services

As a young adolescent, Jamelle Payne, the founder of YOU'RE WORTHY, felt a call to serve his hometown of Shawnee Oklahoma. Unfortunately, to his disappointment, he was met with a surprising amount of resistance and thus, as a mere 6th grader, was forced to wrestle with the real-life repurcussions of discrimination and exclusion.

However, from the incident, Jamelle gained important insight. Over time, he began to see that society in general was undergirded by a complex network of smaller social "circles, " the membership of which is selectively guarded and regulated by its members based on their own priorities, self-concept, and presuppositions about the world.

While a system like this lends to the stability of society in general, it often does so at the hefty price of practicing discrimination, fostering entitlement, and marginalizing the unseen and unheard. Over time, these social practices result in ideological stagnation and further entrenchment in their discriminatory practices. In the end, "cycle " is formed in which social units exclude and marginalize new or differing voices leading to even stronger exclusionary practices. Meanwhile, the "unseen " and the "unheard " are pushed further into the margin where they are stripped of their power to contribute, change, and improve society.

The purpose of YOU'RE WORTHY is to break the destructive cycle by helping all people find their own voice while simultaneously learning to value the voice of others. This purpose is accomplished by creating an environment of positivity and encouragement in such a way as to get people to understand they have something valuable to contribute to the social circles in their personal world: family, school, church, community, friends, government, and so on. So, whether you choose YOU'RE WORTHY to emcee your event, speak to your group, create focus and purpose for your team, or entertain at your event, you can be assured that the message will be empowering, unifying, encouraging, and purposeful to motivate and to affirm.

It was then he wanted to provide a voice for the unheard and the not seen. Shortly, after the 7th grade year he was helping make an impact in the community with 8 different organizations. The biggest accomplishment that year was joining the board of advisory for the Board of Education and helping fuel the Shawnee Youth Coalition to later host and emcee for the Shawnee Youth Speak Out that held the attention to Local and State officials. It was truly a voice to the unheard and not seen platform that invited surrounding cities. By his High School year he was V.P of the freshmen class and being flown out to Florida to represent the Shawnee High for a conference called No Child Left Behind. That conference was the fuel of funding that helped the school receive money to provide every child and teacher with updated technology and computers for the whole school. He created the Union Minority Development that gave hope to every student of color to know that there is life after High School that allowed them to visit an HBC College and be active in the community. He was the first SHS Black Class President in 2007 since the 1980’s. Today, you can find him restarting his involvement into the community with helping in every direction possible. Please help me to welcome our emcee for tonight. Jamelle Payne decade employee of Citizen Potawatomi Nation workforce and social services.