Every month, our Executive Director shares personal reflections on the work we do and the impact we witness at First Tee — Metro Atlanta. These letters offer an inside look at how we are building mental health and emotional resilience through golf—not just the outcomes we celebrate, but the moments that shape us, the lessons we’re learning alongside young people, and the coaches who show up every day to create spaces where belonging is possible.
Like a caddie’s yardage book that maps the course with careful observations and insights gained from being close to the game, these letters document what we are seeing on the ground, what we are building together, and where we are headed as an organization. They are honest, reflective, and rooted in the belief that leadership means bearing witness to the work and sharing what that work teaches us.
Each letter explores a different aspect of youth development, mental health, and the
power of community—always through the lens of real experience, real stories, and real
impact.
If you are a major supporter of First Tee — Metro Atlanta, you receive The Yardage Book directly in your inbox each month. These letters are shared here on our website after initial distribution as a window into the heart of our mission and an invitation to understand the deeper work happening on our courses and in our community.
This isn’t just about golf. It’s about what golf makes possible.
January 2026
Happy New Year! I hope 2026 is off to a meaningful start for you and yours. I’m grateful to begin this year in conversation with you, and deeply thankful for your investment in our work in 2025. As promised, I’m launching a monthly series where I’ll share more about our mental health work at First Tee — Metro Atlanta. This is the first of twelve letters, and I’m starting with something personal.
I’ve been thinking about what we ask of ourselves in January. We’re supposed to feel motivated, optimistic, ready to become someone new. But for many of us, and especially for young people, this season doesn’t bring inspiration. It brings pressure. Pressure to have it figured out. To start fresh. To transform overnight. To finally become the version of ourselves we think we’re supposed to be.
But here’s what I’ve learned: when you’re standing in a moment that requires you to start over, it often doesn’t feel like possibility. When you’re living it, it can feel like endings, like losing what you had, not gaining what’s next. That’s why I’m starting here.
In December, I told you I’d share more this year about our mental health work, about how we’re strengthening emotional resilience through golf, about the moments that shape how I lead this organization. This is the first of twelve conversations we’ll have in 2026. Each month, I’ll pull back the curtain on a different part of this work.
And in January, when the noise about new beginnings is loudest, I want to share something personal about what real starting over actually requires.
I was a senior in high school when I found out my girlfriend was pregnant. College felt impossible. My future felt like it was closing before it ever opened. The statistics about teen parenthood were clear: things were going to hard and more than likely, I wasn’t going to make it.
I told my parents, who were heartbroken. And then I had to face my girlfriend’s mother. I expected anger. Disappointment. A door slammed shut. Instead, she said: “While I am disappointed, Jenae, don’t let this make you decide not to go to college. I believe in you.”
Here’s what changed in that moment: not my circumstances, but my permission to belong.
I was still going to be a teen parent. College was still going to be hard. None of the external realities shifted. But something internal did. She told me I belonged in my next chapter. That I wasn’t disqualified. That the future I’d imagined wasn’t gone, it was just going to look different. She gave me permission to keep going when everything in me wanted to quit and give up on the goals I had always had. And that became the foundation I stood on when nothing else felt stable.
Every day at First Tee — Metro Atlanta, I meet young people standing in their own version of that moment.
They’re already surrounded by noise. Social media showing them everyone else’s highlight reels, a culture that celebrates overnight success while hiding the years of struggle behind it, pressure to have everything figured out right now when most adults know that life is full of pivots we never saw coming. They’re measuring themselves against the 5% while living in the reality of the 95%. And in January, that gap feels even wider.
What they need is what I needed: someone who sees them in their struggle and still believes they belong in what comes next.
That’s the mental health work we do here. With coaches who understand that young people need space to struggle without shame, to make mistakes without being defined by them.
Our coaches ask questions like “What do you need right now to feel like you can keep going?” They create moments where a young person can say “I’m not good at this yet” and hear back “You belong here anyway. Especially on the hard days.” Where starting over isn’t a sign that something’s wrong, it’s proof that you’re still in the game. Where the message underneath everything is: You belong here. You can begin again. We believe in you.
Here’s what I’ve learned about new beginnings: you need to believe change is possible. But just as importantly, you need someone who believes you belong in that change.
Not someone who has all the answers. Not someone who makes it easy. Someone who sees you in the middle of it and says: you still belong here.
So as we step into this new year together, I want to ask: Who gave you that when you needed it most? Who believed you belonged in your next chapter even when you weren’t sure yourself?
And the bigger question: How can we be that for the next generation?
Your support of First Tee — Metro Atlanta makes you part of the community that gives young people permission to belong. This year, I’m inviting you to see even more of how that support translates into real change.
Every month, I’ll share more. For now, I want you to know: the work you support isn’t just about golf. It’s about giving young people permission to keep writing their own stories.
Jenae Jenkins