Families Strengthening Families | Shameka Burrell
Shameka Burrell was inspired to start the nonprofit, Families Strengthening Families, in 2016 when her daughter shared that a friend in school was struggling with self-confidence because of the way she spoke. “I thought it was a great idea to get with my daughter and her friends, and some people within the community to talk about self-image.” And so Shameka did just that. The goal of Families Strengthening Families is to keep families together. Whether that means supporting parents, children, single moms, or struggling dads, Shameka is committed to providing proactive tools to help families stay together.
Today, Shameka runs Families Strengthening Families full-time and, alongside her husband, leads a variety of workshops for families and adolescents, including the Love From Within project. Love From Within is an event designed to help high school girls become empowered and learn to love themselves and the women around them. This event, put on four times a year, brings twenty girls together from three different schools in the Metro Atlanta area, of varying ethnic, racial, and socio-economic backgrounds. For an entire day, these girls learn about self-compassion and friendship through keynote speakers, group activities, journaling, etc. After the event, the girls continue to connect by attending social events together and joining a mentorship program that lasts for a year.
Why is this project important to you?
“Because when I was younger, I was teased for being skinny, my sister and I were called the ‘skinny twins’, but it was giving us a negative body image. This project is important to me for two reasons, one, because you have to be confident in yourself, and learn self-confidence. Two, we are teaching them about loving each other and loving within the community. One of the things we did when we was younger was we always went to the community to serve.”
What are your plans for the project in the future?
Shameka has big plans for Families Strengthening Families, including a resource center to support all kinds of families. She shared that there are many organizations and resources to support families once they have gotten into trouble or fallen on hard times. Still, there are not nearly enough resources that offer preventative measures to help keep families together and kids out of trouble. The long-term goal for Families Strengthening Families is to reduce the amount of families that split up. Kids have a better chance for success when families stay together, so Shameka wants to teach families how to work through problems, stay together, and leave a legacy.
What else would you like people to know about your project?
“Even though you can’t choose your family, doesn’t mean you can’t love your family. You can still show love to your family no matter what. Our saying is, ‘we believe if you help the community be better, the community can help the world be better.’
