Meet Our Students
At the Ormond Center, we are blessed to work with extremely talented student interns and fellows who are passionate about addressing barriers to thriving. Read below to meet them!
TJ Bryant
Hometown: Marianna, Georgia
Degree Program: Master of Divinity
Graduation Year: Spring 2023
TJ started interning with the Ormond Center during the first summer of his graduate studies and he stayed throughout the rest of his seminary education. He shares that, as he grew as a thinker and began to understand his faith more, he saw that the Ormond Center was doing beautiful, hard work that aligned with his educational background and interests.
A strength of the Ormond Center is in relationship building centered around listening and mutuality in a way that reimagines what it looks like to contribute to the common good. I think the Ormond Center is a great gift to the church and a great gift to the world in mobilizing people. The sky’s the limit - there’s no ceiling to that work.
During his time as an Ormond intern, TJ was closely involved with Pathways Towards Impact in a variety of capacities. He spent almost an entire school year supporting community research and resource building, and then he went on to play an instrumental role in developing a strategic plan that would reposition Pathways Towards Impact in new and innovative ways. TJ also supported the inception of the Shine Tutorial in rural North Carolina, a Pathways Towards Impact project that officially launched in March of 2023 (learn more here).
Pathways Towards Impact embodies the work that the church needs to do. Churches are really suffering from the brokenness of this world, black and brown communities in particular. The work of the church is going to have to be something that looks like the faithfulness displayed in Pathways Towards Impact. Coming alongside and thinking critically and being an agent of shalom in the community through the church will be critical.
TJ was also a key supporter of Community Craft Collaborative, a program of the Ormond Center’s Academy of Teaching, Training, and Learning. He shares that working closely with churches through Community Craft was formative to his faith and leadership. TJ wrote and taught a devotional curriculum for the Collaborative, centered on core tenants of the faith such as lament, truth, and resurrection hope. He shares that he has seen congregants engage critically with these teachings in a way that leads to discipleship.
Community Craft calls people out to be faithful disciples to address opportunities with ministerial imagination that enables deeper and longer lasting forms of shalom that would not be available by other means. I tend to think the real gift of the Ormond Center is getting people to do that in a sustained, organized way.
TJ expresses gratitude for the mentorship he received during his time as an Ormond Center intern. He cites Dr. Coley and Rev. Howze as two leaders, mentors, and advocates who poured into him and provided opportunities to grow that he is thankful for. TJ cites working alongside leaders such as these for helping to make him a better Christian and a better thinker.
TJ will begin Duke Divinity School’s Doctor of Theology program in Fall of 2023. He seeks to continue pursuing scholarship in service to the church, particularly the black church and black Methodism. TJ states that he hopes to be a faithful servant who teaches in both the academy and the church, open to whatever God calls him to next. He shares that he is grateful for the work he has been part of during his time at the Ormond Center.
The Ormond Center has been a blessing to me and I’m sure it will continue to be a blessing to the world. I think it is the work of the Holy Spirit who goes before us and organizes things for our flourishing.
Stephanie Cassell
Hometown: Mint Hill, North Carolina
Degree Program: Master of Divinity with Certifications in Christian Education, Baptist Studies, and Preaching
Graduation Year: Spring 2023
Stephanie began interning with the Ormond Center during her final semester at Duke Divinity School, playing an instrumental role in the implementation of Shine Tutorial, a literacy project in rural North Carolina.
Stephanie developed a social and emotional learning (SEL) curriculum to teach to elementary aged students during the tutorial’s Beta Test, which spanned across three weeks in the spring of 2023. During those weeks, Stephanie witnessed students grow in their desire and ability to express gratitude through the SEL curriculum. At the end of each session, students had the opportunity to state something they were grateful for. She shares that more and more students felt confident sharing their gratitude as the tutorial went on. Students had the option not to participate, but by the end of the program, the majority of students wanted to share.
Through the tutorial, Stephanie also connected and communicated with the churches and community partners who helped support the work. She shares that, “Since the Ormond Center made space for imagination and innovation, I also developed a curriculum for churches to utilize that speaks to the importance of childhood advocacy in churches and how our faith supports the care and wellbeing of children.” Stephanie stated that the curriculum has not yet been taught, but she has shared it with churches in the hopes that it will one day be used.
Stephanie believes that Shine Tutorial has great potential for further social impact creation and she is excited to see the ways that the program might develop and grow. Overall, Stephanie feels that her work with the Ormond Center helped foster the imagination of churches and community members. After graduation, she will join her family in Charlotte, North Carolina to discern where God is calling her next in the areas of youth development and youth faith formation.
