Sean McCrindle on helping kids stay on the path

In this transformative episode of "Inspiring Good," hosts Marshall King and Kevin Deary unravel the touching history and virtues of the Bashor Children's Home, an enduring beacon of hope for the children of Elkhart County. This incredible organization, founded by John and Emaline Bashor, has been transforming lives for nearly a century, standing firm throughout the decades as a haven for needy children. Explore the remarkable metamorphosis of the once orphanage-turned-comprehensive treatment center and the deep-rooted values it carries within its heart-warming legacy.

As our conversation progresses, listen as President and CEO Sean McCrindle passionately shares the narrative of growth, innovation, and steadfast commitment to serving as many children as possible under the Bashor Children's Home. Discover the sublime beauty and tranquility of the unyielding embodiment of hope that this campus signifies. Learn about Shawn McCrindle's succession from mentor Don Phillips and how this continuity of leadership has helped preserve and create even stronger connections to communities for Bashor.

00:00:24: Introduction to guest Sean McCrindle

00:04:54: Why did Sean choose Bashor for his career?

00:08:14: The legacy of Don Phillips, the former CEO of Bashor

00:10:12: Expansion and breakdown of Bashor's services

00:14:18: Impact of Bashor on Kevin's family

00:15:37: Bashor's influence and role in the community

00:16:52: Program highlights; Teen Court

00:19:20: Success story of a benefited kid from Bashor's services

00:20:31: Host's personal narrative about Shawn's father and son

00:20:55: Discussion about family and bagpipes

00:22:49: Children's educational paths and future career prospects

00:23:14: Vision for the organization in the next ten years

00:24:27: Stories related to Bashor and people involved with this organization

00:25:22: Introduction to volunteer Jay and his contribution to Bashor

00:27:17: What brings hope amidst challenges

00:28:32: Show closing and acknowledgments

This show is a production of the Community Foundation of Elkhart County. It is powered by equipment from Sweetwater and recorded in the Viaggio Studio at weIMPACT in Elkhart's River District. Editing is done by the award-winning communication students at Goshen College, home of one of the best college radio stations in the nation. Listen to Globe Radio at 91.1 FM. Learn more about the Community Foundation of Elkhart County at inspiringgood.org You can follow us on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn. Music is provided by Sensational Sounds. Thanks for listening. We hope you are inspired and inspire good and your community.

