Dina Carole
Most of us think of radio as a very public medium, but host Dina Carole of Frederick’s Key 103.1 radio station has a different perspective. Her favorite thing about radio, she says, is the intimacy it offers and how it enables her to speak to people “one-on-one.” “When I’m doing my morning show,” she says, “I’m always aware that it’s just me and that one person in the car, driving to work.” This is particularly exciting for her because it allows her to frame her programming around sowing into people’s lives. “Every day I’m asking myself—what can I say to make someone’s day better?”
Her Key 103 morning show, which she’s been hosting since 2020, is built to provide encouragement and positive fuel for days and lives Dina knows can be stressful. “A Cup of Joy,” for instance, is a segment of the show sharing uplifting news about people making a difference in the community. Another favorite segment, “Dear Dina,” serves as a radio advice column in which she can provide empathetic support so people “know they’re not alone.” Before every early morning show starts, she takes time to pray and ground herself so that she’s in the best frame of mind possible: “I ask to be able to bless my listeners each day.”
Her commitment to serving others has even led to a creative repackaging of personal time: she’s turned date nights with her husband, Troy, into “Decorating Date Night,” where they will give a room in someone else’s home the HGTV treatment (for free!). It’s picked up steam and the concept now has its own website (DecoratingDateNight.com). Creativity and authenticity are the key ingredients Dina uses to make others’ lives better. She finds her deepest fulfillment in spreading hope and joy.
Personal Quote: “Kind words are a creative force, a power that concurs in the building up of all that is good, and energy that showers blessings upon the world.” (Lawrence G. Lovasik)
Désirée Tucker
Désirée Tucker, Executive Director of Frederick nonprofit Women Solve, has found a perfect example of the ripple effect in the organization’s program Seed to Roots. Started four years ago, she brought students together to broadcast a small holiday concert for a group of grandparents. This February, the program brought 107 students together across Frederick County for a major event at the Weinberg Center—featuring music, art and dance celebrating Black history. Ticket sales go to fund arts scholarships awarded by Women Solve; this year, the Chief of Staff from Governor Wes Moore’s Office of Community Initiatives was present to award every participant a certificate of achievement. To top it off, Frederick Mayor Michael O’Connor awarded Women Solve a grant to take all the students on a New York City trip to Broadway. Not bad for four short years of effort to bring diversity initiatives into local schools.
Women Solve was founded in 2021, based on Désirée’s observation of just that: “Women coming together to solve a single issue can make major progress.” After she moved to Frederick in 2017, she quickly got involved in community activism. She noticed that meetings tended to bounce from issue to issue without dedicating significant time to drill down into each one. Women Solve brings together groups of women who can make a major difference in specific areas. For example, the nonprofit’s program Get Fit Frederick is aimed at cultivating health and fitness as a lifestyle, and Y.E.T. (Your Every Tomorrow) is a public relations campaign to discourage vaping and smoking among youth.
The most rewarding part of Women Solve, Désirée says, is empowering so many women to create change. “Women sometimes think there’s a special qualification needed to step up and get involved. I had no previous nonprofit experience—I’ve just taken the next step, and the next, to get to where we are today.”
Personal Quote: “It’s the little things citizens do. That’s what will make the difference.” (Wangari Maathai)
Jasmine Sneed
Jasmine Sneed has been blessed to see the ripple effect of her previous work really coming to fruition as the Frederick Rescue Mission’s Director of Partnership Development. “I had never wanted to be a development director,” she says, laughing. “But then I realized that cultivating relationships is what development is actually about.”
Jasmine had done exactly that for years before coming to the Rescue Mission. She served as a consultant event and strategic planner for numerous nonprofit organizations and small businesses and got to know just about everyone in town along the way. Over the past few years, both COVID and her mother’s passing shook up her life and schedule, and after readjustment, she knew she was ready for something new.
In the Rescue Mission, she found an organization that truly resonated with her desire to serve others, and her Christian faith. Jasmine relates that most people she meets have at least heard of the Rescue Mission, but don’t know the full breadth of what it does. The cafeteria, for instance, serves breakfast and lunch to those in need 365 days a year. The Mission distributes groceries and clothing, as well—in addition to its longstanding role providing residential programs addressing substance abuse for men and homelessness for women and children.
She has long seen herself as a professional dot-connector, so to speak, and finds grace in the fact that the network she’s created is being used to serve those most in need. Jasmine’s gift for forming connections has brought the faith, nonprofit and business communities together around sharing hope and love.
Personal Quote: “Preach the Gospel at all times. If necessary, use words.” (St. Francis of Assisi)
Rose Chaney
Rose Chaney has a long and varied history of community involvement, but it’s possible her greatest ripple effect will stem from a project yet to be released: AARCH Society’s African American Heritage Center. As the current major activity of AARCH Society, this museum under construction will one day house both permanent and rotating collections bringing to life the history of Frederick County’s African Americans. The facility, at the corner of South Carroll and East All Saints Streets, will also include multimedia exhibitions and a room for genealogy and research. Finally, the story of this community within our wider community will have a place of pride for years to come.
Rose was a founding member of AARCH along with the late Alderman William O. Lee, Jr., whom she says developed the vision for AARCH and began the collection of museum artifacts. It’s taken a few years to carefully build the collection and generate funding, but Rose looks forward to the museum’s opening in 2025. The space is being renovated, AARCH has engaged an architect, and a collections development firm to frame and produce the exhibits. It’s amazing to consider what future generations will have access to as a result of this effort.
