lot of things about myself in the process.
Speaker 3 (29:46):
What have you learned about yourself?
Speaker 1 (29:49):
I've learned that I am a good leader. I've learned
that I am a good visionary. I think that I
have a lot of people in my organization who are
great at you know, governance or finance or marketing or
whatever or legal right, yeah, but there's really nobody that
has the vision to push it forward that I have
(30:11):
right now anyway. And I'm sure there's people out there.
And that is a little founder syndrome maybe, but I
think that that has My gifts have come out as
I've gotten older, and I can utilize those to help
grow this organization. You know, I'm moving from day to
day things now to you know, getting more exposure to
corporations and you know, starting to do fundraising, just really
(30:35):
elevating the knowledge of our organization out in the communities
that haven't heard of us before. And so my role
is changing and and I don't see myself stepping away
anytime real soon. I think that right now it's still
relevant and to keeping the organization going and moving forward.
And we've had hiccups, trust me, we have had some hiccups,
(30:56):
but nothing.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
Yeah, no, it's nothing, nothing worthwhile.
Speaker 4 (31:00):
There's been a couple of times I want to quit,
but you know I didn't.
Speaker 3 (31:03):
So so is there chapter in Memphis? There is not
change that. That's right. We got to change that for sure.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
I just need one.
Speaker 4 (31:14):
Eighth grade mom to talk to.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
That's all.
Speaker 3 (31:16):
I need one eighth grade mom to talk to.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
I think there's probably at least one hundred listening to
us right now from this area.
Speaker 3 (31:25):
Expect a call.
Speaker 2 (31:26):
Okay, all right, so explain to me kind of what
a chapter looks like and what the year looks.
Speaker 3 (31:35):
Like for them. Okay.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
So we start out our calendar year runs April one
to May. It May one to April thirtieth, and we
so we recruit in the spring, so for anybody starting
a chapter, they'll get their incoming ninth grade class. Unless
it's a new chapter, then we let them do two classes.
But existing chapters will recruit in the spring and then
kick off their year May first, And we do that
(31:57):
so that kids can serve some hours during the sum
you know, when they have a little bit more free times.
But we we offer two parts to our program. We
do the service component and they have to do a
minimum of twenty hours a year, and most a lot
of them do more than that. We have some kids
doing one hundred and fifty hours, you know, a year.
We really have a passion for it. And then they
(32:18):
can do their service hours whenever they want to, but
they do them with their mom. And that's what makes
us different than a lot of organizations. I think that
is our key differentiator is that you go serve with
your mom. Your mom doesn't sign you up and kick
you out the door, and she actually goes and does
the work with you. So they start serving during the
summer and then in the fall we start a set
of meetings that the young men have to attend and
(32:40):
they have to attend seven out of five out of
seven meetings that are offered a year. And the meetings
are like once a month on a Sunday afternoon for
an hour and a half, and they will do a
variety of life skills that we teach them. And so
we have a set curriculum in place and we cover
things from you know, like how to change a tire?
Speaker 4 (33:00):
You know, how do you shop at the grocery store?
Speaker 2 (33:03):
Mom based organization teaching boys how to change a tar
now that I love.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
What's what's the car maintenance?
Speaker 2 (33:11):
You know?
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Well, we get we bring in speakers for the grade level,
or they may go to an auto shop right and
learn the ten things they need to check on their car,
or we will teach them about insurance and why it's
important not to mess up your insurance, or we teach
them about things. I say, the one of the big
things that we do is making good decisions, and we
bring in speakers who will speak to them. Moms tell
(33:33):
the kids all the time, don't drive and drink, don't
take drugs, don't do this, don't do that. But when
somebody else comes in and talks to them and shares
the real life consequences of some of those bad decisions,
it's far more impactful.
Speaker 4 (33:46):
So we have a very relevant story.
Speaker 5 (33:48):
Why is it Sean speaks story?
Speaker 1 (33:51):
Yeah, okay, so one of the most impactful ones that
I have had. We actually did this as a multi
chapter meeting in play so I think we had fifteen
twelve hundred people there, I think. And this young man
got up to speak and he's in a motorized wheelchair
when he comes up to the stage and he doesn't
his entire presentation. He has presented and created himself with
(34:15):
his index finger because he can't speak, but he can
type and he so use a voice.
