Jerry Kellman is a community activist currently working as a senior advisor at the National Community Reinvestment Coalition (NCRC), an association of more than 600 community-based organizations that focus on developing new constituencies and new strategies for reinvestment from financial institutions. Kellman has a history of working with churches and community organizations, and in the 1980s was a supervisor for the Developing Communities Project (DCP) in Chicago. In 1985, Kellman hired Barack Obama to work with him at DCP, a faith-based organization, as a community organizer on Chicago’s South Side. Kellman acted as a mentor to Obama during his organizing years. Then, during the 2008 Obama for President campaign, he served as the media spokesperson for community organizing and was a speaker at the Democratic National Convention.

"We learn the most from our defeats, from our failures, not from our successes." Jerry Kellman