DURHAM, NORT CAROLINA.- An exhibition exploring leadership at TROSA (Triangle Residential Options for Substance Abusers Inc.) through photographs, writing, and interview text Porch Gallery, Center for Documentary Studies through July 12, 2003.
Public Reception: Sunday, April 27, 2-4 p.m.
Program will include curator Barbara Lau, photographer Cedric N. Chatterley, TROSA founder Kevin McDonald, and TROSA residents.
Founded in 1994 in Durham, North Carolina, Triangle Residential Options for Substance Abusers Inc. (TROSA) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping drug and alcohol abusers change their lives. TROSA builds citizens, not just sober individuals. It is a highly structured and well-organized operation run by current residents and staff members, many of whom are graduates of the program. The principles of social entrepreneurism, self-help, and individual empowerment guide the program’s approach to recovery. In 2001, Kevin McDonald and TROSA received a prestigious Leadership in a Changing World Award from the Ford Foundation in recognition of their outstanding community leadership in improving lives.
More than 300 men and women are currently residents in the two-year TROSA program. Each resident receives food, clothing, housing, therapy, vocational training, health care, and educational assistance at no cost to the individual and in exchange for living free from drugs and alcohol and working in one of TROSA’s many businesses. After graduation, residents also receive inexpensive, reliable vehicles; safe, affordable housing; and ongoing therapeutic support.
TROSA’s motto, Each One Teach One, makes learning leadership skills part of everyday life. Kevin McDonald and other staff members model leadership by sharing their own experiences with residents and by providing the backbone to a community of hard work and personal change. Residents participate by providing peer counseling and community support to one another and by serving as role models once they graduate and transition into the larger community.
The photographs in this exhibit were taken by independent documentary photographer Cedric N. Chatterley. The exhibit was curated by Barbara Lau, community programs director at the Center for Documentary Studies. Each One Teach One is part of an ethnographic research project on leadership at TROSA conducted by Lau and Chatterley, with support from the Center for Documentary Studies, TROSA, and the NYU/Wagner Research and Documentary Component of Leadership for a Changing World, an initiative of the Ford Foundation in partnership with the Advocacy Institute and the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at New York University.