Speaker 3 (34:20):
Paralysis has taken his.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
Voice too, and so he was paralyzed by being a
rider in a friend's car who was drunk and had
an accident and he lost everything, and you know, except
for his actual life, and he was making people's changing
people's lives by doing these presentations.
Speaker 4 (34:40):
And I remember I was with my youngest son.
Speaker 3 (34:43):
How did he do a speech with his finger?
Speaker 1 (34:45):
It was voice activated through the so he.
Speaker 2 (34:47):
Could type on a keypad and the computer would read
what he had had would speak what he's typing. And
he would tell the story of a rider in a
drunk accident and could.
Speaker 4 (35:00):
Hear a pindra right?
Speaker 1 (35:01):
And my son turned to me, goes, I'm never going
to drink alcohol.
Speaker 4 (35:05):
Of course you know that changed but later, but.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
Drinking alcohol and drinking and driving or two different things.
Speaker 1 (35:11):
Yeah, And so we really try to we do that.
We've had another family in Plano, Taylor Hooton Foundation. I
don't know if you've heard of them, but this young
man took his life because he had been taking steroids,
and so they came in and teach taught the kids
about steroid use about you know, a lot of these
kids are into pre pre workout things. They're very dangerous.
(35:35):
We've had moms come in and talk about how they
lost their son because they had a massive heart attack
by taking the the pre workout stuff. So there's a
lot we try to bring in things that will educate
the young men. Sometimes we educate the young men and
the moms. You know, we were we were right on
the bandwagon with a vaping thing that when it came
out and talking about that about the fentanyl.
Speaker 4 (35:57):
You know that's out there in the world.
Speaker 2 (35:59):
So we education around practical life experience stuff as well
as service.
Speaker 1 (36:05):
Those are two focus.
Speaker 3 (36:06):
I mean, that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (36:11):
My So, I do not believe in having able bodied
children in your house while you are working and they
are doing nothing.
Speaker 3 (36:27):
It infuriates me.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
So one of the things Lisa and I did at
a very early age, when the kids were eight, they
started learning how to do yard work edging, weed eating,
mowing clip and ivy, picking up leaves, whatever. And it
was a typical I mean, you're for planos. So you
know what, early August is hot. It's hot and.
Speaker 3 (36:53):
In Memphis is humid.
Speaker 2 (36:54):
And so my nine year old daughter, or at that
time she would have been eleven year old daughter comes
around the corner, red face, sweaty, angry, and eleven or
twelve year old girl has a little level of sassiness
that starts to burble up. I think is the precursor
to becoming a woman anyway. So she comes around the
(37:19):
corner and looks at me with a bag of grass
over her shoulder and says, why can't we have a
yard man like normal people? And I said, honey, the
very question is the reason you're out here in this yard.
My kids, my girls had stilted boots and worked on
the lumber yard before they had make up.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
My boys, that's impressive because I can't say I did
the same.
Speaker 3 (37:45):
Well, they didn't have a loveyard, so I did.
Speaker 4 (37:50):
All those things.
Speaker 2 (37:51):
But my kids, my boys, learned how to weld and
change tires and do all the Here's the reason I'm
telling you all this is my son. My first son
went to college and by his senior year, in his
fraternity of one hundred and eighty people, any single time
(38:11):
somebody had something as simple as a white or blade
that didn't work, a blinker light out, a flat tire,
a switch on the wall of their dorm that didn't.
Speaker 3 (38:22):
Work, they called will that's great. Well, these idiots didn't
even know which side of a screwdriver to hold. Yeah,
you know, yeah, And it.
Speaker 2 (38:32):
Does speak, in my opinion, to a little bit of
a loss among our young men coming up that they
stuff that I took her granted that a male needed
to know to do.
Speaker 3 (38:50):
They don't don't.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
And so I hear what you're talking about about how
to change a tire and finances and basic practical responsibility stuff.
I mean, that seems so simple that there's stuff we
had to be teaching, but you're putting it into almost
a practical curriculum.
Speaker 1 (39:12):
Yeah. One of the things that I've I've gone after
and said to our ninth grade moms when they're helping
plan the meetings, is that you need to have a
class and teach them how to paint, because you know,
we go to all these places to paint for the
the you know, shelters and things like that, and they're
they make a hot mess.
Speaker 4 (39:27):
And then when somebody has to come in and clean
up after them.
Speaker 1 (39:31):
And so I was like, first we need to take
them to Low's or hum depot or something like that
and teach them how to paint at least simply, you know.
