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Global grandma

A retiree finds her calling with a group that helps improve life across the globe.

HISTORIC HYDE PARK - Jan Roberts' e-mail address pretty much sums up her goal in life: roberts@transformworld.org

Outwardly, she seems like a typical retiree, one who relishes hours with her 4-year-old granddaughter and enjoys the occasional movie.

But Roberts, 65, is founder and leader of the Institute for Ethics and Meaning, an organization that encourages people to help each other, the environment and the community.

She runs the institute from her eighth-floor, one-room apartment overlooking Bayshore Boulevard. Roberts calls the organization a group of "just plain folks who care." The 12-member board includes a retired hospice worker, a restaurant owner and former mayoral candidate Frank Sanchez.

The institute has become the U.S. headquarters for the Earth Charter, an international movement that lays out ideas for improving life across the globe.

Roberts leads a group of 50 volunteers in Tampa who work to garner financial and moral support for the charter. Half of their $50,000 budget last year paid for an Earth Charter summit, she says, and much of the rest went to a fledgling program for children called Earth Scouts. Roberts says she doesn't benefit financially from the fundraising; her work is all volunteer.

She says a spiritual path led her to this cause.

"I was baptized twice and almost drowned in two churches," Roberts said. "I was an atheist, I was an agnostic. Finally I said, "What is my purpose here?' "

She grew up on Long Island, New York. Married at 18, divorced 15 years later from her Air Force officer husband, she came to Tampa in 1972 to attend the University of South Florida, three daughters in tow.

She got married again, this time to "a hippie on a purple motorcycle," graduated in 1974 with a degree in counseling and went on to get a master's degree in rehabilitation counseling in 1976.

She worked briefly as a travel agent, then became a social worker in a state program for women convicts and women on welfare. Many of the women, Roberts said, wanted to change their lives but could make more money on welfare or through prostitution than in legitimate jobs.

"That's when I started to see that something wasn't right with the system here," she said.

Roberts divorced again after eight years, and in 1981 she cofounded the Womens Survival Center, now the Centre for Women, in Hyde Park. There she counseled displaced homemakers just like herself - women who had never worked outside of the home, but now suddenly had a financial need to do so.

She went into private practice as a psychotherapist and became a frequent speaker on parenting, corporate team-building and diversity.

"I've always felt like I was doing some good in the world," Roberts said.

She spent six years living on a sailboat moored offshore around Tampa Bay. Five years ago Roberts married her third husband, Brower. He is so impressed with her that he took her last name.

"She's a much better person than I am," he said.

But as Roberts grew older, that question of purpose in life gnawed on.

The epiphany came in 1996 when Roberts saw an advertisement in a Jewish magazine for a summit in Washington, D.C., called the Politics of Meaning. It was organized by Michael Lerner, a writer and Jewish rabbi.

The seminar took place on Roberts 58th birthday.

"So I said, "That's a sign,' " she recalled, sitting barefoot on the couch in the one-room studio she shares with her husband.

She came back with a loose idea to form a grass roots group that would promote a sense of community, cooperation and volunteerism, or as Roberts puts it, an ethics of caring. She founded the Institute for Ethics and Meaning later that year.

Out of the blue in 1999 she was invited to an Earth Charter conference in Italy. She didn't know exactly what it was all about until she got there and found that there was an international group of people doing exactly what she had in mind.

The document lays out a list of 16 principal goals, including "treat all living beings with respect and consideration" and "eradicate poverty as an ethical, social and environmental imperative."

"The concept of the Earth Charter is that all life is interdependent," Roberts said. "It's not only about cleaning up the air and the water, but it's also about economic justice. Actually, I cried when I first heard about it."

She had found her calling.

In June 2001, Roberts wrote a book called A Community Spirit of Caring Begins with You, a 286-page how-to guide on promoting community involvement.

In September of that year, just days after the terrorist attacks against the United States, she organized the first Earth Charter international summit, via satellite broadcast with volunteers in 12 different cities. The local portion was held at the University of Tampa's Pepin-Rood stadium, with a large screen TV and Danny Glover as the guest speaker.

The third annual summit will be in October at Hillsborough Community College, and an upcoming art show at Matthews Gallery on Hyde Park Avenue will help pay for the cause.

Roberts almost single-handedly raised the money for the 2001 summit, which cost $9,000 per city.

Since then, she's been called upon to speak at similar events around the world. Roberts believes destiny brought her to the Earth Charter.

"Without my even being aware of it, my life has put me at this point," she said.

AGE: 65

EDUCATION: Master's degree in counseling, bachelor's in psychology.

FAMILY: Husband, Brower; three daughters; two granddaughters; one grandson.

POSITION: President and founder, Institute for Ethics and Meaning.

HOW SHE PAYS THE BILLS: Social Security.

TYPICAL DAY: She spends her days soliciting donations and meeting with volunteers. She's also working to launch the Earth Scouts, a children's organization that encourages good citizenship and environmental awareness.

HEROES: Her father, Fred, who died in 1976; Nelson Mandela.

FAVORITE BOOK: The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future, by Riane Eisler.

MOST RECENT MOVIE SEEN: Pirates of the Caribbean.

EARLY ACHIEVEMENT: She started a Boy Scout troop for girls because she thought Girl Scouts and Brownies were boring.