Who WE Are – Tilesha McFee and Tameka Mays

As twin sisters, Tilesha McFee and Tameka Mays share a lot. Both share the same professions as paraprofessionals in the Colonial School District (CSD), both share a passion for children as educators and mothers, and both share a passion for helping others in CSD where they were raised as children. When not working or at home with their husbands and children, Tameka and Tilesha spent the last five years providing food and clothing to others in the community, but when the pandemic shut schools down last March, the twins doubled down and went to work.

“We knew we had connections and resources available to us to bring large amounts of food into the community. It all started with the willingness to want to help. We simply couldn’t allow families in our community to remain hungry without trying to do something about it. We invited others in our community to be a part of it and the response was overwhelming!” Tilesha says. That response from last March to the end of December resulted in the twins using donations to distribute more than one million pounds of food to over 25,000 families. So far, in 2021 they have delivered food to more than 3,000 families. They didn’t do the work alone.  Their husbands, small children, and volunteers, many of whom are Colonial employees and students, rallied around their cause and helped. Tameka, whose three daughters attend schools in the district says, “Colonial’s support for our work has been amazing. We have learned how much Colonials care and have seen the true Power of WE in action. Colonial Nation has provided us resources, volunteers, and the parking lot as a base location for food pickup for our volunteers.” Tilesha, who lives in Philadelphia with her spouse and four daughters, echoes her sister’s sentiments saying, “the Power of We took on a life of its own! It is about a community of people coming together to support one another. Knowing that we are in this together and we will get through it together.”  As for working through all of the challenges brought on by COVID-19 Tameka says, ‘“this pandemic has brought challenges to many. We are no exception to that. It has been difficult for us, but it takes pressure to create a diamond. We are using this time to make diamonds.”

As a reward for spearheading the food distribution project, the twins didn’t get diamonds, but they did get national attention, lots of it. Much to their surprise, they earned a fully paid trip to Disney, a treasure their families won’t soon forget.

To view stories about their work and their visit to Disney, Click the links below: 

Their story – https://f.io/W3zL1dx_

 Their Disney adventure: https://f.io/wbMLUeMU