How Voice Up Shares the Voice Up Media Network with 40 Public Health College Students at Georgia State University
40 public health students are learning about the Voice Up Media Network at Georgia State University — and Voice Up is one of their featured partners throughout the entire fall semester. It's the first step on what is going to become a new transformation for how we look at media and its relationship to our health.
The Story
On the morning of Charlie Douglass's 86th birthday, Art Fuller joined a Public Health Careers course at Georgia State University as the guest speaker — hosted by Dr. Jacque-Corey Cormier. For one hour and thirteen minutes, he shared the Voice Up Media Network with the next generation of public health professionals.
Most media networks begin with a subject — news, sports, music, business. The Voice Up Media Network begins somewhere different. It begins with people and purpose. And on this morning, that purpose was shared with 40 college students who are preparing to enter the field of public health.
And this was not a one-time visit. Voice Up is one of the course's featured partners throughout the entire fall semester — returning to the classroom, working alongside the students, and helping shape how a new generation of public health professionals think about media and its relationship to health.
Art explained Voice Up's mission — turning lived experience into career pathways. He shared the origin story, the doctoral dissertation connection, the difference between a founder, a director, and a CEO. He named his leadership style as servant leadership. He walked through the application process, the success benchmarks, and the five core principles: collaboration, humility, precision, patience, and empathy.
Three times during the session, he brought his uncle Charlie into the room — as proof of the science of purpose, as the source of his resilience, and as a story handed forward when a student, Jaiden Nelson, closed the session with the words: "Tell your uncle happy birthday on behalf of all of us."
That exchange — Art told the story, the students received it, and they handed it back as a birthday wish — is the Voice Up Media Network in one moment. And it is just the first step on what is going to become a new transformation for how we look at media and its relationship to our health.
Session Highlights
134
Countries reached in year one
40
Public health students
86
Uncle Charlie's birthday
1:13
Hours of lecture
Emily Metheny · United States
A children's book about childhood anxiety — now in classrooms across multiple states
Emily wrote a children's book born from her own experience with childhood anxiety. Large organizations are now purchasing it for classroom use across multiple states. Her lived experience became the credential.
Maryam · Nigeria
Selected 1 out of 1,000 for a global mental health program
Maryam was selected from 1,000 applicants to join Overcome UK — a global behavioral health role-play practice studio at buildbetterhealth.life serving people worldwide. One Voice Up student, chosen from a thousand.
The Five Core Principles — Voice Up's Accountability Framework
Collaboration
Humility
Precision
Patience
Empathy
Art didn't just name the principles — he used them live as diagnostic tools to examine a real decision. They are how Voice Up processes every win and every setback.
The Door Is Open — Five Steps at VoiceUpLab.org
Art walked the class through the application process: five steps on voiceuplab.org. Step one gets you a one-on-one conversation with Art himself. Complete all five and you receive a free personalized 8-week guide — whether you join Voice Up or not.
Art's opening line: "We are looking for students just like you — right now, today, without delay."
Servant Leadership
Named students live, on the call
Art identified himself as a servant leader — mission-driven — and demonstrated it live by naming specific students on the call. He said leadership is "just as much about the relationships you have with people than the task you're actually trying to accomplish."
The Dissertation
Voice Up came directly from Art's doctoral research
Art's doctoral dissertation — defending December 2026 — studies how African American students connect lived experience to careers in behavioral health. Voice Up is the organization built directly from that research. The lecture was a public, plain-language translation of the thesis.
The Network Keeps Growing
This Georgia State session is the first update in a series. The Voice Up Media Network keeps growing — and we will keep sharing the story. Our next feature drops September 24, 2026: more student stories, more network growth, and more proof that lived experience is the pathway.
Stay connected. The story is just beginning.
"Tell your uncle happy birthday on behalf of all of us."
— Jaiden Nelson, public health pre-med student, Georgia State University
Invite the Founder to Speak at Your Institution
Art Fuller — Founder, President & CEO of Voice Up Publishing — is available to guest lecture at your university, college, high school, organization, or community gathering. The Georgia State session you just read about is one example. Sessions are available live, virtual, or a combination of both — and every engagement is tailored to your audience, from a single class period to a full semester-long partnership.
Across every topic below, the focus is the same: the power of connecting to your purpose. Art draws on the full breadth and depth of his lived experience and expertise to show how that one connection changes a career, a community, and a life.
Lived Experience as the Career Pathway
How your own story becomes your professional credential — the core Voice Up thesis from Art's doctoral dissertation on the Naming Gap, and the proof that connecting to your purpose unlocks a career no degree alone can open.
Servant Leadership in Practice
What it means to lead by naming people, building relationships, and putting the mission first — demonstrated live, not just described, as the daily practice of connecting your leadership to a purpose bigger than yourself.
Founder, Director, and CEO — The Three Roles
A clean, teachable breakdown of governance: founders need humility and boards, directors execute, CEOs answer to a board smarter than they are — and how knowing which role you play keeps you connected to the purpose that started it all.