And so they were like really, and I was like, yes, really,
because we don't have the energy to go back and
clean up your mess. So, you know, if you're going
to do a paint project. Make sure you have a
class that teaches them how to paint a wall.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
The only manage if you do something right to it right,
the first right right. I remember a friend of my
kids coming over when Will was cutting the grass, and
the kid was looking at this lawn mow as if
he was looking at an alien. And he said, mister Bill,
I said. He said, where's the button? And I said
what button? I said, the button? The button story started,
(40:13):
and I'm like, come here, boy, and I made them
hold the thing and I told him to lean over
and pulled the cord and he pulled it three times
and he was like, wow, that's hard.
Speaker 3 (40:24):
And I'm like, what your parents should be flogged.
Speaker 4 (40:29):
Now they have electric ones, so yeah, we're.
Speaker 2 (40:34):
Still a methis. We have electricals run here. So it
looks like in May they're serving. And then throughout this
time you have these practical classes. You have meetings, and
and the moms are with the boys.
Speaker 1 (40:51):
The moms don't meet with the boys. There's only when
they do the service. The moms actually have meetings also,
but we teach different things we actually try to and
things that are interesting for moms, like elder care. You know,
where do you where do you start with that, or
bringing in a philanthropy speaker, you know, to talk about
one of the philanthropy partners that we have, or you know,
(41:11):
talking through you know, how to communicate with your son.
So we try to give them different types of things
that are we call it feeding the mom. So she
wants to come to the business meeting and hear what's
going on with the chapter. And she lanced at ten
three a year, so both both ends get a little
bit of a curriculum.
Speaker 2 (41:28):
And then this really cool. So I want to I
want you to tell this story and why it matters.
We highlighted probably a year ago, Sleep and Heavenly Pace. Yeah,
it's still one of my favorite stories. And it actually
connected us to another story in is It Jamaica Haiti
in Haiti, where we now have a Haitian orphanage that
(41:55):
has beds that now are working with sleep and have
only piece and the because the orphanage has a woodworking shop,
orphans at the woodworking shop are building beds for Haitian
kids who are not orphans, who don't have beds.
Speaker 1 (42:10):
Oh, I love that.
Speaker 3 (42:11):
Yes, we think about.
Speaker 2 (42:12):
Well, that's the power of an army and normal folk yes,
it's that connectivity in the bottom up work.
Speaker 3 (42:17):
But anyway, I know you guys.
Speaker 2 (42:19):
Have done something Sleep and Heavenly Peace, but you had
a really creative idea to make sure that the kids
understood why these bets are important.
Speaker 1 (42:27):
Oh yeah, yeah, ye. So we actually work with Sleep
and Heavenly Peace and many of our chapters because they're
all over the country too, and one of the chapters
this year for their ultimate gifts, they do an education.
Speaker 3 (42:39):
My ultimate gift. First, I jumped it. I should that's okay.
Speaker 1 (42:42):
Well, we serve Sleep and Heavenly Peace for regular hours
and for Ultimate Gift hours, so it could be either one.
So let me skip the ultimate gift and I'll finish
this story and then we'll talk about that because that's
a bigger subject. That's cool, okay. So Sleep and Heavenly
Peace they were going to go do their projects. So
they decided to take all the kids who are going
to participate in the project dender moms and go sleep
like in a gym floor overnight without you know anything,
(43:06):
but maybe I think they were allowed to bring a pillow.
And so these kids then they got up the next
morning and they're like, so, how do you feel today
and they're like, not so great. How did you sleep?
Not so great? Yeah, my body hurts. And then they
were like, well, how do you think it would feel
like if you had to do that and then you
didn't get breakfast, and then you had to go to school,
you know, and how would you feel in school? Would
(43:26):
you be able to be the best student that you
could be? And they were just like, oh my gosh,
how do people do this? I did it one night,
you know, and and it made them understand why they
were building these beds at the project. And so when
they actually build the beds and they deliver them, they
they connect with the children who are receiving it and
understand that this is making their life better.
Speaker 4 (43:48):
And it's just a power.
Speaker 1 (43:49):
It's so powerful.
Speaker 2 (43:53):
And that concludes part one of my conversation with Pam Rosner,
and you don't want to miss part two. Now we'll
be able to listen to together, guys, we can change
this country.
Speaker 3 (44:05):
It's going to start with you. I'll see in part
two
Host
Bill Courtney
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