Our Sister's Keeper MN

Is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, serving the Twin Cities dedicated to empowering BIPOC young ladies, women, and their families. We are equally dedicated to improving the overall health and wellness of "community" through preventative and restorative programming, raising awareness, empowering families, and connecting them to opportunities that develop practical life skills, financial literacy, and self-esteem in underserved communities impacted by social injustices and inequalities.

OSKMN has established community partnerships that highlight the positive influence OSKMN has within the communities we serve. We have built trust through community advocacy and are considered a trusted community messenger, making community intervention and collaboration a priority. Partnerships with Ramsey County Sheriff, Saint Paul Salvation Army, Saint Paul Parks and Recreation, and the continued partnerships with the Department of Health, the City of Brooklyn Center, Brooklyn Center Area Schools, Brooklyn Center's Emerging BC Co-hort, Hennepin County, and Hennepin County Victims’ Advocates

OSKMN is very committed and civically engaged as a community collaborator; we mediate for the communities we serve throughout the Twin Cities. Promoting community cohesion and addressing poverty-induced disparities through on-going community collaboratives: Community Resource Events (CRE), Healthy Families, Healthy Community Collaborative (HFHC), and The Community Mentorship Program.

Our Mission

Our mission is to prioritize the needs and perspectives of BIPOC women and their families and address the systemic factors that contribute to marginalization and harm by promoting restorative healing practices in the community.

Vision

To facilitate the empowerment and advancement of women and women of color to equip and prepare them to advance in positions of management, upper management and entrepreneurship that is often hindered by gender and racial inequality.
OSKMN will offer solutions and resources that will support a thriving ecosystem, build a stronger community of women and their families that navigate through racial, social and economic and gender inequalities

Purpose

Empowering women by providing and offering opportunities that will encourage and develop practical life skills, self-improvement and self-esteem that are critical to the empowerment and advancement of women and women of color in underserved communities impacted by gender and racial inequalities that affect productive and healthy lifestyles for women and their families

Our Goal

To be a connector of resources; establish a pathway to sustainability through hands on advanced learning, entrepreneurship training, self-improvement programs, and internships. Our programs will be self-sustaining, consistent and achieved through our community led empowerment programming.
Bring communities of women together to address issues and provide solutions for the poverty, mental health, food insecurities and family issues that are present on a daily basis.

Executive Director

Mz. Leigh

I am Mz. Leigh, co-founder and executive director of OSKMN. I grew up on the Northside of Minneapolis, attended North Community High School, and have experienced firsthand the systemic barriers that affect our BIPOC young ladies, women, their families, and their communities. I am the mother of six amazing children, all of whom have graduated from high school and college or are currently finishing up their college degrees. It was important for me as a parent to be able to help my children navigate the systemic barriers that, still to this day, can hold our children back or make it difficult for them to level up. It was a small price to pay to keep my kids extremely busy with books and sports, and I realize that it is not that easy for families to do so. I developed and ran a girls youth sports program for over 10 years, along with my children's father, so that our young ladies could have access to the things they needed to be successful, while navigating the systemic barriers that ordinarily wouldn't be a burden if they did not live in the communities they lived in or were not limited on resources to participate. That program then was founded on the same principles as OSKMN now: "To whom much is given, much is required." It is our responsibility to empower our young ladies, women, and their families with the tools necessary to be successful.

OSKMN has become known in the communities that we serve for our hard work and dedication to community building. We are blessed to partner with communities throughout the Twin Cities and other organizations that collectively aspire to create C.H.A.N.G.E. (Community, Healing, Advance, Nurture, Growth, Empower), to be able to create space in the communities that need it the most. I count it a blessing and an honor to serve BIPOC women, their families and the communities that we serve.