Help from the Financial Opportunity Center Lets Community Member Pay It Forward

When she moved to Jacksonville two years ago, Leeanndra Members could not have predicted the employment struggles she would face. 

“I hit a rough patch,” Members said. While she found work initially, Members experienced large gaps in employment that made it increasingly tough for her to care for her three young children at home. Then, a friend recommended her to a new program that could help her find the right opportunity. 

That friend was Michelle Hughes, program manager at Steps 2 Success, Florida’s first Financial Opportunity Center (FOC). These centers utilize a financial and career coaching model that has proven successful in more than 90 LISC-managed locations across the country. 

The FOC’s research-based approach differs from other career training or financial literacy programs in that it uses team coaching to help participants achieve their goals. Coaches help participants obtain steady, living-wage jobs, boost their credit scores and increase net worth. Members is a proud testament to the center’s achievements so far in Jacksonville. 

“The program has changed my life in so many ways,” she said. “From the time I went in up until now, I look at things with a whole different perspective.” 

The team at Steps 2 Success helped place Members in a job she loves. She now works at a local food pantry, allowing her to provide for her children while “paying it forward” to neighbors in need. She recently was promoted to a management position. Members’ positive experience goes beyond her new position. “I learned how to budget and they showed me how to actually map out my goals,” she said. “Before this program, I was lost, but now it feels like my life is finally back on track.” 

Hughes says her favorite part of her role is seeing the transformation in the dozens of clients Steps 2 Success serves – transformations that spark better engagement and involvement in nearby neighborhoods. “We have definitely seen a difference in the community,” Hughes said. 

That change in the community and its people is why the Financial Opportunity Center continues to receive investments from LISC Jacksonville and partner organizations including United Way of Northeast Florida, Lutheran Social Services of Northeast Florida, Family Foundations of Northeast Florida and New Town Success Zone/Edward Waters College. 

Members said her Steps 2 Success coaches gave her the skills to turn negatives into positives. “They taught me that if you run into a roadblock, you don’t stop. You go until you find a yes,” she said.

Leeanndra Members and her three daughters.