Describe what you do for a living.
The Roseland Volunteers youth football program is a youth football organization that serves children in the Roseland community ages 6 through 14. Right now we have about one hundred kids in the program and those are football players as well as cheerleaders.
Where is your block located? How did your block contribute to your development as a person and as a professional?
I’m a father of three. They’ve been playing youth football and I’ve been volunteering during that for the last seven or eight years and I go to a church that is right adjacent to the park, Chains of Broken Ministries. I drive past this park quite a bit, and I just realized that it was never anything going on within this park. So, with that being said, once my sons graduated out of the youth football and went into high school, I felt that would be a good time to bring a positive youth program right within this community here.
Describe the moment where you came into your own as a professional.
The moment I feel like I came into my own as a coach with this program was Feb. 1, 2013,, it was the start of Black History Month which is something that is very important to me, and that’s actually when we got everything off of the ground and started the program and put it into action.
Why are you proud of being from Chicago and how did Chicago help to mold you as a person and as a professional?
I’m from the south side of Chicago and I grew up on 47th and Vincennes. I saw a lot of negativity going on, but I was able to see my parents as well as some of my neighbors were going to work and taking some of the kids out the neighborhood. We had a real tight-knit community. If somebody didn’t have food, then some of the neighbors would provide it for them. Just being around that kind of thing gave me the visual to know that we all can work together and when we do work together positive things can come from it.
Describe your first memory of McDonald’s. If possible, describe a McDonald’s moment in your life that is significant to you?
The first time I ate at McDonald’s that I can recall, I may have been about five years old and I got a good grade on a report card and my dad used to ride a motorcycle. So I remember us getting on the motorcycle and riding to the McDonald’s and getting an ice cream cone and that’s the first memory that I can vividly say that I recall from McDonald’s.
The McDonald’s moment that I am thinking of right now is actually one that is closely related to our football program. We generally go out on the weekends and we pass out literature and things like that with the kids and usually once we get done with that in the afternoon we take the kids out to McDonald’s and kind of have a fellowship-lunch outing with the boys and that always seems to provide some really good memories for us.
Check out more photos of Coach Lance and the Roseland Volunteers youth football program.
