Organizational Directors & Officers

Here are the members of the Board of Directors and Officers of MyGrowthPlan.Org, Inc. prior to our acquisition on August 12, 2011 by The Bridge of Northeast Florida, Inc., a nonprofit youth service based in Jacksonville, Florida.

Karen Britt - Member, Board of Directors. Karen is currently employed with the Gateway Council of the Girl Scout s in Jacksonville, Florida. Previously, she worked as the Director of Teen Programs at the James Weldon Johnson Family YMCA in Jacksonville where she directed the city-wide Black Achievers Program. And, for seven years Karen was as a Family Services Counselor for The Florida Department of Children and Families. A graduate of Florida A&M University with a bachelors degree in Broadcast Journalism, Karen has recently received her Masters degree in Public Administration at the University of North Florida. She loves sports, especially enjoys hanging out with her family including son Kelvin and daughter Kelley.

 

Paul O. Johnson - Chair, Board of Directors; Executive Committee Member. Paul is the retired Senior Vice President and member of the Corporate Management Committee at H.B. Fuller Company. An attorney by training, prior to H.B. Fuller, Paul was General Counsel, VP for Administration, and member of the Management Committee at Green Giant Company. When not traveling the world, sail boating, skiing with his family in Colorado, or working in his southern Minnesota vineyard, Paul has found time to serve on two other nonprofit boards -- the Indianhead Boy Scout Council in St. Paul and the Self Help of Hard of Hearing based in Bethesda, MD.

 

Jerry K. Lee - Treasurer. Jerry currently serves as President of Lee Financial Group, a financial services business. He is also an adjunct business professor at Northwestern College and a frequent seminar facilitator at the University of St. Thomas. As a team member at previous employers, Jerry has w orked as an auditor for an international public accounting firm, project management accountant, accounting manager, controller for publicly traded firms, and as a treasurer and chief financial officer. Jerry is a licensed pilot, and enjoys spending time with his wife at home or traveling. Sunday mornings he can usually be found teaching Sunday school for 4 & 5 year olds.

 

Phillip W. Miner - Vice President & Chief Partnership Officer. For 30 years Phillip has been helping high school youth and young adults realize their dreams through a variety of higher education positions at Pacific Lutheran University and Hamline University.  Phillip's most recent position has been as the Director for Community Initiative at the Minnesota Private College Council. Phillip is a Board Member of the Girl Scout Council of Greater Minneapolis, Chair of the Advis ory Committee of the YMCA National Black Achievers Program, and serves on the boards of Pillsbury House Theater and the MN Minority Suppliers Development Council. Former service includes, Immediate Past Chair and member of the Multicultural Development Center Board of Directors. Among his many honors, he has been awarded the 2001 Martin Luther King Jr. Humanitarian Award from Minneapolis Community & Technical College and the Educator of the Year 2000 Award from INROADS/Twin Cities.  Phillip is currently retired and volunteers his time with the La Villa African American Museum in Jacksonville and with the Duval County Democratic Executive Committee. 

 

Jon Pekel - President & Secretary; Member of the Board of Directors; Executive Committee Member. While in grad school, Jon developed a teen center on the northside of Chicago, and while serving as a clergyman on the southside of Chicago, he developed another teen center. Then, for 15 years Jon held public affairs positions at four Fortune 500 companies, followed by 12 years running his own for-profit consulting company, The Fulcrum Group, and then his founding and serving as President of the nonprofit MyGrowthPlan.Org, Inc. to serve @risk and other teens.  And, for nearly 25 years on a part-time basis, Jon taught graduate level MBA students at the University of St. Thomas. Having unsuccessfully run for U.S. Congress back in 1976, Jon sees following politics as something of a hobby.  Jon is now in the process of doing the research for writing a personal memoir of his 70+ year journey towards authenticity that took him through multiple and varied career platforms and life situations.  And, he is in the process of constructing a new website where he will resume writing his regular opinion column called "As I See It Now" that he wrote back in the 1970's in Terre Haute, Indiana.

 

Dr. Dwight C. Watson - Member, Board of Directors; Executive Committee Member.  Dr. Watson received his B.A. and M.Ed in elementary education from the University of South Carolina and his Ph.D in curriculum and instruction from North Carolina State University. He has taught elementary and middle grades for ten years and has been been a central office administrator for a large, urban district. Dwight is the former associate professor of education and Chair of the Department of Education at Hamline University, and Interim Director of the Center for Excellence in Urban Teaching. Currently, he is Associate Dean of the College of Education at the University of Wisconsin at Eau Claire. Dwight conducts numerous local, state, national, and international workshops in curriculum integration, and is a consultant to the Minnesota State Department of Education for the Basic Skills Standards and the Minnesota Comprehensive Assessments. Dwight is a member of the Board of Directors for the American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education and the Association for Independent Liberal Arts Colleges of Teacher Education where he also serves as treasurer.