This Week's Guest:


Air Date: December 7, 2023
Cooperative Development

Christina Jennings, Christina Clamp. Michael Peck & Kevin O-Brien Share Products and Services for the Mind & Community

Share:

Christina Jennings, Christina Clamp. Michael Peck & Kevin O’Brien Share Products & Services for the Mind from Everything Co-op’s 2023 Co-op Holiday List.

Everything Co-op continues its Inaugural 2023 Holiday List, a thoughtfully curated list of products and services from the cooperative community. In this 2nd installment Vernon introduces listeners to three of his picks for your “Mind” and “Community”. Christina Jennings, Executive Director of Shared Capital, Christina Clamp, Director of the Center for Co-operatives and Economic Development, Michael Peck, executive director and co-founder of 1worker1vote, and Kevin O’Brien, General Manager of Worx Printing, will share their products and services featured in the 2023 Holiday list.

Christina Jennings is the Executive Director of Shared Capital Cooperative, a national CDFI loan fund that provides financing to support the growth and development of cooperatively owned businesses and affordable housing. Christina has more than 25 years of experience in community development finance in the US and internationally. The focus of her work has been on economic justice and creating equitable access to capital. She joined Shared Capital in 2008 where she provides strategic leadership, oversees lending, and leads capitalization efforts. She has also launched and managed small businesses and social ventures.

Christina Clamp is the Director of the Center for Co-operatives and Economic Development, and has over 40 years of teaching experience at Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU), as a professor of Sociology. She is also a consulting researcher on a national study of catalyzing community wealth with the American Sustainable Business Network.

Christina has been actively involved in promoting the study of cooperatives since her dissertation, which was a study of management in the Mondragon cooperatives. She has served as a consultant to various clients including National Cooperative Bank and US Department of Agriculture Rural Development. Her board work includes board chair of LEAF, a CDFI; the ICA Group and the Fund for Jobs Worth Owning.

Michael Peck serves as executive director and cofounder of 1worker1vote. Emerging from the October 2009 collaboration MOU between the United Steelworkers and Mondragon International, 1worker1vote serves as fiscal sponsor for the 2022-2023 Build Mutualism Campaign. Peck is also co-founder and managing director of a second for-profit start-up, The Virtuous Cycle Collaboratory, a majority-minority worker cooperative and social enterprise (mission: to “flatten unequal socioeconomic curves into shared prosperity virtuous cycles”).

Kevin O’Brien is the founder and general manager of the worker-owned union cooperative Worx Printing in Worcester, MA (USW 2936). Worx is a third generation evolution of the Union Co-Op Model codified in 1worker1vote by the United Steelworkers and the Mondragon Cooperative. For 28 years, he has been dedicated to cooperating with others to advance anti-sweatshop movement policies and practices in the apparel industry. His experiences have helped thousands of Labor Unions, Nonprofits and Political Campaigns to lift awareness, advance campaigns and programs, and improve fundraising results using ethically manufactured branded merchandise.

Our host, Vernon Oakes, is a consummate advocate for cooperatives. He is a Past President of the National Association of Housing Cooperatives, and he’s served on several boards and committees to advance the interests of cooperatives. Recently, he served on the Limited Equity Cooperative Task Force, established by Anita Bonds, At-Large Member of the Council of the District of Columbia. Vernon is an MBA graduate of Stanford University, who has used his business acumen to benefit the community, by promoting the added value of the cooperative business model. 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *