Community Leadership and Building Community Pride are cornerstones of the work of Gaston Together.
- The Community Leadership Awards event (CLA) impacts both of these goals by showcasing outstanding community leadership in Gaston County and celebrating leadership as a source of community pride.The Community Leadership Awards is an annual event designed to recognize/celebrate effective, unique leadership by an organization in Gaston County. The "Circle of Caring," a sculpture of concentric circles symbolizing continuing community spirit, is presented to the winner. The event highlights community leadership as well as leadership development and showcases positive attributes and successes in Gaston County.
- Our leaders of tomorrow, third grade students, are also honored during the presentation with the announcement of the "Proudest Kid in Gaston County" Essay Contest winner. The essay contest is the companion program to the “Pride in Gaston Traveling Tour” which the third grade students enjoy in the fall. The tour exposes students to fourteen sites/locations in Gaston County that are sources of community pride,
- Overall, these programs are inspiring for organizations and individuals alike emphasizing productive leadership in our county and providing students with good citizenship examples for future growth.
Civic Engagement Leadership was developed in response to a two-fold community request:
1) to address leadership growth for Gaston County and
2) to attract and retain younger adults in our county.
From this request, Gaston Together created the Civic Engagement Leadership (CEL) process. We completed three years of research, discovery and development to identify gaps in satisfying these requests and to avoid duplication of efforts. CEL’s goal is to establish a pool of potential future leaders for Gaston County through a process of:
- Cross-Sector Community Building
- Increased knowledge of Gaston County (What makes us like we are?)
- Personal Skills Development/ In-Depth Personal Awareness
The purpose of the Gaston Together Healthcare Commission(GTHC) to develop a workable community-wide agenda to improve the health status of the citizens of Gaston County. This work is accomplished through a network of organizations and people involved in health care access, funding, distribution of resources and allocation of those resources.
There are currently two Policy & Advocacy work teams:
- The Gaston Controlled Substances Coalition (Mental Health and Substance Abuse)
- The Health in All Policies work team focusing on incorporating a health lens on all decision-making
The Healthy Gaston initiative, a process to create a culture of wellness for businesses, schools and churches. Organizations follow a set of guidelines/criteria to attain Bronze, Silver and Gold levels of achievement.
The Gaston Clergy & Citizens Coalition (GC3)is a county-wide, non-denominational ministerial association formed in the late 1990’s by Gaston Together. They are a group of grassroots ministers reaching out to make positive change in Gaston County. GC3 members meet monthly to address community issues and work on positive relationship building.
- Mission: To embrace opportunities by building bridges of Faith, Family, Education and Empowerment
- Vision: To be in Partnership with God and Each Other to build stronger communities in Gaston County.
Their current focus areas include:
- GC3 - Law Enforcement Covenant
- Gaston Together MLK Unity Awards
- Breakfast of Champions at middle schools.
The GC3 meets on the second Thursday of each month at 9:00am at First United Methodist Family Life Center in Gastonia.Meetings are currently being conducted in a virtual format due to the Coronavirus guidelines.
