ORLANDO, Fla. – This week’s Getting Results Award goes to Shaniqua (Shan) Rose. Rose can best be described as a community organizer, advocate and founder of the nonprofit Change For The Community.
Recently, Rose was helping organize vaccination sites in West Orlando but she is a part of so many more projects in the Central Florida area.
“I guess you can call me the glue,” Rose said from the gymnasium at the YMCA on Hastings Street in Orlando. “Putting things together and making sure they happen and take place.”
The pop-up vaccination site. organized in partnership with Senator Randolph Bracy (Dist. 11), was part of a month-long series of locations targeting the west side of Orlando. Rose says they will be able to vaccinate more than 3000 residents.
Rose says she enjoys helping people by finding the organizations or government agencies who can meet the need.
Rose said. “It’s knowing that there are opportunities out there for everything you can think of and being able to connect those dots.”
Rose says she learned how to connect those dots while working for the City of Orlando in the Economic Development Department and Permitting Office.
“Research is the key,” she said. “Let me research how someone else has solved that problem and let’s see if this can work here.”
Rose says her passion is for West Orlando and specifically the Parramore neighborhood where she moved in 2018.
“We just want to make sure that those who have need, have the ability to receive it,” Rose said about her work.
In 2019 Rose started the nonprofit, Change For The Community, where she mentors kids, organizes neighborhood clean-ups and offers homeless outreach among other projects.
Rose is also the local NAACP secretary, program manager at the Central Florida Urban League and she sits on the Parramore Community Engagement Council.
Rose laughed when asked about her busy schedule.
“Lets go down the list!” she said.
Rose was nominated for the News 6 Getting Results Award by friend and coworker, Eric Brown, who calls her the new face of leadership in Orlando.
“I sent the email because I wanted Shan to be recognized for all the work she does in the community,” Brown said. “With everything she does, she does most of it behind the scenes. My thing is, it’s time for her to be shown.”
Rose said she has many more projects in the works, hinting that they may add more spotlight to her efforts.
“I just want to see positive change,” Rose said when asked what drives her. “How can we collaborate as a community to make it a better place to live, work and play.”