About Healthy Routines

Healthy Routines (HR) supports communities impacted by conditions associated with extreme poverty. HR takes an ecological approach to neighborhood wellness by offering services to low-income residents while strategically collaborating with businesses, nonprofits, and government agencies regarding effective ways to reshape the built environment. 

Our mission is to promote growth and development by exposing our neighborhood fellows to transformative environments in areas of higher education, housing, and professional development.  By working collaboratively with a diverse range of stakeholders at the communal, institutional, and governmental levels, we are able to foster meaningful opportunities that our disenfranchised citizens can use to enhance their quality of life. 

Healthy Routines, founded in 2019, is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. 

Healthy Routines is not a university, nor is it an entity managed by the government. Instead, it is a community-based organization led by highly experienced individuals, many who come from low-income neighborhoods, while others were once incarcerated, that collaborate with stakeholders such as government institutions, colleges, businesses, and nonprofits to bring transformative opportunities in education, employment, and housing rooted in evidence-based practices. 

Healthy Routines was co-founded by Jay Holder, who is also the Director of our research partner, the National Executive Council (NEC) at Columbia University's Center for Justice. As an ambassador for Columbia University’s Center for Justice, Jay Holder serves as a national Program Developer tasked with studying extreme poverty. One major factor associated with extreme poverty is criminalization. As a result, we have partnered with Prison-to-Professionals which is a community-based organization that specializes in supportive services for system impacted people. 

See Our Team for more information.