The Five Core Principles as an Accountability Framework
Collaboration, Humility, Precision, Patience, and Empathy — not slogans, but diagnostic tools for examining real decisions and setbacks, and for staying connected to your purpose when the work gets hard.
Purpose Science & Health Outcomes
The research behind purpose-driven living: longer life, disease resilience, and the evidence base that shows what happens in your body when you connect to your purpose — the science that underpins everything Voice Up teaches.
From Dissertation to Organization
How academic research becomes a living organization — the journey from the Naming Gap thesis to the Voice Up Media Network — as a model for turning your own scholarship into a purpose you can actually live out.
Building a Purpose-Driven Media Network
How Voice Up reached 134 countries in its first year — and what it takes to build media that begins with people and their purpose instead of a subject, so that every story strengthens someone's connection to their own.
Community Storytelling & Local Issues
The Gary, Indiana trilogy, the Charlie Douglass legacy, and how media can serve communities traditionally underrepresented in the narrative — connecting neighbors to a shared purpose and a shared story.
Entrepreneurship & Bootstrapping a Mission
The Bootstrap Business Accelerator approach — building an organization from lived experience without waiting for permission or outside funding — and how staying connected to your purpose is what carries a founder through the hard early years.
K-12 Education & Combating Bullying
Children's books, the Parent/Guardian Waiver framework, and how Voice Up supports students from elementary through high school in finding their voice — because connecting to your purpose early changes the whole trajectory of a life.
Mentorship & the Bike-Riding Metaphor
Art's go-to teaching device: somebody else taught you how to ride a bike, and that is what mentorship looks like — scaffolding, not lecturing — and how being mentored (and mentoring) keeps you connected to your purpose.
Fellowships, Internships & Career Pipelines
The full Voice Up pipeline — from the First 100 Hours module to paid fellowships and internships — and how each step is designed to turn lived experience into real career capital by keeping students connected to their purpose.
Music, Jazz & the Creative Arts
Art's life as a professional jazz musician and teacher — the connections to Anthony Braxton, Roland Dahinden, and Randy Weston — and how the creative arts are one of the most powerful ways to discover and stay connected to your purpose.
Publishing & Lived Experience Publications
How Voice Up Publishing and J. Ellington Publishing turn student stories into books — Emily Metheny's children's book, the Fuller Road reviews, and more — as living proof that publishing your lived experience deepens your connection to your purpose.
Mental & Behavioral Health Careers
Art's work as Chief of CCBHC Operations at Hamilton Center — connecting clinical practice, public health, and the Voice Up pathway for the next generation of helpers who want their careers tied to a purpose that serves others.
Community Mental Health & CCBHC Operations
What it takes to run Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics — the compliance, the care model, the staffing — and how purpose is the only thing that sustains leaders in this demanding field.
Applied Purpose Science
The research program behind Voice Up — how purpose is measured, taught, and tracked — and how institutions can apply it to move from theory to measurable outcomes in the lives of the people they serve.
Global Reach & Cross-Cultural Purpose
Maryam in Nigeria, students across 134 countries, and how Voice Up works across cultures, languages, and borders — because connecting to your purpose is a human universal, not a Western one.
Video Interviews & Voice Discovery
The Voice Up video interview process — how a recorded conversation becomes a tool for self-discovery — and how hearing your own voice back is often the first time someone truly connects to their purpose.
How to Invite Art Fuller
Whether you are a professor, a program director, a high school counselor, or a community leader — Art is open to conversations about live guest lectures, virtual sessions, hybrid series, semester-long partnerships, panel appearances, and keynote talks. Reach out through the Voice Up site, and the team will help shape a session tailored to your audience and format.
Your Voice Has Value — and Your Voice Works.
A free platform built on the Voice Up principles. Take a Voice Interview, upload a document for feedback across seven writing lenses, hear your work read aloud, and run an APA review with an authenticity check — all designed to refine your voice, never replace it.
What You Can Do Here
Voice Interview
Answer six short questions and get an authentic writing-voice profile — your tone, your strengths, your blind spots.
Document Analysis
Upload any essay, reflection, or personal statement. It is scored across seven writing lenses — academic, journalistic, narrative, and more.
AI Narration
Hear your work read aloud in five professional AI voices. Catch clunky sentences and feel where your writing lands.
Discover Your Voice
A free-writing exercise that reflects your true voice back to you — no prompts, no pressure, just you.
Connected Pages
Admin — Draft & Review, Then Publish
Step 1 — Create drafts for review. Creates a Mailchimp draft newsletter campaign and emails a full preview (newsletter + social media copy) to the site administrator. No social posts are published yet.
Step 2 — Publish social posts after review. Once you have reviewed the draft email, use this button to publish the social media posts to LinkedIn, Instagram, and Facebook using the anchor image.