Like Alesha McMullen’s vision board, LINC’s employment success program likes to think large in imagining what’s possible for families on the rise.

“I’m a big manifest believer,” McMullen said.

The mother of two, speaking from LINC’s Homebuyers Workshop with Murrell Homes Real Estate Group, was right in line with LINC’s thinking when it comes to building the future she wants.

For her and other parents in LINC’s Missouri Work Assistance program, the ambition is more than getting a job. More than getting education.

The pictures and words McMullen cut from magazines for her board shine with depictions of “enjoying the journey of life,” she said.

Career. Family . . .

And a home.

McMullen is one of more than a dozen parents that took part in some or all of four workshops that LINC and Murrell Homes put on at the Kansas City Public Library’s Plaza Branch this summer.

No one was saying that the path to home ownership is easy.

Murrell Homes’ Sharonne McGee opened the final session by recapping all the classwork so far — debt-to-income ratios, budgeting and cleaning up credit, getting insurance, renters’ rights, sustaining work — and then leapt into new lessons on real estate agents, market guides, list prices . . .

. . . and comps, appraisals, inspections, earnest money, negotiations, closing costs . . .

It was enough that somewhere in the thick of it, class participant James Doss let out a head-shaking, “whew!”

But at the end, McMullen called the experience “a stepping stone.”

And Brittany Jackson, who came to the workshops and brought along her brother, Dondre Bynum, said, “I’m hopeful now.”

“That’s our mission,” McGee said, “to make sure to encourage folks that they can be home owners. It’s a key that opens doors to the future, to leaving a legacy for your family.”

Jalyn King was thinking about her daughters, 6 and 2, and their future when she took measure of all she had learned.

“My 6-year-old has been asking for a house,” King said. But it has seemed like such a distant dream, because King and other parents in LINC’s program were in situations that led them to apply for TANF — Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, also known as food stamps. All of them have been through hardships and were connected to LINC by the state to get support from LINC’s case managers in building education, job training, life skills and other aid to set a path to self-sufficiency.

King, who works at a nursing home, was already getting help from LINC in dealing with car loans, housing issues and utility bills. But LINC and Murrell Homes wanted to help her think bigger.

The workshops were meant to be “eye-openers,” said Murrell Homes’ Rhonda Davis.

“We show them you can clean up your credit,” she said. “We give them insights to the process and really engage them.”

Now King believes getting that home her 6-year-old imagines is something she can accomplish.

“I tell her it’s going to take a while,” King said, “but we will get a house.”

Every year LINC helps some 400 parents in the Missouri Work Assistance program. And the LINC team is always looking for ways to enhance the support and inspiration it provides, said Aaron Bond, LINC’s Associate Director of Workforce Initiatives.

“We think of different things we can provide outside of the norm,” Bond said, that goes beyond the state’s directive to “go find a job.”

LINC teamed up with Murrell Homes to build on other classes in budgeting and finances to offer paths to homeownership.

More than just achieving self-sufficiency, owning a home “is creating wealth for your family,” Bond said. “And maybe you might want to become an investor, and it becomes a career.”

LINC this summer also started Wellness Wednesdays, offering weekly opportunities for parents in the work initiatives programs to join in a yoga class and learn strategies for physical and mental health. Later this month, LINC will be offering a luncheon with a motivational speaker.

These efforts are all part of helping parents “break the cycles of poverty,” said Jayme Horn, LINC Workforce Initiatives Program Supervisor.

“We want to motivate clients to look at their whole person,” she said.

The stress on a family can be intense, said Holli Lawson, who is raising three children, ages 13, 8, and 4.

“When you’re renting you’re always scared that one day you’ll get kicked out,” she said. “You don’t know how a landlord is going to be. It’s traumatizing.”

The life skills classes, the mental health help, and now the dream of a home give her hope.

“Owning something of my own, that’s what I really want,” she said. “Something I can pass on to my kids.”