Transcript

0:24

Today, our guest is Shawn McCrindle, president and CEO of Bashor Children's Home. He oversees an agency that began serving kids in Elkhart County in 1923. Shawn joined Bashor in 1996 and has been in this role since 2021. Shawn is skilled at helping kids and understanding how to lead a staff, doing that with excellence. He's a native of Goshen and has degrees from Manchester University and, and Indiana University South Bend. He is also a husband and father of two children. Welcome, Sean and Kevin. Take it away. All right. Good morning, Shawn. How are you, my friend? I'm great. How are you doing? Good to see you. I am doing fine. As you know, I'm a huge fan of Basha children's home for lots of reasons. One, just the service they do for not only our area, but outside Goshen, outside Elkhart county, throughout the state. Outside of the state. Bashor has grown over the years, and I have a personal tie to Bashor as well as you know. So tell us a little bit about John and Emmeline Bashor, who started the Bashor Deaconess Orphanage. Yeah, it's a great story and a great beginning and really an indicator of who we are now, even, and who we will be. But John and Emmeline were a married couple who couldn't have their own children and had a real heart for kids, a real love for God's commandment to serve others. And they had a farm. And, you know, in my mind, the story goes like this because I'm very visual, is one night they're sitting at the table at dinner and talking to each other and said, you know, we have this place. We have no one that it's going to go to. And we have a responsibility to help kids. And so in those days, there were orphanages, and so they decided that they were going to set up and leave their farm as an orphanage to help children. And the thing that's amazing to me about that is, you know, as they were doing that, they had no idea that a few years later, the Great Depression was going to happen. They just launched out into faith with love, and that's still where we're at today. And that accounts for the ties to the Methodist church? Yes. Yes. They were both united Methodist attendees and had a strong belief in the wesleyan tradition. Tell us a little more about your partnership collaboration with the Methodist church. And do they own the property or do you own the property or how does that work? Yeah. So we're deeply connected to the United Methodist Church, and when it started as an orphanage, it was basically paid for and overseen by the church and owned by the church. As years went by and as we became more of a treatment center, the church has always continued to be a huge support of our agency. But the agency itself is not owned by the church. We're a private nonprofit. It is set up, though, that if there was some reason that Bashor had to dissolve, it would go back to the United Methodist church, but they would need to use it to help children. What I really appreciate about your campus is it is as beautiful today as I imagine it was in 1923 when it opened its doors. You've been able to keep the character, the flow of the fields. You have some woods and forests. I've just been completely amazed at how you've been able to grow the organization and yet blend in the buildings into the campus. And if anybody's never been to Bashor, I would highly recommend asking Sean for a tour of the facilities and the programs. Because as beautiful as the land is, it's the incredible spirit of the staff and the volunteers and the board of directors that really bring bachelor to life and really transform lives. So it's one of our most prized nonprofits in Elker county. And I would even argue one of the most important ones for transformational change. I'd argue that, too, but I'm very biased, Kevin, a little biased. You know, I always tell our kids, too, you may not want to stay here today, but when you're my age, you pay a couple hundred bucks a night to stay on a campus like ours. That is so true. It's beautiful. You have fishing and ponds and paths. That's a good point. But speaking of you, since he brought you up. So tell us about why did you choose Bashor to make your career? Well, it would be nice if I could tell you I had this laid out plan when I was 21 years old to start at Bashor and stay there for a long time and become the CEO. But actually, I got done with my undergraduate and realized I didn't want to go on to graduate school right away because I wanted to decide what part of helping people I wanted to be in. I was originally looking at psychology, and I had an internship at a place somewhat like Bashor and realized I just really liked mad, angry kids. And so I went to Bashor and had an interview, was told, or, you know, I told the guy that was interviewing me, I'm only going to be here a year because at that time, I was moving out of Goshen. It's too small. I need to go somewhere else. And here we are 28 years later, and the guy that I said I'd only be there a year for with, he had three retirement parties and retired at 50 years. So I don't know if I'm going to beat him, but I'm definitely a lifer. So your mentor, one of your many mentors, but one of the mentors that I think very highly of is Don Phillips, retired about, I don't know, about three. Right. Three years ago. And one of my closest friends is we were working together in the goshen area for the good children and families. Big loss. But you have stepped in from the COO role right into the CEO role. Can you talk a little bit about that mentoring and what it meant to you? And then also what the difference was between being a COO and a CEO. Yeah. So Don's always hard to talk about without using sarcasm because it was kind of the love language he enjoyed. Um, but, you know, I'll tell you, when I. When I was at Bashor and I started as a second shift staff there, and so I was directly in front of the kids when. When I was there, initially, I was worried about the place. I'll be honest with you. I think there were some things that. That we needed to do a lot better. Um, and it was still a great agency, great heart. But as Don came in, so I was actually there before Don became the CEO. And as Don came in, I quickly saw a focus on where we were going to go. Not necessarily all the steps to get there, but that everything we were going to do was whatever kids needed and that we needed to work with other agencies to make sure that we were maximizing what we could do for kids. And so our agency exploded, basically. And the services we started to provide, and over the years and over the time that he was there, not only there's two things that happened is our services grew a lot. Three things, really. Services grew a