When Dea Coleman moved to Hickory Tree Apartments in Selbyville, with two young children in 2006, she could not foresee what was ahead of her.

The public housing community, managed by Delaware State Housing Authority (DSHA), required participation in the Moving to Work (MTW) program.  This is a requirement of any person or family receiving public housing, Section 8, or Housing Choice Vouchers, with the intent of helping individuals work towards homeownership within five to seven years.

Ms. Coleman, who cared for her father after a stroke, already had her Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) license and had worked as a CNA for Atlantic Shores and Green Valley Terrace in Millsboro. 

After taking time off to have her third child, she went to work for Bayhealth in Milford and stayed there until 2014.  During that time, she earned her license as a practical nurse (LPN) and successfully graduated from the MTW program.  

Later that year, she moved to Wicomico County, Maryland, to work as a parent facilitator for Wicomico County’s Social Services Department.  She also waitressed to earn extra money to support her young family.

Ms. Coleman moved back to Delaware the next year, working as an LPN for Genesis Healthcare, an assisted living facility in Seaford, and Harrison House, a rehabilitation center in Georgetown. 

In 2018, she joined Seasons Hospice, where she worked as a clinical liaison, traveling to visit patients in their homes, at nursing facilities, and at Christiana Hospital. 

Ms. Coleman said the work for Seasons Hospice was intense but “opened up my horizons,” allowing her to realize what opportunities there were for her to grow and make a difference in healthcare and as an entrepreneur. 

In 2019 and 2020, while working for Aveanna Healthcare, which provides services to children with disabilities, the Covid 19 pandemic gripped hospitals and other healthcare facilities, creating a need for more nurses and healthcare professionals. 

By 2021 – seeing an opportunity to fill that need – Ms. Coleman partnered with other nurses and launched a healthcare staffing agency.  Ms. Coleman also went back to school during that time to bolster her own healthcare credentials and earned her registered nursing (RN) degree in 2022.

In 2023, Ms. Coleman once again seized on an opportunity to fill a need in the healthcare community.  In addition to identifying the need for well-trained certified nursing assistants, Ms. Coleman knew from her own experience with the typical eight-week CNA training program that an accelerated four-week program would appeal to prospective nursing assistants. 

By researching and studying textbooks, Ms. Coleman developed a four-week curriculum that gained state approval and by October 2023, Coleman’s CNA Academy was launched.  It took several more months to find and set up classroom and clinical training space in Dover and recruit nurses to teach classes.  The first class at Coleman’s CNA Academy was held March 27, 2024.   

Ms. Coleman also started developing partnerships with health and social service agencies and organizations that worked with clients in need of job skills. 

One of those organizations was DSHA.  Ms. Coleman remembered her years in public housing and the MTW program, saying the program “gave me the foundation I needed to be able to succeed in life.”

Ms. Coleman met with Elana Davis, DSHA’s Director of Housing Management, and convinced her that the CNA Academy program would appeal to MTW clients interested in the healthcare profession and developing the skills that would help them find employment quickly.

Ms. Davis said Coleman made a persuasive case that, as a former MTW client and public housing resident, she understood the challenges DSHA’s residents face with finding a good job and achieving independence.  

Ms. Davis said DSHA was also open to a partnership with Coleman.

“It’s important for us to build opportunities for our MTW clients to gain education that will lead to better jobs and self-sufficiency.”

A Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed, stipulating that if Coleman’s CNA Academy maintained state accreditation, provided daycare services for parents, and offered job information and placement to graduating students, DSHA would give information about the CNA Academy to interested residents and offer full scholarships for them to enroll in and successfully complete the four-week program.

Since July 2024, 21 MTW clients have received scholarships to attend Coleman’s CNA Academy and all but three have graduated from the program. During 2024, 30 students graduated from the Academy, and they are now working at institutions such as Genesis Healthcare, Bayada, Silver Lining, Dover Behavioral, Brandywine, Bayhealth, Polaris Nursing Home, Kent Harmony and the Delaware Veterans Home.

Ms. Coleman has also branched out to offer other services for her students’ convenience.  In addition to being a drug and tuberculosis testing center, she has contracted with Prometric, a test administration company, to be a regional certification testing center.  This has made it possible for her students to receive their certifications faster, since they don’t need to travel to another regional testing center.

Ms. Coleman supports her students in other ways.  She offers daycare services by partnering with the Learning Tree Academy and financial literacy seminars through a partnership with M&T Bank. For students thinking about buying a home, she refers them to DSHA’s Kiss Your Landlord Goodbye program.

For her achievements as an entrepreneur, Coleman was awarded the Pete DuPont Freedom Foundation Table Award for “Reinventing Delaware,” and the Lisa Blunt Rochester Award by the Delaware Black Chamber of Commerce.

With a strong presence on social media, Ms. Coleman ends her Facebook page entries with the tagline “We are more than an institution.  We are a resource hub.”

Because her Academy is self-funded, Ms. Coleman still works as a nurse, picking up weekend shifts that come into her staffing agency.

Ms. Coleman admits that she lives a hectic life, but she relishes the opportunity to help people start and thrive in a career in which their marketable skills enable them to support themselves and their families, as she was able to do when she left DSHA’s MTW program.