Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Jermar Perry. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Hi Jermar, thanks for joining us today. Have you ever experienced a times when your entire field felt like it was taking a U-Turn?
When it comes to wide U-Turns and how I ended up in my current field it was all some what accidental. I started off working my way through community college and eventually ended up with an Associates Degree then my Bachellor’s Degree in Journalism. After college, I interned at a local newspaper in the South Philadelphia neighborhood I was raised in. However, the field was a little slow for me so I ended up working at a program for ajudcated youth who were trying to get accclamated back into high school. The program was called Sankofa and was basically a African centered mentoring program. Unfortunaetly, after working with the program for a year the budget was cut due to funding from the city.
I was relagated back to working security which I was content with since it was the job I had throughout college. I would meet my now wife who thought that I would make for a good social worker since I loved working with children. About a week after we would go on our first she would call me crying because her nephew had just killed a man with a hammer in South St. Louis and she would be moving back to help her mom as they prepared for the trail.
My wife and I would date long distance for a year and I would eventually move to St. Louis. While in the process of moving I applied to Saint Louis University Master’s level Social Work program. This would be a wide turn for me since I didn’t know much about the field, was new to the area and had a lot to learn while being acclimated to a new culture and a new area of discipline.
Jermar, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
My name is Jermar Perry and I am the CEO of The Village PATH. The Village PATH is a St. Louis based non profit and our mission is to increase awareness, access + acceptance of mental wellness within Black communities. We run several programs accross the city, the first is our Healing & Writing Cirlce which we started pre covid in August of 2019. The Village HAWC is a space where self identified Black men are given a time to heal and to share their joys and pains while also journaling via prompts. We also pay for self-identified Black men to go through five free sessions of therapy from our Village Thearapy and Assistance Program and we also have a program for young men called The Village ROPE which is a RIte of Passages Program where we partner with LifeWise STL and their after school program.
I would say that myself and my partner Bryant Antoine who also runs the day to day of The Village PATH are most excited about the space we have builidng when it comes to the work we are doing. We currently have a partnership with the Bullet Related Injury Clinic and have been working with gun shot vicitms for the last few months. We love when we see people wearing Village PATH sweatshirts or people when we randomly bump into folks who we have helped through our services and we see the joy on their faces. The work that we do is truly humbeling in every aspect and we our proud that people may not know us by name but that they are getting to know The Village PATH.
Other than training/knowledge, what do you think is most helpful for succeeding in your field?
Other than training and knowledge I would say the most helpful thing when it comes to succeding in the field of Social Work is rapport building. On top of The Village PATH I am also The Director of The Marianist EXCEL program at Saint Mary’s High School. The one thing that I was able to be succeful besides providing snacks to hungry teenaged boys is to build a relationship with the young men that I work with on a dialy. Before I chastise them about poor grades, attendance or being in the halls, I make sure to ask them how their day is going. I show them that I genuinely care of
Can you tell us the story behind how you met your business partner?
Bryant and I met while we were both attending SLU. Not knowing a lot about the profession of Social Work, the one thing that I did not know was how little Black men were in the field. Being new to St. Louis I did’nt have a ton of friends which was difficult since I left behind a lot of family friends. I would see Bryant in the hallways and eventually we would join a task force that was set to assist the school with diversifying the staff and the program. During graduation Bryant and I were the only two Black men to graduate from the department. Shortly after graduation I would ask Bryant did he want to help with facilitating a men’s group and the rest is history.
Contact Info:
- Website: thevillagepath.org
- Instagram: @thevillagepath
- Facebook: The Village PATH
Image Credits
Tyler Small