Exec­u­tive Direc­tor, African Amer­i­can Fam­i­ly & Cul­tur­al Center

Bob­by Jones, Sr. was born and raised on the South Side of Chica­go, Illi­nois, Bob­by is the youngest of eleven chil­dren. He moved to the San Fran­cis­co Bay Area when he was a teenag­er with an old­er sib­ling and his fam­i­ly for bet­ter oppor­tu­ni­ties and to fin­ish high school. In high school, he played foot­ball for two years and was then recruit­ed to play foot­ball for Chico State. While at Chico State, Bob­by obtained a Bach­e­lor of Arts in soci­ol­o­gy. He has always worked in fields where he has been able to help peo­ple, and he states that he real­ly enjoys what he does. He has instilled in his three adult chil­dren the impor­tance of help­ing one anoth­er and being the best, most hon­est per­son you can be.

As Exec­u­tive Direc­tor, he is com­mit­ted to work­ing at the African Amer­i­can Fam­i­ly & Cul­tur­al Cen­ter (AAFCC) because of its mis­sion state­ment and what the cen­ter stands for as a whole; it is some­thing that he very much believes in. He states that ​“We have to uplift and help our com­mu­ni­ty and restore the val­ues of teach­ing and how to love your­self first, so you will then be able to love oth­ers. The pro­grams that the AAFCC offers can help the com­mu­ni­ty do those things, and that they are all free just shows how much we here at the AAFCC are help­ing the com­mu­ni­ty. We have seen it hap­pen with the youth, from get­ting bet­ter grades and atti­tudes chang­ing, to the adults who have come out of jail get­ting jobs, sup­port­ing fam­i­lies, and becom­ing pro­duc­tive cit­i­zens in the com­mu­ni­ty. I believe that giv­ing back not only to your com­mu­ni­ty but also to any­one you come into con­tact with is some­thing one should do as an indi­vid­ual, but it is also some­thing the AAFCC does on a dai­ly basis.”

Bob­by and his wife reside in Oroville, and he gets to see many of the peo­ple whose lives he has worked to improve, and it is very reward­ing for him to see how far some of them have come. In his spare time, he coach­es foot­ball and bas­ket­ball, and he enjoys any­thing relat­ed to music. He enjoys fly­ing his drone and help­ing chil­dren and young adults in any way possible.