PIVOT FAMILY
The Pivot Family Foundation is a private foundation started in 2018. The vision for the foundation was born from a friendship between Jay Sharpe and Dontonio Wingfield who wanted to help with the overall development of the community. Mr. Wingfield had committed over fourteen years to working with the youth of this community through the Albany Hawks program. Mr. Wingfield merged the Hawks program with the newly created Pivot Family Foundation and together with Mr. Sharpe has worked on inspiring, equipping, and connecting with others in this community.
-What do we want to accomplish through Pivot?
To help foster the overall development of individuals, families, communities, and societies.
-How do we plan on accomplishing this?
Through the process of connecting those with the same mission of development, helping to equip individuals within our community, and inspiring through raising awareness of others doing great things within the community.
-Media
When the pandemic affected our community, the Pivot Family Foundation focused our attention on creating media content that would connect, inspire, and equip our community while people were not able to congregate. Through our efforts, we were able to highlight businesses, nonprofits, and people who were doing great things in Albany, Georgia. Our developmental videos were used in schools in SouthWest Georgia, presentations during Albany City Commission meetings, and other civic organizations in our region. The Pivot Family Foundation was able to help launch 1334 Media which is now its own 501c3.
The Albany Hawks
The Albany Hawks came under the umbrella of the Pivot Family Foundation after the founder of the Hawks, Dontonio Wingfield, helped create the vision for the foundation. Under Mr. Wingfield, the Hawks program has served this community for over 14 years. The focus of the Albany Hawks is mentoring youth from the ages of 9-14 years of age through the medium of basketball. The program has been impactful to boys and girls at a critical time of development by helping them to develop social skills and work ethics. This is done in hopes of them becoming productive members of society. Many in the program have gone off to attend college and the military with some in the program going on to become teachers and coaches themselves.
One facet of the Hawks program is feeding the kids attending in the afternoons. Mr. Wingfield thinks this is a critical component of the program in the fact that it ensures that the kid has at least one meal at the end of the day. At the program’s peak, over 100 meals were served in a two weeks period. Another important aspect is facilitating field trips that help kids to compete against other kids outside of their immediate surroundings. The goal of these field trips is to broaden the horizons of the youth in the program.
Here is a story from Jay Sharpe!