Angela McCauley

I was raised well. I grew up in a two-parent household, and both of my parents worked hard. They always instilled in us the importance of education and doing the right thing. I always feel like I could be the poster child for integrity, because I have a very high level of integrity. I say to people every day, 'I was raised well,' because when somebody thanks me, I respond, 'Oh, I was raised well.' You have to be raised well in order for you to then expand and enhance your abilities, it creates the blueprint for you as a person and a professional. I'm also a rule follower and this has taken me a long way. The foundation my parents gave me has allowed me to continue serving and leading others throughout my entire career.

When I was working on my associate's degree, I met a seasoned social worker who was working for NCIA, a youth second chance school. She advised me to make sure that I selected a college that was more diverse, had a wide variety of all different cultures, for my undergrad. That's what made me select UMBC, and it's been a huge benefit for me in my career and my path that I chose for graduate school. I just think it's provided a great opportunity with the different people I've met throughout time, and the networking piece of it has been invaluable.

Stay focused on serving the people. Don't choose careers for the salaries - nobody's making a million dollars serving people. Stick to the focus of serving people, and ensure that you always work in a team capacity, no matter what your role is. I've been fortunate to be at the mid-level manager level and now up to the executive level for probably the last 15 years, but I operate like I'm entry-level, meaning that my mindset is we're here to serve and help people. Even though my position allows me to make decisions, my focus is what can I do to make this person's life better. So just stay focused on who you're serving, and never forget about why you got into this field in the first place. That's what has kept me going and I've been the same way all these years.

The biggest challenge is always not enough funding to continue really critical community-based programs. Even at the government level, there's not enough funding to make sure we have enough people to serve each capacity. Once people return to the community, or even youth that are in the community, the wraparound services that are best fit to serve folks - there's not enough programs. When I left HEBCAC due to funding, I mean, we had fiscal sponsorship with Hopkins for 30 years, and that ended, along with all the other funding. It was a tragedy for that to happen, and I'm still sad about that. It's very unfortunate because folks lose out on services and they're not getting the support that they need. In Baltimore, there are a lot of food deserts - you could go 20 blocks and there's not a supermarket. I still kind of feel the same way about community-based programs - it's not enough services, so you can go many, many, many blocks and not have enough community-based programming to help the folks in the community.

Integrity is at the top of my list - I always feel like I could be the poster child for integrity because I have a very high level of it. Being able to trust the folks around me is also critical. I value being able to work in a caring, healthy environment, both at work and at home. And helping others is fundamental to who I am - if someone needs help, I believe in lending out a hand to somebody if they need a helping hand. These values guide everything I do, both professionally and personally.