Meet Jim Hollandsworth of The Path Project

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jim Hollandsworth.

Jim, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
In 2008, my wife Melinda and I met one family living in a mobile home community about 3 miles from our house called Gwinnett Estates. These new friends were first-generation Mexican immigrants and they introduced us to a neighborhood where very few children were graduating from high school, and many were headed down a destructive path. At that time, I was an Executive Pastor at a local church and Melinda had been a 2nd grade and special education teacher. One afternoon while visiting this family the oldest daughter Maria asked us we’d help her and her siblings with homework because their parents didn’t speak English. So we started a weekly homework help program.

The program grew each week as other kids in the neighborhood started to come for homework help. After a few months of doing this, we began meeting at the property manager’s office with about 40 kids each week. In November 2009 there was a shooting that occurred in the neighborhood. The following week the property manager gave us the trailer and with help from folks from our church and dads from Gwinnett Estates, we turned this crime scene into a community center!

We began doing homework twice a week and got to know more families each week. We began to learn about some of the challenges facing the kids in this community. The biggest challenge we saw was that the majority of the teenagers in Gwinnett Estates were not graduating from high school. We decided to see how we could help with this problem!

We put a little more structure to our programs and eventually hired a full-time teacher to run our programs. We expanded to every afternoon in 2011 and started to see some really good success. One afternoon a 6th-grade girl named Sophia asked us, “So, when are you guys going to leave? Churches always come in here but they always leave.” So that night Melinda and I made a decision – we were going to stay and not leave!

in 2012 we formally launched the Path Project as a 501c3 non-profit organization and in 2013 I left my job at my church and started working full-time as Executive Director of the Path Project. We have since grown from serving kids in one mobile home park to serving kids and families in 8 mobile home parks in Atlanta and Nashville, TN.

Has it been a smooth road?
No, it has definitely not been a smooth road. There have been many ups and downs.

Some of our biggest struggles have been:
1. Building trust with families in new communities – it takes time for people to recognize that we exist to help their kids graduate high school and we’re not there with some other agenda!
2. Overcoming dropout culture – in the communities where we serve it’s normal for kids to drop out of school. It’s hard to change this culture!
3. Tragedy – in July 2017 we experienced a horrible tragedy at Gwinnett – the mom of one of our families murdered her husband and 4 of her 5 kids. It was the most tragic thing we’ve ever experienced and was devastating to the community.
4. Lack of community support and funding – we had to close our programs in Covington due to a lack of community support and funding.

So, as you know, we’re impressed with The Path Project – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
The Path Projects exists to guide at-risk students on their path to high school graduation and God’s plan for their future. We do this by operating community centers inside mobile home parks. We partner with local churches, schools, and businesses to help kids succeed academically!

We are most proud of seeing kids in our programs become the first members of their family to graduate high school and go to college!!

We believe what sets us apart from other nonprofits doing community and education programs is our hands-on approach to working right alongside parents and schools together to help kids stay on track academically!

Let’s touch on your thoughts about our city – what do you like the most and least?
What I love the most about Atlanta is the people! Nicest people in the world! I was born and raised in Snellville and have seen a lot of growth in my 38 years but the people here are still the friendliest in the world!

The thing I like least is the traffic in the suburbs! I wish I could walk to work!

Contact Info:

• Website: pathproject.org
• Phone: 678-439-9316
• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: instagram.com/thepathproject
• Facebook: facebook.com/thepathproject
• Twitter: twitter.com/thepathproject

Getting in touch: VoyageATL is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.