At the Ormond Center, I grew in my thinking around the possibilities in becoming part of the lives of young people, and I grew in my imagination of what could even be possible in working with young people. I will carry and uphold the values of partnership and imagination into the next stage of my career.
Allie Hargrove
Hometown: Greenville, South Carolina
Degree Program: Dual Master of Divinity (Duke Divinity School) and Master of Social Work (University of North Carolina Chapel Hill)
Graduation Year: Spring 2024
Allie came to Duke Divinity School wanting to better understand how the church can contribute to community development, particularly in the housing realm. She shares that the Ormond Center was asking questions that interested her and led to her wanting to serve as a student intern.
During her time as an Ormond intern, Allie has collaborated on a variety of projects including the Traditioned Innovation Project, the Enterprise Solutions to Poverty Field Guide, and the Church & Community Placemaking Lab. Allie shares that her work in helping to implement these projects and programs has helped her better understand the value of ingenuity and personal relationships. She believes that, when working with church congregations who are attempting to help their community, one must speak both theologically and sociologically about what a thriving community may look like. Allie credits the Ormond Center with giving her a toolset to navigate those conversations with conviction and ease.
The Ormond Center is resilient, adaptable, and nimble to change, and I have been lucky to participate in a variety of diverse projects. The staff at the Ormond Center have sincerely invested in me, not only as an intern but as fellow learner and person. They take my ideas seriously, and I always feel like a valued member of the team. For that, I am grateful!
Allie plans to continue interning with the Ormond Center over the summer as she prepares for her final year in the dual MDiv/MSW program at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill She shares that she looks forward to continuing to build creative coalitions and partnerships across The Ormond Center and other Duke offices.
Chris West
Hometown: Garner, North Carolina
Degree Program: Master of Divinity with Certifications in Faith-Based Organizing, Advocacy, & Social Transformation, Missional Innovation, Baptist Studies, and Theology, Medicine, & Culture
Graduation Year: Spring 2023
During his time as an Ormond Center intern, Chris helped implement a variety of programs, projects, and processes. In particular, he supported the researching and writing of grants for small and midsized nonprofit ventures, helped with the strategic planning process for Pathways Towards Impact, consulted on three early-stage Pathways Towards Impact programs, helped facilitate conversations through the Community Craft Collaborative and Placemaking Lab programs, and worked with Dr. Coley to draft the theory of change for the Ormond Center.
I have learned so much about nonprofit leadership and the unique power of congregations to transform communities. The Ormond Center is full of talented, faithful, thoughtful, entrepreneurial leaders that take relationship, spiritual formation, and community health seriously. Simply being part of this Center and spending time with the staff has given me so much joy and hope.
One of the Pathways Towards Impact projects that Chris was instrumental in supporting was the Shine Tutorial project in rural North Carolina (learn more here). Chris states, “It was incredible getting to see this program come to fruition from the earliest planning stages. In just a few short weeks during the Beta Test phase, we saw a major impact on several of the kids involved and on the students from both Duke and Campbell. The kids learned several new emotional vocabulary words and developed some new math, reading, and test taking skills that could have a major impact. The university students got to live out their callings and see the gaps in their own education/experience through intentional reflection with the program staff. This program is going to make an incredible difference in the lives of the least of these.” Additionally, Chris hopes to continue serving in a leadership role with Shine Tutorial post-graduation. He seeks to continue seeing God at work in the lives of children, students, teachers, and volunteers from faith communities.
Another Pathways Towards Impact project Chris helped to support was the Healthy ME: Mental Health for Millennials program. Developed by Duke Divinity School graduate Rev. Cedrick Barrett, Healthy ME offers consistent wellness practices that center believers in the midst of life’s challenges. Chris shares that, although the project is still in its early stages, it has already made an impact on mental and holistic health amongst the millennial population in Wilmington, NC. Chris represented the Ormond Center at the launch event in January 2023 and was excited to hear the positive feedback from participants.
During his final semester of seminary, Chris engaged in a directive study experience under the supervision of Dr. Coley. He shares that the course helped him think through his hope of future research on faith-based entrepreneurship and served as a capstone experience with the Ormond Center. Through the experience, he was able to help with Ormond’s Community Craft Collaborative program and spend time internally reading about innovation, scaling, and adaptive leadership.
I really benefited from having conversations that connected faithful entrepreneurship and Christian witness, which have led me to further understand how we can see God in our work. These conversations and readings have also helped me develop an appreciation for reflection on how our faith is shaped in careers and callings not typically associated with one's faith, like management or entrepreneurship. God is at work in spaces and people we often look past. If we open our whole lives to God, at home and at work, publicly and privately, we can have faith that God will show up in surprising, mysterious, and transformational ways.