Alumni Service Award: Neldine Edwards

Neldine Edwards is executive director of We Can Make a Difference, a non-profit organization through which she delivers parenting and life skills training programs. She established this organization after retiring from Riverwood Community Mental Health Center where she worked for 28 years.

She is a certified instructor in two “best practices” parenting programs and has trained over 1,000 parents and 500 service providers. She is one of just four national instructors of program facilitators in one of these programs.

Neldine graduated from Lake Michigan College in 1973 with an Associate in Arts degree. She also holds a Bachelor in Social Work degree from Nazareth College and is a graduate of LMC’s Community Leadership Academy.

Neldine is involved in a long list of community activities and has been honored for work with the Martin Luther King Jr. Humanitarian Award, the Innovative Initiatives Award from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the Outstanding Service in Race Relations Award from the Race Relations Council of Southwest Michigan.

Neldine Edwards received an Alumni Service Award in 2006.