LANSING, MI– The Peckham Community Partnership Foundation will kick off its annual celebration of National Disability Employment Month, through its bi-annual Speaker Series featuring best-selling author and mental health facilitator, Mike Veny on Wednesday, October 13 for a morning and an afternoon session.
Veny is a Certified Corporate Wellness Specialist with presentations that move past simply educating an audience to providing them with actionable steps they can take to change their lives and work environments. His bestselling book Transforming Stigma: How to Become a Mental Wellness Superhero and The Transforming Stigma Workbook have become valuable mental health resources for people of all ages.
Registration is required for this virtual event. This is a free event, open to all who are interested. Peckham will stream the events LIVE during both sessions, with an interactive Q&A session to follow. The morning session will be from 10:30 to 11:30 a.m. and the afternoon from 2 to 3:00 p.m.
Interested individuals should register here.
If interested in a pre-event interview with Mike Veny, please contact Shavonne Lewis, Peckham Senior Brand & Outreach Manager at shlewis@peckham.org.
MIKE VENY SHORT BIO
Mike Veny is a leading mental health speaker whose message inspires the diversity and inclusion of all. As a virtual speaker, author, writer and podcast co-host, he’s one of the most popular mental health influencers in the world. His mission is to support people in receiving the gift of emotional wellness through a variety of Diversity and Inclusion activities, including a mental health course and a diversity course.
Mike’s path to becoming a speaker became evident at an early age. He convinced the staff at psychiatric hospitals to discharge him three times during his childhood. In addition to being hospitalized as a child, he was expelled from three schools, attempted suicide, and was medicated in efforts to reduce his emotional instability and behavioral outbursts.
By the fifth grade, Mike was put in a special education class. Aside from getting more individualized attention from the teacher, he learned that pencil erasers make great sounds when tapped on a desk. He had no idea that drumming would become his career or his path to recovery.
As an adult, Mike spent many years facilitating drum workshops for children with special needs, teaching them to channel their energy by banging a drum while also learning how to listen, focus, work together and succeed through teamwork. The project was such a hit that he continued to expand his drumming program, first to adults in recovery and eventually into the corporate setting.
The Peckham Community Partnership Foundation supports Peckham’s bi-annual Speaker Series which brings national speakers and authors, disability rights advocates, and individuals who have overcome personal challenges to provoke, motivate and inspire our audiences. Free and open to the public, the Speakers Series raises awareness around disability issues while celebrating the contributions of those who are differently abled.
Peckham is a nonprofit vocational rehabilitation organization that provides paid job training opportunities for people with disabilities and other barriers to employment. For more than 42 years, Peckham has provided jobs and job skills training to thousands of individuals with barriers through five different business lines throughout Michigan, and also has operations in Phoenix, Arizona and London, Kentucky.
Peckham, Inc., is a national award-winning organization, recognized for its achievement in providing exceptional vocational rehabilitation, creating inclusive cultures and building quality workplaces for employees.