Jacqueline M. Carrera remembers the college ethics class discussion that sparked her professional passion and ultimately redirected her career path.
Carrera, a finance major at Loyola College, debated the community?s responsibility to address social issues like homelessness and poverty. She couldn?t believe her classmates who said the community shouldn?t be burdened with solving local problems.
“At the time, that really angered me,” Carrera said. “It was very clear to me that there are social issues that are community issues as well.”
Almost 20 years after that ethics class, Carrera, 39, president and chief executive officer of Parks & People Foundation in Baltimore, still works from that belief, striving every day to improve the quality of life for Baltimore residents.
Since 1993, Carrera has led Parks & People, a nonprofit organization that runs educational and recreational programs for children and works to create and maintain green spaces in Baltimore.
When Carrera took over Parks & People, established in 1984, the foundation had no full-time employees and a budget of about $400,000. Today, Parks & People has 38 full-time employees, with more than 200 working part-time in the summer, and a $4 million budget, Carrera said.
“Her focus remains on making Baltimore a better place to grow and live,” said Monica Logan, director of youth programs for Parks & People. “We identify different needs in the community and really help to make Baltimore a better place, and that?s exciting.”
Instead of taking a job on Wall Street after college, Carrera “explored the nonprofit world,” running a soup kitchen in Colorado and then becoming a community organizer for Maryland Save Our Streams before joining Parks & People. She says she has plenty of work still to do, developing business models to generate additional income for the organization and overseeing the restoration of a nine-acre section of Baltimore?s Druid Hill Park.
The passion ignited in Carrera in her college ethics class keeps her moving forward, said Guy Hager, director of great parks, clean streams and green communities for Parks & People.
“She?s got great enthusiasm,” Hager said, “and she maintains positive working relationships with everyone, which isn?t easy in this world.”
