NLDP has launched a brand-new website! Our website, designed by the firm Jetpack Group located in the St. Clair Superior neighborhood of Cleveland, highlights the three core pillars of our programming: our 16-session curriculum, our graduates and graduate support programs, and program coaching. It also establishes our branding that is consistent with where we have come from and where we are going as a leadership program designed for Cleveland's neighborhood leaders.

Visit our brand-new website to learn more about our program and our graduates, who are featured on every page, and to apply or share the application for Cohort XVI!

Both NLDP and CDCLP have begun their recruitment for their next two cohorts. The Neighborhood Leadership Development Program (NLDP) is recruiting for its sixteenth cohort while the Community Development Corporation Leadership Program (CDCLP) is recruiting for its third cohort. NLDP continues to build grassroots and community leaders who are committed to creating change in Cleveland's neighborhoods while CDCLP focuses on developing the leadership of leaders at Community Development Corporations in Cleveland.

NLDP seeks to uniquely develop the diverse leadership abilities of engaged Clevelanders who are committed to creating a city and region which works for everyone. The program has three core pillars: leadership development, program coaching and graduate support. CDCLP engages high-level CDC directors, board officers and other CDC leaders to help improve their leadership skills and their professional capacity to make a greater impact on the neighborhoods they serve through education, coaching and experiential activities that involve critical issues facing CDCs and neighborhoods.

NLDP and CDCLP are actively recruiting community leaders to invest in their leadership journeys. Sessions for both NLDP and CDCLP will commence in late summer 2023 and will be held at Trinity Commons. The NLDP application period is open until Thursday, August 10th at 5pm and the CDCLP application period is open until Thursday, August 3rd at 5pm.

Are you interested in applying or do you know someone who should participate in NLDP or CDCLP? View our program curriculum and share the NLDP Cohort XVI application and the CDCLP Cohort III application!

There is never a dull moment at NLDP sessions. One sunny morning in our session room at Trinity Commons, two participants from Cohort XV realized that they had the same hobby: riding motorcycles. Sarah Murphy and Lurleen McNair, active participants in our fifteenth cohort, each have ridden motorcycles for years but did not know each other until NLDP Cohort XV commenced.

Our participants come to NLDP as their whole-selves, ready to increase their leadership skills and willing to learn. They have different backgrounds, upbringings, passions in life and experiences in the world, but they all share one common thing – they want to improve Cleveland's neighborhoods. We have found over the many years that beyond this one thing they have in common, the cohort participants form a bond with each other unlike any other. Not only do they realize other things they share in common, like riding motorcycles, but they form life-long friendships and bonds that end up supporting them through the highs and lows of community leadership.

Visit our new website to learn more about NLDP, our graduates and how you can have the opportunity to form friendships like this one!

Dameyonna Willis, NLDP Cohort XII Graduate, has recently published a new children's book titled Where's My Crown?. The book was written for young queens to understand the importance of self-love and having confidence. Her goal is to expose young ladies to future possibilities while still supporting and guiding young queens through the daily challenges of being a young lady.

Dameyonna was born and raised in Cleveland and is the founder and CEO of Queen IAM. The mission of Queen IAM is to “Empower, Enrich, and Educate young ladies everywhere.” It was created to promote and encourage self-love, self-respect and self-understanding in young queens, so they will know their value their self-worth and grow into strong, confident, and beautiful women. The program offers mentorship, workshops, events, and service-learning projects designed to inspire individual growth, and its four core values are Respect, Pride, Strength, and Beauty.

To learn more and purchase the book on Amazon, click here. You can also like them on Facebook or follow them on Twitter to support Dameyonna's work in the community.

NLDP's Graduate Support Grant Program exists to assist and support NLDP graduates by providing financial support for their leadership efforts as they promote and execute their neighborhood projects while also providing an opportunity for NLDP graduates to learn the skills of grant seeking and grant administration, including grant writing, grant implementation, and grant reporting.

NLDP focuses on funding the direct services work that graduates lead in Cleveland's neighborhoods, allowing them to purchase items for programming and to stretch their impact. So far, NLDP has granted more than $240,000 to graduates, reaching 72% of Cleveland's neighborhoods.

All NLDP graduates who are operating projects in one or more Cleveland neighborhoods, either on a grassroots level or through a 501c3 nonprofit, are eligible to apply for the NLDP Graduate Support Grant.

Congratulations to the NLDP graduates who received Graduate Support Grants this year! Learn more about our Graduate Support Grant Program here.

Goods Bank NEO, founded in 2022, is a community resource center dedicated to providing nominally priced new goods to nonprofit organizations to stretch their impact. The Goods Bank exists to help you meet your mission by saving you money.

Goods Bank works with nonprofit organizations in Cleveland to help them secure the goods they need, for the people they serve, at a reasonable cost. Membership is open to nonprofits, schools and faith-based organizations. Organizations must be a qualified 501(c)(3) that has been in existence for at least two years. Annual membership is $100. Learn more and apply here.

In April, NLDP gathered graduates at Goods Bank NEO to learn more about the organization, how it can help their work in Cleveland's neighborhoods, and to network with each other at our first in-person graduate event in over three years! Thank you to Goods Bank NEO for hosting our graduates!

NLDP GRADUATES: Learn more about how to receive a discounted membership fee at Goods Bank for your first year through NLDP by contacting your Graduate Support Manager, Marcia Shepherd, at mshepherd@nldpcleveland.com or 216-875-6521.

NLDP and CDCLP rely on the assistance of local newspapers and neighborhood observers to spread the word about our recruitment efforts. It is our goal with recruitment to reach as many leaders as we can, both in terms of grassroots, neighborhood leaders for NLDP and Community Development Corporation leaders for CDCLP. We are extremely thankful for the assistance of local community papers and observers to help us spread the word about our programs, we truly could not do it without them!

Pick up and share one of the papers below when you see us featured this summer for NLDP and CDCLP recruitment!

NLDP will also be running ads in some of the Observers listed above as well as in other community papers, be on the lookout and help us spread the word!

To better market the videos on our YouTube page, we have been featuring one video each month in our Newsletters. This month's video features CDCLP, specifically Cohort I and their experiences participating in CDCLP, which will soon enter its third cohort year. Watch here!