Founder of Youth Emergency Shelter Receives Young Leader Award
The Texas Woman’s Foundation Awards Stacy Johnson.
Austin, TX, May 19, 2022 --(PR.com)-- Central Texas Table of Grace, a nonprofit emergency shelter for foster children, is pleased to announce that the organization’s CEO and Founder, Stacy Johnson, was awarded the 2022 Young Leader Award by the Texas Women’s Foundation. Johnson joined six other businesswomen who received awards for outstanding leadership at an awards banquet on April 26th in Dallas, Texas, as part of the foundation’s Leadership Forum & Awards Celebration.
Johnson brings expertise to her work through lived experience in the foster care system. After entering foster care at the age of two, Johnson spent the next 14 years moving from foster home to foster home. Deciding she could take care of herself better than the State, Johnson studied and worked hard to achieve her goal of emancipation (declared an adult by the courts) by the age of 16. After finding success in a sales career, Johnson decided to pivot her aims and pursue her lifelong dream of helping other at-risk youth realize their full potential. In May of 2014, that dream came to fruition as she opened the doors of Central Texas Table of Grace, an emergency shelter for children ages 6 to 17 in the foster care system who have nowhere else to go. The mission of Central Texas Table of Grace is to create a loving, nurturing, homelike environment for displaced youth in the Central Texas area, providing shelter and healthy food as well as teaching healthy habits and life skills. Today, under Johnson's leadership nearly 500 children have experienced the life-changing, loving, nurturing care offered at Central Texas Table of Grace.
With 20% of foster kids becoming instantly homeless after turning 18, Johnson launched the Grace365 program in 2021. Grace365 is a Supervised Independent Living Program for young adults ages 18-22 who have aged out of foster care. The program provides them with fully furnished apartments in addition to support with school, job readiness and life-skills training. These elements work together to put the young adult on a path to being healthy and happy.
“Achieving a monumental goal despite all odds, gave so much back to me that I had lost in the shuffle from home to home,” Johnson said. “Always an outsider and never cared for properly, I lost my self-worth. But then I found someone who believed in me, and then I believed in me.... and I achieved what I had set out to do. I found myself, my strength and my happy place. I want to help create more stories like mine and prevent the all-too-common story and stereotype of ‘The Foster Kid.’”
About Table of Grace
Established in 2014, Central Texas Table of Grace is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization headquartered in Round Rock, Texas. The organization addresses the critical need of emergency housing and care for displaced children and youth through local initiatives and targeted outreach programming. Table of Grace also administers Grace365, a Supervised Independent Living program for kids 18-21 who have aged out of foster care. Grace365 was officially launched in 2021 and provides aged-out foster youth with a fully-furnished apartment, while offering life skills classes, education and job skills support, and community connection.
Visit at www.ctxtableofgrace.org.
Johnson brings expertise to her work through lived experience in the foster care system. After entering foster care at the age of two, Johnson spent the next 14 years moving from foster home to foster home. Deciding she could take care of herself better than the State, Johnson studied and worked hard to achieve her goal of emancipation (declared an adult by the courts) by the age of 16. After finding success in a sales career, Johnson decided to pivot her aims and pursue her lifelong dream of helping other at-risk youth realize their full potential. In May of 2014, that dream came to fruition as she opened the doors of Central Texas Table of Grace, an emergency shelter for children ages 6 to 17 in the foster care system who have nowhere else to go. The mission of Central Texas Table of Grace is to create a loving, nurturing, homelike environment for displaced youth in the Central Texas area, providing shelter and healthy food as well as teaching healthy habits and life skills. Today, under Johnson's leadership nearly 500 children have experienced the life-changing, loving, nurturing care offered at Central Texas Table of Grace.
With 20% of foster kids becoming instantly homeless after turning 18, Johnson launched the Grace365 program in 2021. Grace365 is a Supervised Independent Living Program for young adults ages 18-22 who have aged out of foster care. The program provides them with fully furnished apartments in addition to support with school, job readiness and life-skills training. These elements work together to put the young adult on a path to being healthy and happy.
“Achieving a monumental goal despite all odds, gave so much back to me that I had lost in the shuffle from home to home,” Johnson said. “Always an outsider and never cared for properly, I lost my self-worth. But then I found someone who believed in me, and then I believed in me.... and I achieved what I had set out to do. I found myself, my strength and my happy place. I want to help create more stories like mine and prevent the all-too-common story and stereotype of ‘The Foster Kid.’”
About Table of Grace
Established in 2014, Central Texas Table of Grace is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization headquartered in Round Rock, Texas. The organization addresses the critical need of emergency housing and care for displaced children and youth through local initiatives and targeted outreach programming. Table of Grace also administers Grace365, a Supervised Independent Living program for kids 18-21 who have aged out of foster care. Grace365 was officially launched in 2021 and provides aged-out foster youth with a fully-furnished apartment, while offering life skills classes, education and job skills support, and community connection.
Visit at www.ctxtableofgrace.org.
Contact
Central Texas Table of Grace
Chad Randall
214-218-9520
https://centraltexastableofgrace.org/
Chad Randall
214-218-9520
https://centraltexastableofgrace.org/
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