Award-winning media entrepreneur and founder of Joy, Inc., Chude Jideonwo, will be engaging students of the Cal Turner Program for Moral Leadership in the Professions at Vanderbilt University in a special conversation exploring psycho-spiritual care for marginalized communities. The invitation comes as part of the program’s long-running student fellowship, which brings together graduate students from across Vanderbilt’s professional schools to reflect on ethics, leadership, and the responsibility of their professions to serve the common good.
For more than 25 years, the Cal Turner Program has convened students from fields including medicine, law, business, engineering, nursing, divinity, and education to interrogate the moral questions at the heart of their work. This spring, a group of fellows is examining the role of psycho-spiritual care in supporting vulnerable communities. The students identified Jideonwo’s work through Joy, Inc. and his broader advocacy around mental health, emotional wellbeing, and purposeful leadership as an important example of how storytelling and civic engagement can support healing and social change.
The invitation was further inspired by a Nigerian medical doctor currently pursuing a Master of Public Health at Vanderbilt’s School of Medicine, whose work focuses on psycho-spiritual care for children and preventing abuse among vulnerable populations. Through the conversation, the fellows will be learning from Jideonwo’s experience building platforms that encourage emotional awareness, reflection, and compassionate leadership.
The program reinforces the commitment to connecting students with leaders whose work demonstrates the integration of professional excellence and moral responsibility. By sharing insights from his work with Joy, Inc. and his broader storytelling platforms, Jideonwo will be contributing to the fellows’ ongoing exploration of how their careers can advance justice, care, and human flourishing in communities around the world.