lot. Our connections to other agencies and our community grew a lot. And then the biggest thing is the deep culture we have today was really in the beginnings of being developed heavily. And that culture is we have a responsibility to help as many kids as we can, as long as we can, and work with anybody who helped facilitate that effort. And that culture continues today with you. Yes. Yes. Yeah. I think one of the greatest testaments to leadership is when you step away and the organization can continue to roll and keep the same values and keep the same culture. And that's really a gift that Don has left to bash the children's home as his legacy, not to mention the thousands of children have come through the programs and the staff that he has touched and the staff that he has grown, is just immeasurable because you can just see it paying it forward. Yeah. He was a leader developer for sure. Absolutely. And the other thing is, too, is our board. We have an amazing board. Again, I'm biased. I tell everybody I'm biased, but it doesn't mean I'm wrong. Have an amazing board. And just yesterday in our, our board meetings, we had this really good conversation about how we make sure we stay on our plumb line, that, you know, what things do we have in place to make sure we maintain our culture, our focus, and our drive and our connections to make sure that what we're doing today will improve what's going on in our community tomorrow. You are definitely sounding like Don Phillips more and more every day. Not as loud as him, no. But honestly, your own passion just oozes out of you. It's the same as Don's. Communication styles may be a little different, although I can pick up the sarcasm from a mile away. Another thing about Don is last week we had a staff appreciation week and it culminated Friday in a staff appreciation dinner. And who was in our kitchen washing pots and pans as a volunteer? It was don't. He's just an incredible servant. Yep. Yeah. So I want to talk a little bit about programs and services at Bashor. Bashor has really expanded its programs. It started out as an orphanage, which I'm sure had a school and educational piece, but maybe you can break us. Can you break the campus down into the service areas? Yeah. So, you know, I always, when I'm talking with our new board members, I use a pressure gauge is kind of a visual for them. And so if you think of a pressure gauge on the, on the red end, it's, it's the most risky, most intense. And so if I start there with Bashor, we have several residential care services. So those kids are with us 24 hours a day, seven days a week. And those are our most intensive ends of care. And we have a locked, secure facility, which is not a detention. The kids aren't locked in their rooms, but those are kids who could be a danger to themselves or a danger to the community. And so they have to be in a facility where they can't just run away. Cause they would very readily. And in those programs, we serve guys with very intensive behavioral needs and we serve girls. And then one of our secure facilities, and a lot of people don't understand this is our survivors of human trafficking. And people don't understand why would you have a secure program for those girls? And the reality is, when you understand the life that they've been in, most of the time, they don't trust anybody. And the first thing they want to do is run away. So we have to protect them from being able to do that. And then we have other open residential programs, which means that the kids wander campus, we go off campus with them. And those serve kids with substance abuse treatment issues, really complex trauma, and then young boys who are receiving treatment for sexually maladaptive issues. And that program is very effective at those kids not continuing behaviors that are unhealthy for other children. We also have our emergency shelter care, and our emergency shelter care is both for children who are in transition from one place to another, kids who had to be removed from their homes because of abuse, but also for kids that are known as homeless kids. And people say, how can a kid be homeless? Well, they run away in some situations, they get kicked out of their home even though they're not 18. And that's a program that's funded completely by benevolent dollars. And it's a great thing because those kids aren't couchsurfing, getting in dangerous situations. And we can work with their families to get permission to have them stay there for a little while, but then get them back into the home. And that's been very successful. Sean, I'm just curious about some numbers, like, do you, how many kids are you serving at a time? Do you have any idea how many you've served in your hundred year history? And how many staff members do you like? Any of those numbers, I think would be interesting, just because I think you're doing a tremendous amount of work, and I'm not sure everybody understands how much work happens on your campus. Yeah, I think we're always amazed when we really stop and take a look at the numbers. So in our residential care, on a daily basis, there's about 60 kids. So while it's high intensity, it's not a lot of kids. But then throughout our alternative school and our community based services, on a daily basis, we're serving another 100 kids or so. So in a year, we're serving somewhere between 1117 hundred kids in one year. And over the time, we kind of, we tried to calculate the number as best we could, and we know we've served over 15,000 kids in the time that we've been there. Well, one of those kids were. Mike was my son. So my son, who's now 39 years old and doing well, lives in New Hampshire. He's a welder. But Bashor literally saved his life, as you know, you were a big part of that. That meant so much to his mother and I, his siblings. He had just gone off the path. And he's a normally great kid, doing fine, but just, it didn't take much to fall off the path, thanks to Bashor, because he wasn't court ordered, he was more dad ordered. But Bashor was there to say, how can we help? And not just because it was my son, but because they do that for everybody. And Bashor wrapped their arms around him and little, and he spent the summer there. And really it evolved and changed his life. And we got our son back and he ended up going to the military. And today he's married with kids and doing well, living in New England. And he remembers his time and the people at Bashor fondly, even though at the time, he was pretty mad at me. But I personally experienced that in my family, and I could never thank you and Bashor enough for what you've done for my family. It seems like it was yesterday. Yeah, but