April is Volunteer Appreciation Month and FYI would like to highlight the 16 years of service Max and Barb Roadtruck have completed with FYI’s ministries.
They both joined the board in 2005 and while Barb stepped down from her role on the board in 2020, you can find both pitching in whenever they can at FYI events.
Our gratitude for them, and for all our volunteers, runs deep.
“I appreciate their commitment to the organization and the success of the mission,” said FYI Executive Director Nikki Stefanow. “The board has made a lot of changes in how it works recently and Max has stepped up and changed with them, when it would have been easy to say that he was done and ‘Let someone else do it.’ And that goes back to their dedication to the mission.
“They want to be a part of this. They’ve involved their family in the mission and they’ve given a lot of their time to FYI,” she continued. “They have been a steadying force at FYI. They both have sweet, dear hearts. And they are awesome prayer warriors.”
Their impact started in 2005 right after our nonprofit changed its name from The Women’s Network to Family and Youth Initiatives.
“Pat (Banaszak, co-founder and former executive director) had a notion that the organization needed a board of directors and she asked Barb and I to join,” Max said. “I knew Pat from church and we had helped FYI out with flowers for the Mother’s Day event.”
Max brought experienced management skills with him, being a Program Manager for the U.S. Air Force at Wright-Patterson AFB for 20 years. He also served in the Air Force in Turkey and Saudi Arabia as a logistics plans officer. He and Barb are both long-time members at Mary Help of Christians Catholic Church in Fairborn, where Max serves as a deacon.
The Roadtrucks truly believe in FYI’s mission.
“Empowering families, helping them be families, is important to us,” he said. “They are under attack internally because some parents don’t know how to be parents. Some don’t realize that they are actually in charge. The authority is not there.”
The Roadrucks feel called to helping with that and other family challenges.
“I’ve always been very impressed with the function of what we do,” Max said. “At Family and Youth Initiatives, we work with family and kids. We support and train the moms. We’ve made a lot of progress helping the dads become more involved with family life.
Max called the opening of the Parenting Netwpork’s Baby Stores and starting the Real Life Teen Choices program “huge.” He has also been impressed by the stronger unity that has been established during this past transition year for the ministry.
“It’s always significant that the director’s talk to each other about what they do for FYI,” he said. “In the past, there were different programs that didn’t necessarily connect. We have a cohesiveness now that was hard to attain in the past.”
All of this has both excited about FYI’s future.
“It’s very bright,” Max said. “We have a very strong board and we are now looking downstream more. And we have concrete plans for the future. Our opportunities for grants, and for private funding, are increasing. That will allow us to help more families and kids.”
If you would like to join our team of volunteers, give us a call at 937-845-0403 or visit us at www.fyiohio.org. To learn more about FYI, visit our website, or follow us on social media at either www.facebook.com/FYIohio.org or www.instagram.com/fyi_ohio.
