Through culturally sustaining education, healing-centered engagement, and workforce development, VOICES provides the relationships, resources, and opportunities for youth to heal, grow, and further their path towards economic self-sufficiency and civically engaged lives.
Our Four Pillars of Wellness
VOICES programs and services are grounded by our Four Pillars of Wellness
Healed
Systemic oppression forces us to acknowledge that healing must be the core for communities to transform and thrive
Educated
Equitable educational opportunities are essential for economically stable and thriving communities
Creative
A collective and neutral platform for trauma and social justice issues to be explored without judgment is essential
Disciplined
Communities need tools to create new personal habits and pathways for self-sufficiency
Since 2010
VOICES has co-created innovative programming with its youth and communities. VOICES is a Black-led organization founded and ran by a local wife and husband duo, Kia and Trey Wright, with a desire to transform communities of color.
All staff and board members are predominantly people of color and are from working-class and diverse backgrounds. Given their identities–as well as their personal, professional, and civic involvements, VOICES leadership has a profound, nuanced understanding of how systemic racism, generational poverty, and gaps in systems of support entrench the challenges their youth and families face.
This understanding has led to new VOICES initiatives that aim to change the inequitable system youth are engaged in, alongside supporting, and growing the youth themselves. VOICES believes that playing a role in systems-level change is the only way to achieve their long-term vision: bringing about the day when every Indianapolis child, family, and community has the tools, resources, and collective capacity they need to lead self-determined lives.
Board of Directors
Melissa Blackwell
Director
92C Partners
Michael Coleman, Vice Chairman
Associate Director for Policy and Technical Guidance
Employ Indy
Hayes Barnes
Sales Strategy Manager
MedPage Today
Lauren Hall Riggins
Director of Identity Programming
pilotED Schools
Patrick Jones, Chairman
Sr. Vice President of Leadership and Equity
The Mind Trust
Diane Wade
Outreach and Engagement Coordinator
The Milk Bank