TEEM spirit
Nonprofit gives clients fashion makeovers that symbolize their new lives.
Susan Brown walked down the runway with confidence, showing off an ensemble from The Black Scintilla as if she were a high-fashion supermodel.
The clothing she wore — a stylish pink trench coat and chic skinny jeans — represented more than fashion trends.
Just six months ago, Brown sat in jail after committing a drug-related offense. The garments she modeled at the “Transformation Fashion Event and Luncheon” helped symbolize the new life she has embraced with the aid of The Education and Employment Ministry known as TEEM.
Brown and others with similar testimonies were the stars at TEEM’s recent fundraising event at the Oklahoma City Golf & Country Club. The highlight of the Nov. 28 benefit was the fashion show featuring the TEEM models who showed off clothing from local boutiques like The Black Scintilla, Mode, Blue Seven, Rosegold and The Library, a clothing rental startup. Before donning their new outfits, the excited models received makeovers from local stylists from The Eden Salon & Spas.
Megan Scott, TEEM’s development director, said the fashion show was an opportunity to focus on all of the successes of individuals who overcame a litany of challenges to re-enter society after incarceration. TEEM works to help individuals coming out of incarceration and poverty by providing them with educational opportunities, legal assistance, job placement, personal development and work readiness training.
“I think it shows the beauty of our participants better than anything I can ever do or say because everybody deserves the opportunity to shine,” she told the luncheon crowd.
TEEM board member Terri Cornett, who served as the event’s mistress of ceremonies, gave a brief description of the models’ lives before they became involved with TEEM.
“That was then, this is now,” she said before encouraging Brown, Chip Grimmett, Antone Williams and seven other individuals to each take their turn on the runway.
Jimmy Little, celebrating two years of sobriety, walked the runway, flashing a shy smile.
Grimmett, 59, wore a plaid flannel shirt, black Levis and a gold puffer vest from Blue Seven. He said was serving the last of his prison sentence at a transitional correctional center when TEEM leaders helped him get a job.
He said he lost his home, cars and business after he was imprisoned on drug-related offenses, but “TEEM’s been kind of an extended family for me.”
Williams, 30, said becoming involved with TEEM has helped
How to help
For more about The Education and Employment Ministry known as TEEM or to make a donation, call 2355671 or go to www.teem.org.
In recognition
Tom and Judy Love and the Love family recently received TEEM’s inaugural Leaders in Transformation Award in recognition of their work to transform lives through TEEM and other organizations in the Oklahoma City metro area. him reach his goal to become stable. He said by working with the nonprofit in the months before he was released from prison, he was able to find a job as a machine operator for a building manufacturer.
“It was life-changing to know someone is out there in my corner, someone who believes in second chances,” he said.
Brown, 32, said she had anticipated the fashion show for weeks and loved the attention from the volunteer stylists and makeup artists. She said drug addiction landed her in jail, but through TEEM, she now has two jobs and is better able to care for her children.
“TEEM is such a blessing, and that in turn allows me to be a blessing to other people,” she said.
Transforming lives
TEEM Executive Director Kris Steele further emphasized the luncheon’s theme of transformation and hope in his remarks those gathered.
Steele said TEEM has been pleased to see that Oklahomans and society in general have recognized that many people need a second chance to transform their lives for the better.
“There was a time when society believed that people who engaged in antisocial behavior were somehow bad people. Then, the predominant thought was that punishment, excessive punishment, ultimately was the answer. At that time, we thought that people who went to prison deserved to be there. We were reluctant to provide second chances and welcome returning adults back into our community. We tended to define an individual by their worst moment, by a mistake, rather than the sum of their existence,” Steele said.
“That was then, but now we know that justice-involved individuals are capable of moving beyond a troubled past to become productive members of the community. We know a person is not defined by prison . ... We know that every person in our state has value and that there is no such thing as a spare Oklahoman.”