Being around Cary-Grace Clark instantly puts anyone in a good mood. I can’t tell you exactly how she does it, but as a Youth Development Specialist with Family Service of Roanoke Valley, it has to come in handy. Cary-Grace facilitates Teen Outreach Program® (TOP®) and Positive Action to build positive life skills, relationships, and healthy behaviors in our community’s children and youth.
Cary-Grace is pursuing a career that allows her to be a part of people bettering their whole selves. She’s passionate about seeing people realize and believe their worth and capability in a way that saturates every part of their life, and enables those around them to know and live out the same truth. She knows individuals impact families, which impact systems, which impact nations. She realized working with youth aligned her passions with her career, so Family Service’s TOP® and Positive Action were natural choices.
“At the end of the day, we want our kids to aspire to positive action, feel like they have a place to belong, and be passionate about their purpose and impact on their life and community.”
When Cary-Grace isn’t out in our community working with youth, she’s out in it with her friends. She loves finding activities and venues that let her friends bring their dogs along too. As a self-described humanitarian and a person who measures success by the little moments, it should be of no surprise that her favorite quote comes from Jean Vanier:
“Love is to recognize that the other person is a person, is precious, is important, and has value.”
