Message from Mike – Summer 2018

I hope this message finds everyone in our Thrive community, happy, healthy and enjoying the summer.

I recently had the honor of attending Thrive’s 2018 Leadership Experience and Development (LEAD) graduation. LEAD is a groundbreaking initiative that prepares and empowers young adults who want to learn what it takes to become a leader and better the world around them.

Our eight LEAD graduates embody the best of youth of any ability. They’ve embraced the concept of servant leadership. These LEADers understand that leadership is not telling others what to do. Rather, it is leading by example, through serving others.

I had the privilege to address the graduates and shared these quotes on service, leadership, and greatness:

“Everybody can be great because everybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and your verb agrees to serve. You don’t have to know about Plato and Aristotle to serve. You don’t have to know Einstein’s theory of relativity to serve. You don’t have to know the second theory of thermodynamics in physics to serve. You only need a heart full of grace, a soul generated by love. And you can be that servant.” Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., February 4, 1968.

These remarkable graduates have set out to do what is so needed in our world today. I congratulate and salute them, and I can’t wait to see what they will do next.

Your active, generous support is what makes LEAD, and all that Thrive accomplishes, happen every day. Thank you for your trust, friendship, and support.

Until the fall,

Michael A. Rodrigues, President & CEO