it was literally 20 isn't amazing five years ago, long time ago. We think we have a time warp at Bashor because like I said, I would never believe that I've been there as long as I can or as long as I have been. And the thing I just want to say is, in situations like that, we were apart, but we didn't, we don't, we didn't save his life. He saved his life. He made his choices in that. That's one of the beautiful things about Bashor, is we know that we have lots of tools to help. But in the end of the day, those kids successes and those family successes are theirs and theirs to own. We just get to celebrate them. Well, you threw them. You threw them the line along with thousands of other kids. And so many of them have gone on to have good lives and be good leaders and good people have their own families and breaking cycles. And so we can't be more appreciative. When I was looking at the programs, it reminded me, because I'm pretty familiar with Bashor and it reminded me of some of the things that I had forgot that you do. Because now that I'm retired from boys and girls clubs, I forgot about things like your teen court and your shoplifting and your truancy and your outpatient counseling and all the things that are coming and going. And Bashor is this thriving, almost beehive of activity. Yeah. With buses pulling in and vans coming in and out and children coming and going and families coming and going. I thought it was fascinating when my son was going through there and how you, Endon told me, where do you think you're going? You're part of this process. So we had to go to family counseling, but I had a chance to watch shoplifting class. Not how to steal, but after you've been caught. Yeah. We don't teach you how to do. It, but maybe you could talk a little about some of those other programs, especially the ones that are run by kids. Yeah. Yeah. So teen court's a perfect example of this. So I love teen court because it is set up to be a court. And what happens is the prosecuting attorney's office, the probation department, there are kids that they have that come into their arena, and they say, this is a kid who may not need to be in this, in the system fully. And so for those kids, they'll refer them to our teen court. Our teen court is amazing because all the judges are attorneys in the area who volunteer their time to be judges. But everybody else, all the jurors, the prosecuting attorney, the public defender, are actually teens. And so, you know, it's a great program for the kids, for kids to get experience doing that. And we have kids who are, you know, have interest in criminal justice in their future and things who volunteer to be the prosecuting attorney, defense attorney. And then the jurors are also a mix of volunteers. And then every kid who successfully completes teen court is a part of their terms. They have to serve as a juror. And so those kids come in, and those families come in, they meet with the defense attorney, they go through the process. The jury will give them, you know, a sentence, so to speak, or things like community service, things like that. Most of them are things to reconnect them to the community. But then the great thing about that is, so we receive information from probation that tracks those kids for three years, and we have over 80% of those kids never end up in the court system for at least that three year period, which is a really long time, and that's way ahead of state national averages. So that's exciting. But the other part that's exciting about it is those kids that participate get experiences that help their resume. And many of the kids who are in the prosecutor role, the public defender role, go on to college, and we see them enter into the criminal justice field. Yeah. A true measure of an organization that is doing well is the recidivism rate, because if you can get an 80% not coming back, that is huge. 100% of the kids are in the system, and now 80% of them are now out of the system and then also being helped by their peers. And then coming back to help their peers. So what a great program that is. I just want to applaud you for that. Can I tell you a quick story that relates to that? We had a kid who was in our residential care. Really neat kid. This is a long time ago. As he was getting ready to leave our residential care and go into our foster care program, he decided he wanted to volunteer for our teen court, became a prosecuting attorney for it, won a state championship for teen courts as the prosecuting attorney for the state. This guy, after leaving foster care, goes into the army, after leaving the army, comes out, starts running successful realty and construction business. He then decides to become a foster parent for a teenage boy. He then adopts the teenage boy, and three months ago joined our board. Incredible. Yeah. All from the services and programs offered by Ashley Children's home. So I have one last question, and I think Marshall is going to ask a question or two. All right, well, I have two questions. First one, I know your dad because I worked with him years ago through boys and girl scubs. He was in Goshen fire department. I used to call him fire starter, but apparently he was the fire inspector, but that was a start. Well, if you lived with him, he could start some fires, too. I love Marty. He was awesome. But I also know that Liam, your son, plays bagpipes. And that being irish and you being scottish, I think that you don't hear enough bagpipes around, except on St. Patty's Day. But I've heard your son play, and I believe I watched him perform with Notre Dame, their bagpipes and their band and their. Whatever that part of the band is called. I don't know, the guard, maybe the color guard or. Yeah, they have a separate bagpipe band, but, yeah. Amazing. And he was just this little boy who plays a mean bagpipe. How did that happen? Yeah. So when Shelley and I were getting married, I decided, you know, I have to have bagpipes. You know, the one decision I got to have for our wedding. And so we had some. My parents had some friends who were part of the Mishawaka kilty pipe band, and so hired them for our wedding. And my wife was piped down the aisle by eight pipers and four drummers. And one of the guys who was connected to us said, if you have children when they turn ten years old, we'll start doing bagpipe lessons for free with them as a part of what their band does. And so when Liam turned ten, he decided he wanted to do it. I think it was partially because he could avoid having to take piano lessons, but it really took off for him. And, in fact, oh, I can't remember what year it was, but Michigan and Notre Dame were kicking