2022 Red Cross Class of Heroes: Quilen Blackwell – Social Justice Hero

Quilen Blackwell of Chicago is the Social Justice Hero.

Presented by BMO Harris Bank

Quilen has a passion for empowering young people in the community to learn the skills they need to succeed in life. He is founder of Southside Blooms, an organization that creates sustainable, off-grid, urban flower farms, training local youth to cultivate them and deliver the flowers to Chicagoland. In the process, Quilen is providing job and life skills to young people in high-risk areas on the south and west sides of Chicago and showing them how to use their talents to have a positive impact on their communities.

Quilen has also partnered with the Cook County juvenile probation services program and adult services to provide opportunities to high school-age individuals and young adults. He even has developed a sustainable urban farm on Cook County Jail property, providing inmates with the experience of working the farm. He believes his urban flower farm model is “…a viable solution that is scalable and replicable; it is solving problems with gangs, sustainability and blight and it represents a realistic end game to the ghetto as we know it.”

Read more about the 2022 American Red Cross of Greater Chicago’s Red Cross Heroes and how you can join us in making a difference.

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