By: John Hancock, President and CEO, Junior Achievement of Georgia

After the most trying year and a half in recent history, we’ve all taken a look at what matters most to us. For some, that has meant spending more time with loved ones. For others, it may have meant changing careers to something they are more passionate about.

For us at Junior Achievement (JA) of Georgia, and for many of our community partners like Chick-fil-A, it reinforced the importance of caring for people and continuing to strengthen our community partnerships. Everything we do at JA of Georgia is a joint partnership between our organization, school systems and local business partners.

Over the past 18 months, we have seen exceptional commitment and engagement from many of our partners. During a time when our education system experienced more challenges than ever, our partners rallied in support of the young people we serve to make the most of difficult circumstances. Delivering on our mission meant providing extra care to all who are impacted by our programs, even if that meant execution of that delivery looked different.

In recent months and throughout more than a decade, JA of Georgia has benefitted from the model of care demonstrated through our outstanding partnership with Atlanta-based company Chick-fil-A, Inc. Chick-fil-A was the catalyst that helped establish our first JA Discovery Center nearly a decade ago, and the company’s engagement, guidance and commitment since then has further fueled much of our impact and growth.

Rodney Bullard, the vice president of corporate social responsibility for Chick-fil-A, Inc., recently shared with me:

“At Chick-fil-A, we are committed to positively influencing the communities we serve. Our long-standing partnership with Junior Achievement reflects our appreciation for the remarkable work of this organization throughout the country, and we’re inspired by the potential collective impact we can have as together we continue to prepare young people to succeed in the future.”

Words of support and encouragement like this from valued partners like Chick-fil-A continually energize us to go above and beyond in our work. A perfect example is when life as we knew it came to a halt in early 2020, and we knew we had to provide new resources to our educators and students. We understood they were navigating an unprecedented learning environment, and we did anything but sit on the sidelines. We approached our work with a renewed sense of commitment and care, providing high-quality connections and experiences during a time when people needed them more than ever before. We converted our flagship programs to allow students to experience them virtually. Chick-fil-A associates participated online with our middle school and high school students by delivering financial literacy lessons, implementing business case challenges and offering small group career coaching sessions.

Throughout the rest of 2020, we maintained momentum towards our long-term strategic initiatives. In February 2021, we broke ground on the JA Colonial Group Discovery Center in Savannah, set to open in early 2022. Shortly thereafter in March, we opened the JA Discovery Center of Greater Dalton. In both cases, Chick-fil-A and a cohort of local Chick-fil-A Restaurant Operators played a large role in bringing our vision to life.  

We also opened three more 3DE by Junior Achievement high schools in the past year, bringing our total portfolio to 13 schools in Georgia and 28 schools nationally. Our goal with the 3DE instructional model is to make the high school experience more relevant, experiential and authentically connected to the real world. One of Chick-fil-A’s core values is to pursue what’s next, and they have been a major partner and investor in the creation of this innovative model, and our ability to continue to expand to more locations. In fact, the company was involved in all facets of this ongoing momentum with these primary strategic initiatives – funding, thought leadership, employee engagement and volunteerism.

Chick-fil-A’s involvement in and support of JA of Georgia epitomizes the very best of corporate philanthropy. The company’s comprehensive approach to caring for communities through public service creates significant impact in communities across the country and the world, and JA of Georgia is just one beneficiary of that commitment.

As we reflect on the past year and a half, we are thankful for all we’ve learned and the support we’ve been able to provide our communities. We are immensely grateful for our partners, who are committed to helping us provide high-quality connections that create positive and future-oriented mindsets in our students.

Truly, we are only able to do this work as a result of these partnerships with educators and companies like Chick-fil-A, who continually motivate us to do more. We look forward to what’s to come as we continue to expand our reach and impact our communities in meaningful ways together.