off the season, and the ESPN was there, and he got to bagpipe the ESPN stage. So it's. It was a pretty amazing thing. And one of the things that I recently made him do is re redo the or play the Notre Dame theme and one of their other songs. For some of the people I knew who were going over to watch Notre Dame in Ireland play their first game, it was a little painful for him since he's a Purdue guy now. That's got to be painful. Isn't he a mechanical engineer? He is. He's graduating with mechanical engineering this year. And your daughter is also at Purdue? Yeah, she's in biomedical engineering. So you probably own quite a few bricks right now of Purdue, don't you? I feel like I've paid some dues there. Hey, last question about Bashor, and we thank you so much for sharing your passion and your mission with Bashor, but I always ask the vision question, and my friend Marshall has a question for you, too. But I'd just like to know your vision for Bashor ten years from now. What would it be? Yeah, one of our, you know, you set out these big goals that are impossible to achieve, but you hope that you're wrong and you can achieve them. I'd love to see ten years from now, not just because of Bashor, but because of all of our community nonprofits and business partners, that we find a way that kids in our community don't need long term residential care. So what that would look like is we have good enough. Well, good enough services that are connected well enough that kids. We can keep kids in our community, and if they need some 24 hours care, it's much more short term, because I think that would be a way of showing that our community has found a way to create a safety net that it's really hard to fall through. Sean, I mean, as a longtime journalist and storyteller in this community, I've had the pleasure of telling some great stories related to Bashor and some of the people who show up to be part of that village that help you do this amazing work. I mean, the Mick and Connie Luce family. There's a fund at the community foundation of Elkhart county that helps support Connie's kitchen to feed all the kids there. Or, you know, recently, there was a woman named Betty Chatten who lived to the age of 102 and left the foundation one of its largest estate gifts ever. And part of that money's gonna be. Isn't an endowed fund that's gonna support you annually. Yes, you and your programs. But one of my favorite stories that I got to tell as a newspaper guy first was the story of Jay Burt, who's a volunteer who just shows up for kids, doesn't want any attention, did not want to talk to a newspaper reporter, but tell. I think Jay's a great story of somebody showing up for kids. So tell us a little bit more about Jay while we have a few minutes, if you would. Yeah. So, the story of Jay is a crazy one, and I think one of our great God stories. So, one day in our management meeting, one of our staff comes in and says, we have this guy who wants to volunteer, and he wants to show our kids how to hand build wooden boats. I was like, you're insane. I know those people. They're very meticulous. They're very, you know, like. And our kids tend to be a little less meticulous at times, so. But, you know, talked to Don and said, hey, we at least should go see his cool shop. You know, if nothing else, I want to see where a place where somebody builds boats. And so we went to his place and talking with Jay, and I said, you know, our kids don't have the best attention span. Sometimes. He's like, yeah, I know. I said, well, let's start with why. Why are you looking at doing this? And the why is everything, you know, through time, the what you do, how you do it changes, but the why you do it never changes. And so he said, one day, I was driving by, Bashor and six staff were chasing a kid down the road, and I thought, I need to volunteer there. And I knew we'd be okay. So here we are, six years, seven years later, we got six boats that are built, and right now they're building what's called the Saint Isle of Skyboat, which is a competitive rowing boat where they have competitions throughout the world, and they're getting closer to closer and closer to finishing it. And he always worries about when they're going to be ready for boat launch. And I say, jay, I don't care about boats. I care about you and your crew being with our kids, because all's I know is I need kids who have people who love on them, and those guys do it tremendously and happen to build amazing boats. I love that story. And the boats have a great metaphor, launching and, you know, floating and this, you know, I mean, it's a beautiful metaphor, but I've seen Jay and his friends and the others who show up with him work with these kids, and it is remarkable. So, Sean, thanks. Thanks so much for being with us today. I mean, our final question, you, you know, you have a clear sense of humor, a clear passion and love for kids, but, but you're doing really hard work and you deal with some kids in some really tough circumstances. What gives you hope? Oh, the kids give me hope. Our community gives me hope. You know, the thing is, is this work is really, really hard. Yes. But when you meet these kids and you get beyond some of the barriers that they have up for really good reasons, you find out they're just like my kids. They have dreams. They're just afraid of them because they're scary because they've been let down. But when they start to free themselves up, you start to see these kids do things they should not be able to do, have successes they should not be able to have. And then we have a community who says, we love kids, our business community, our community foundation, our nonprofits. We're all in this together in this community unlike any other I've been around. And that gives me hope that we not only can do amazing things for kids, but we can have kids who have really tough stories become part of making our community even more amazing. Thanks so much, Sean. This show is a production of the community foundation of Elkhart county. It is powered by equipment from Sweetwater and recorded in the Viaggio Studio at weImpact in the Elkhart River District. Editing is done by the award-winning communication students at Goshen College, home of one of the best college radio stations in the nation. Listen to Globe radio at 91.1 FM or online. Learn more about the Community Foundation of Elkhart County at inspiringgood.org. Dot. You can follow us on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn. Music is provided by Ray Caldwell, one of the community foundations. Amazing staff members. Thanks for listening. We hope you're inspired and inspired good in your community.