about melvin

Assuming that most of you didn’t click this tab to read a full-fledged bio—rather to figure out whether you want to connect—let me start with the short of it: I am a devoted husband, committed father, learner, teacher, writer, storyteller, lover of people, connoisseur of creativity, purveyor of sustainability and believer in possibilities.

The challenge is to find ways to make such ‘noble’ intuitions pay the bills (if I weren’t married with kids I’d probably be homeless . As my muse, Brudda Langston Hughes, once put it, “An artist must be free to choose what he does, certainly, but he must also never be afraid to do what he might choose.”

Thus, I choose to be a social entrepreneur. The way that looks right now:

• I am a professional speaker and aspiring author. As such, I contributed a prayer of hope to the 2009 release The Audacity of Faith (seen to your right). I am a contributing editor for Sojourners magazine and I periodically post to God’s Politics blog. Additionally, I am happy to report I am making good progress with The Stories in Which We Find Ourselves: A Bible Story Project.
• I am an Language Arts professor (doesn’t “professor” sound so obnoxiously erudite) at Pine Forge Academy, my high school alma mater.
• I do manuscript editing and voice-over work.
• I consult in the areas of nonprofit organization, program and curriculum development, which includes all the document preparation associated with each.
• I am founder and director of Kid Cultivators, a missional youth development nonprofit.
• I am a participant and host in the Emergent Village theological conversation.

For the more curious—or those who just have time to kill—the more narrative/descriptive version goes…

Though social entrepreneur may be the more normative descriptor for what I do, up to this point my favorite description of my work is that I grow kids. On a personal level that involves partnering with my bride of 14 years (June 30), Leslie, as we pour ourselves into our three wonderful children—Jaya, Kari & Melvin IV.

On my most enjoyable professional days, growing kids takes the form of some Kid Cultivators project. Kid Cultivators is the nonprofit I founded in the late 90′s and have worked through for the last 12 years to help youth, youth-workers and their families learn habits of sustainability. We teach them to apply the ethics of sustainability to the way they engage ecology, faith, relationships, education, economics, politics, media and art. We have been community partners with the Atlanta Girls School and participated in the re:CONNECT project in Atlanta, summer 2008.

In 2008, I took a temporary assignment on the faculty of Pine Forge Academy, a parochial boarding school nestled in the foothills of southeastern PA on the river Manatawny. It was a bit of a homecoming for my family, for PFA is my high school alma mater, it was the place where both Leslie’s parents were raised and we now live within walking distance of the church in which Leslie and I were married. Over the years I have also served as a school principal, program director, classroom teacher, camp director/counselor, curriculum developer, consultant, trainer and general contractor. Prior to founding Kid Cultivators, I even did a short stint on local television, for which I was awarded an Emmy™. I also stay active in a growing, generative friendship, Emergent Village, seeking to re-imagine what it means to be church in the world. Outside of that, I’m just trying to remain diligent with my art—writing, teaching and friendship.

Our family is anxious to return to Atlanta summer 2010. Then “we shall see what becomes of this dreamer and his dreams.”

I hope we can connect.