Mark Jennings: Building community with Project FIND

Mark Jennings, the executive director of Project FIND, an UWS-based nonprofit organization that assists older adults, has an imposing résumé that includes a graduate degree from Harvard. But the Washington, DC, native approaches his career with a sense of gratitude and humility.

“I have a brother doing life in prison, who went in at 20 years old in Virginia, and that could be me. Without programs funded through donations and grants, my life could be very different. So I give every single day with reckless abandon because for me it is a way to give back to all that was given to me.”

Jennings, 48, originally set out to be a journalist. After he graduated from Howard University in 2000, he was well on his way, working for the Virginian-Pilot and the Ventura County Star. But the profession proved to be frustrating for him. “I always found myself doing advocacy news stories and it was really difficult to just go back home with people still in the same condition. In journalism, we had to be fair and objective and not insert ourselves into the situation. And that really took a toll on me.”

Jennings’ passion for socially conscious work led him to get a master’s degree from Harvard Divinity School and a master’s in social work from Hunter College. After doing social justice work in DC and Los Angeles, Jennings started at Project FIND in 2018, taking the helm in 2023. He also serves as an adjunct professor at the Silver School of Social Work at NYU.

Project FIND’s mission is “to provide low- and moderate-income and unhoused seniors with the services and support they need to enrich their lives and live independently.” The organization operates four housing residences that are home to about 600 people, as well as four older adult centers with over 3,500 members.

“We are committed to being a part of the community, and that’s not just in name, in terms of geography, but in terms of impact,” Jennings says. “So we open our doors to help block associations. We operate and give some small leases to organizations like AA [Alcoholics Anonymous] or NA [Narcotics Anonymous] or other things, to be able to make sure that we are able to be of assistance to the community in general.” He adds that the organization is always looking at new buildings to expand the footprint of older-adult housing. “That’s the kind of work we want to do in as many places as we can, so long as we have the dollars to do so.”

Although Jennings is no longer a reporter, he still has strong ties to the world of journalism. His wife, Enjoli Francis, is senior producer on ABC’s World News Tonight. “I have to look at news every morning, every night,” he declares with a smile. “My ESPN has to go off at 7 a.m.”

To say that Jennings has a calling to social justice work is to understate the matter. “I’ve always sort of worked with the Biblical aspect, ‘the least of these,’ the most vulnerable individuals in society. I think that’s what keeps me alive.”