Leslie Covington joined The Carying Place as Executive Director in 2015. Leslie obtained her Social Work degree at North Carolina State University and further developed a love for outreach through her local church. Inspired with empowering at-risk and low income families, she continued her experience through her service as a Youth Director, Director of Outreach and Senior Youth Director for the YMCA of the Triangle. Leslie soon felt the need “to go deeper” with serving families and returned to NCSU for her Master of Social Work degree where she focused on mental health, clinical social work and substance abuse counseling. At this time in her life, Leslie strives to use her passion as well as her non-profit and mental health experience to lead and inspire others to achieve financial stability. When speaking of her appointment to the Carying Place, Leslie shared “I’m inspired by the legacy of such a great organization. We are breaking the cycle of poverty that plagues many families in the capital area – there is no better life mission than that!”. Leslie can be reached at Leslie.Covington@thecaryplace.org or 919-462-1800.
Cecile Williams has been the Program Manager at The Carying Place since 2015. Cecile has always had a passion for helping others realize their full potential. Her objective is to provide guidance to those who are down on their luck and have lost hope to set and achieve attainable goals. It is her belief that healthy families yield healthy communities. Cecile received a Bachelor of Arts Degree from Winston-Salem State University and a Masters of Public Administration from North Carolina Central University. Cecile has worked in the social services field in both government and non-profit sector and enjoys working with families as they transition to self-sufficiency. A proud Raleigh native, Cecile is a member of the Wake County Human Services committee and a member of the City of Raleigh Substance Abuse Advisory Board. Cecile can be reached at cwilliams@thecaryingplace.org or 919-462-1800.
Debalina Chatterjee is The Carying Place’s Children’s Program Coordinator. Debalina holds a PhD in Biomedical Engineering from the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) and 9 years of life science research experience between academia and industry. For the past year and a half, she has been a regular children’s program volunteer for The Carying Place’s Thursday night program, especially working with teenagers. During this time, she began to develop a passion for working with youth and underprivileged populations in our community. These new interests lead her to reconsider her engineering career path and seek out an internship opportunity with The Children’s Coordinator here at The Carying Place. She thoroughly enjoyed the experience; by planning and participating in each activity tailored for the children, she continued to use the opportunity to inspire and encourage them by sharing her own stories of struggles and hardships and how she overcame them, and most importantly made each child feel cared for and loved. As the Children’s Program Coordinator, Debalina continues to pursue her goal of learning more about the systems in society that have contributed to the needs of youth and at risk populations in our community, and be more involved in mitigating those challenges.
Sameena Rashid joined The Carying Place in 2007, after a very fulfilling career as a “Stay-at-home” mom for 10 years. She has lived in Cary since 1999. She is married to a software engineer and has 2 children – a daughter and a son. “Working at The Carying Place has been an eye-opener for me. I never realized how many homeless families needed help. Helping families get back on their feet is very rewarding for me and this job utilizes all my skills. As a part of The Carying Place Team, I do whatever needs to be done!“