Mr. James Rodriguez, M.S.W, Ph. D. Candidate, CEO/President of Fathers & Families Coalition of America, Inc., a premiere professional development and membership non-profit providing services throughout Arizona since 1994 and nationally since 1999. James spearheads day-to-day operations in the support of national capacity building services for health & human services providers for fragile families. He has organized and coordinated multiple simultaneous programs and projects to maximize efficiency and support the community expanding operations to include 13 affiliates and a membership base of over 290 colleagues nationally.
Under his direction FFCA has collaborated to serve at-risk young fathers, welfare to work participants, at-risk youth, incarcerated parents, re-entry programs, best practice program development and other special programs statewide and nationally. Programs developed by Mr. Rodriguez, has accounted for more than 23 million dollars of new grant funds to implement direct services for at-risk youth, low-income individuals, community development and capacity building grants and research projects.
As faculty at Mesa Community College Mr. Rodriguez developed twenty human development courses and served as the Arizona Director for Cornell University's Family Worker Development Credential. As a senior research specialist for Arizona State University's Hispanic Family Research Project, Mr. Rodriguez worked with several hundred teen gang members to promote positive lifestyle changes through group therapy services and scope of services for this longitudinal study.
Additionally, Mr. Rodriguez served as a member for: National Alliance for Hispanic Families founding Member, Washington, DC; Executive Board Member of 100 Black Men of Phoenix; Executive Council Member of the National Parent Educator Network; Executive Member of the Family & Corrections Network Board of Directors, Virginia; Member of the Rehoboth Community Development Corporation Board of Directors, Arizona; Member of the First Institutional Baptist Church FIBCO, Inc. Board of Directors, Arizona; Board of Director Member Maricopa County Human Services Department Head Start Division, Arizona ;Contributing Editor BSI International, In Search of Fatherhood a Forum for and About Fathers, Philadelphia; and Executive Board member of First New Life, Phoenix.
Mr. Rodriguez was a Federal Evaluator for U.S. D.H.H.S as a Head Start and Early Head Start Federal Reviewer and Mentor for new Mental Health and Family evaluators. Mr. Rodriguez served as a Federal Evaluator for USDHHS/Office of Refugee Resettlement for Somalia and Sudanese refugee communities..
Rodriguez retired with honors from the United States Air Force in 2003 after serving over twenty years in the armed forces (US Army, US Air Force and US Air Force Reserves) combined. James received his Masters in Social Work from Arizona State University and is currently on sabbatical as a doctoral student. He is blessed with four children and a daughter in-law. As a single father he raised his son James Antonio 22 and Amber Inez 20 and later blessed with his daughers Alexa and Jazmín. On December 12, 2009 his son married Cassandra Marie and now the family has expanded...
