GoodHeart | Jason Brown keeps the flame of youth advocacy burning bright
Published:Monday | February 17, 2025 | 9:34 AMAinsworth Morris/Staff Reporter
At the start of the week, when Jason Brown took his seat as alternate care services manager at the Child Protection and Family Services Agency, his main focus was the new platform he now has to better serve the nation’s youths.
Brown, a well-known mentor to the youths at SOS Children’s Village Jamaica, where he served as village director for the past four years, is eager to use his new role at the government’s leading agency for children in state care to make a broader impact. He plans to propose changes and improvements to ensure that all state homes are safer and more comfortable for the children they serve.
“It’s all aimed at their development, their deportment, having them ready to take on life when the time comes, and just to have them, physically, mentally, and holistically equipped to be great at life and to be successful in their endeavours,” Brown told GoodHeart.
When asked which age group he feels he has reached at the age of 30, Brown said he has connected with everyone from toddlers to adults.
“I have served in different capacities in the church and in the community, professionally. In my local community, I had the privilege of being the Sunday school superintendent, and now the Sunday school advisor, where I will have programmes aimed at children and young adults in the church, and also the community [through] Vacation Bible School, school family-oriented seminars, singles seminars, school based activities, back-to-school [and] Christmas treats ... all of those social initiatives,” Brown, who is a member of the Bethel United Church of Jesus Christ in Stony Hill, said.
During his tenure as village director at SOS Children’s Village in Stony Hill, the home ranked in the top percentile of children’s homes in Jamaica, thanks to his efforts in transforming the lives of young men and women. Under his leadership, wards moved on to study medicine and graduated with honours.
Years ago, as a trained teacher with a passion for the government’s STEM programmes, Brown served as an information technology and general science teacher at Jamaica College. Between 2017 and 2020, while still under the age of 25, he was appointed head of robotics and first form supervisor.
He led the Jamaica College team to make history in 2023 by winning the Motivate Award at the First Official Tech Robotics Challenge in Houston, Texas, out of 191 competing teams.
“I started JC in 2015 [and] in 2016 I was asked to give an eye, just to see what’s about the robotics team, given my background in it based on life studies. And upon doing that, I was made the faculty advisor, where I had the privilege of managing the team that will entail guiding them along the guidelines of competing online, having the robot parts procured and ready for them to build, doing networking to raise funds for the different chapters of the competition, dealing with their travel arrangements and hotel arrangements, transport arrangements, when overseas, travelling with them, pretty much being their guardian, [and] their parents,” Brown said.
“I did that from 2016 up until I lifted my hands to hand over in 2023,” he added.
During the pandemic, to reach youth online, he teamed up with radio broadcast host Chevauni Blair to host a Friday night Instagram live series called ‘Unboxed’. The series served as a virtual Christian youth class for young people confined at home during curfew hours.
Although not a dad as yet, the recently married man is elated that he has been a father figure to many youth whom he has interacted with at SOS Children’s Village, his church and Jamaica College. In back tracking during the interview, Brown said youth outreach has always been a passion of his, ever since he was a youth, and the fire in him continues.
“I feel as if it’s a natural progression. I would have always enjoyed working with youth/children/youth development/nation building, so in this seat, I have a space where I can be a part of the conversation [on a national level] that will make life better for children who are deemed wards of the state,” Brown said.
He added, “They’re often overlooked. They’re often misrepresented by society. And I believe that you are not a result of your circumstances. These children would not have had a say in what’s happened to them or why they came into care, but that does not mean that they don’t deserve quality of life or what life has to offer. So to be a part of the process that facilitates them living a wholesome life that can shape their future and lead to their becoming future nation-builders, it’s an honour, and it’s something I look forward to being a part of, specifically for 2025.”