Rose, a retired art teacher, has served elsewhere in Frederick on the boards of I Believe in Me and the Religious Coalition. A lifelong member of Asbury United Methodist Church, another major focus has always been helping the homeless. She also keeps busy with Alpha Kappa Alpha (a service sorority), the Frederick chapter of the Negro Business & Professional Women’s Club and the Frederick Art Club. She may have left teaching in 2004, but her legacy in the community was only just beginning.
Personal Quote: “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‘What are you doing for others?’” (Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.)
Debbie Streeton
Debbie Streeton has a special capacity that not everyone can claim: she is a true ambivert. Most people—extroverts or introverts—feel worn out with too much socializing or alone time, but Debbie makes use of both to feel refreshed. Privately, she maintains a gratitude practice and prioritizes personal development, and this has only increased the joy she’s been able to derive from connecting with others. “It has always come naturally for me to be around people. I love getting to know them and hearing their stories,” she says.
Frederick is lucky, then, that Debbie has found a position so well suited to her gifts and goals: Member Services Manager at the Frederick County Chamber of Commerce. She provides a welcoming and enthusiastic presence at an organization that is all about helping business owners connect. Debbie says that her role at the Chamber has only continued to open her eyes to how vibrant and giving a community Frederick can be, and she takes special pride in helping local businesses develop networks and gain resources. She loves the engagement she’s able to take part in through organizing the Chamber’s many events.
Some of her favorite successes so far have been facilitating the National Civics Bee with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, building on the Frederick County Public Safety Awards and rebooting the Chamber’s popular Golf Scramble event, which connected 144 members in 2023. Her efforts with the Chamber team following COVID have helped bring the organization’s member tally from 755 to 930 today.
Her Chamber connections, she says, have led her to other avenues for local service, such as the Carroll Creek Rotary, Frederick Health, WISH—Women Inspiring, Supporting, Helping and Mission of Mercy (among others). Overall, it’s the “genuine” people she’s met every day who continue to bring meaning to her purposeful life.
Personal Quote: “Courage and self-compassion allow us to embrace vulnerability, which leads to joy and meaningful connections with others.” (Brené Brown)
Carleah Summers
Carleah Summers is no stranger to the negative ripple effect that can occur when people’s lives are ravaged by addiction. She proudly relates that March 28th marked 18 years of her own sobriety. Since getting clean, she has dedicated her life to helping other women heal from this disease and start on the path to wholeness—her own journey has made her painfully aware that there are “a million ways to tear a family apart.”
However, at Andrea’s House, the women’s residential treatment facility she founded, Carleah has sought to create a space where residents “recover as a family.” Currently housing seven women and their children, it’s a place where at-risk women are enveloped with support. The facility attends to addiction treatment, mental health, spirituality, parenting, legal counseling and job placement. Andrea’s House was named for Carleah’s late aunt, who supported her through her healing process. The facility is a testament to the fact that we live and thrive in community with others to cheer us on.
Carleah is keen to emphasize the fact that many Andrea’s House residents face one of the most painful things a woman can face: having to extricate her children from the foster care system after confiscation by CPS. Carleah was determined that her recovery facility would be a place where families are truly put back together, and she says that the most important and rewarding victories she celebrates are when a woman’s children are able to come home. Aside from the formal support structures, Carleah feels that the recovery community she’s been able to cultivate is the most life-affirming feature of all. The positive relationships the women gain, she says, long outlast their move to independence, and provide incentive for progress for years to come.
Personal Quote: “To whom much is given, much will be required.” (Luke 12:48)
Theresa Williams-Harrison
Theresa Williams-Harrison has found a path to impact through versatility, and by sharing from her own personal strengths. She understands that sometimes the simplest acts can have the most far-reaching effects, even throughout a life of appreciable success. Her specialty is encouragement, both personal and professional: “If there’s a need,” she says, “I’m going to see how I can help.”
She’s a small business and youth mentor through both The Bow Collective, a women’s business organization, and Delta Sigma Theta, a public service sorority in Frederick County. Aside from that, she’s built Just A Kind Note, a nonprofit aimed at lessening the growing effects of loneliness. Engaging with volunteers, Just A Kind Note allows people to handwrite kind letters to the elderly, police officers, hospital patients and others in need of love. Theresa recalls hearing of a time when the message in one of their delivered notes stopped a man from relapsing into drug addiction.
Her own victory over breast cancer, after a three-year battle, has inspired another venture to make a difference. In being open about her diagnosis and treatment, she attracted the attention of others fighting cancer, and now she says she receives a few “support referrals” every week. Theresa doesn’t view herself as a counselor in these cases, but as a listener. “People want to be able to talk to someone who knows what they’re going through,” she says. She feels blessed to be able to speak to them from a position of courage and hope.
Theresa herself is the founder and senior managing partner of GEORGE STREET Services, Inc. a tech company specializing in digital transformation and digital services, DevSecOps, IT and cyber security solutions. Finally, she looks forward to walking in 2024’s Paris Fashion Week—a model to boot, Theresa proves a life well lived shouldn’t be put in a box.
Personal Quote: “Grab the hands extended to you to build your solid foundation and extend your hands to do the same.” (Anonymous)
