Systems we learn in School

It was fun to play the Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader game, and then to move to more reflective questions to think critically about the education system, especially in Detroit. I was thinking about how primary school shaped me to stay within system parameters and be a people pleaser. I remember in high school there was a class where the history teacher played movies every class that were fictional depictions of historical events. To be honest, it was fun at first and gave time to work on other homework, but I became more and more ticked that the teacher was on her computer the whole time and didn’t teach anything. I wasn’t sure what we were even learning, since fact was never separated from fiction.

A friend of mine and I decided that if the teacher started up another movie, we would walk out of class. We did and went to the library to study. And I felt terrible. That was my one detention. But it wasn’t getting detention that bothered me – it was that I knew that although I had acted on my frustration, it hadn’t communicated the message I wanted to send. I was conflicted between the feelings of getting in trouble and not clearly expressing. Later, I went and apologized in tears to the teacher, trying to explain why I did it. I was completely unskilled in how to handle a situation like that – from how to voice a complaint to how to explain why it bothered me to translating it into change. Even service work and advocacy were taught within parameters – more about working in the system, and “helping” bandaid approaches… I was also oblivious to why that step over the systemic line was so painful and what it meant about how I had been institutionally trained to stay in line.

In that sense, the mindset I learned from primary school has been incorporated in a lot of my life. Part of school is navigating the system, and I’ve been good at that. Grant writing is similarly about navigating the system, meeting requirements, following rules, and I’ve been good at that, too. One of my biggest challenges has been breaking down those internalized structures, which I think is essential for real change and community organizing.

In college, I read Stanley Milgrim’s Obedience to Authority, which fundamentally changed how I think about socialized systems. I was fascinated by how one of the only people who refused to participate in the experiment was a priest, whose religiously-instilled values moved him to see past the superficial requirements of the study and to value humanity. This inspired me to study religions, to get at the fundamental values that fuel our humanity.

So when we talk about radical imagination and what that means for school curriculum, I think also about school culture and what we teach about humanity. We teach that the system is the end-all-be-all and force people to be measured according to that framework. We teach that the system can measure a person’s character, their ability, their grit, their worth – that it can even measure who can succeed and who cannot, that it can determine who is good and who is bad. And it fuels people within the system to believe and perpetuate these views. Not only are these disproportionate and damaging – of course they are also lies.

I know this isn’t especially helpful. But sometimes, you know, it feels powerful to look back at the big system monster that you maybe didn’t see but that has always been there, and say, We see what you did there, and we’re doing something about it.

Town Halls & Curriculum Feedback

I heard some snippets about how class went on Monday, and look forward to hearing more. This week I was in Ann Arbor during class time, helping to facilitate a town hall around curriculum reform. We’ve been pushing for more transparency and student leadership in the process, so I hope the Monday and Tuesday gatherings were helpful.

I joined the curriculum committee about a month ago. It has been an interesting time to tap in, because the reforms we’re talking about now are more than tweaks and changes – we’re talking about a cultural shift and big change to how SSW structures curriculum. While I recognize there is some resistance to this, I think students have been energized by the prospect of informing change, even if we won’t be here to experience the full transformation.

There was great feedback at both sessions, much of which we have talked about before but was important to push for again. A key point was the need to get away from Eurocentricity in curriculum / teaching and to not burden students with marginalized identities with speaking for their group / teaching, which is exhausting and takes away from their learning. Students highlighted courses like Afrocentric approaches and Microaggressions as courses that need to be more available to students or required.

Another theme was the need for more / better support from advisors and help with planning coursework, making sure requirements are being met, and making sure coursework support career goals. Some ideas are to create separate positions for people devoted to advising, rather than having faculty do it. We also talked about student cohorts for peer-to-peer support.

Other themes that came up were the need for more support and flexibility in taking coursework outside of the school, preference for shorter courses with lower credits, the need for more consistency across course sections, the need for more variety in practice area courses (mentioned by students in IP and in CO), more support for commuters and part-timers (e.g. hybrid courses, online alternatives, classes at other campuses), and skills-based practice/coursework.

To view curriculum materials, check your inbox for a link to the shared Google Drive folder, which includes the slides, meeting minutes, handouts, and additional materials. You can also fill out the Town Hall Curriculum Feedback survey to share ideas, questions, and reflections about curricular reform. (comments are anonymous!)

Collectives & Community Gardens

It was great to be at a Detroit location this morning, and to learn more about Grace in Action and the collectives/cooperative efforts. I was especially interested in the lending approach and process (reminded me of the Grameen approach to microcredit) and hearing about some of the examples of co-ops who are incubating or underway. It was also inspiring to hear Margo mention her trip to Boston and the work there around creating a system for community controlled economy as an approach to combat capitalism.

The topic of today’s facilitation fit quite well into this thinking of community systems and how they can be replicated and sustained. Reading about Growing Power was a great way to get us to think about how community gardens can be very successful but also face significant challenges. The video was a helpful supplement for the reading, and it was interesting to hear Will Allen explain “high-value” maximized space and another interviewee mention the environment impacts of shipping food into the city from far away, including wasted energy for transportation. The group activity was a great way to brainstorm and problem solve in the scenarios. It was particularly interesting to react to the university students wanting to help out with the community garden and to the potential grant from WalMart. As we discussed in class, there were a lot of unknowns, but it was a productive exercise to consider different angles (e.g. subcontracting, negotiation, etc).

As for our commitments to action around food and environmental justice, a first step for me is being a more responsible consumer by buying locally whenever I can. I do this to some extent, but I can do better. I can also advocate for healthful, community-sourced food at institutional meals/events, whether they be at my placement or SSW or elsewhere. Wherever I land, I would also love to eventually be part of a community garden, especially to engage youth in summer programs.

Final Project: Coloring Activity Book

It is done! As mentioned in my previous post about the project, I made a coloring activity book for youth to encourage their reflection about identity, community, and community engagement. Youth have power voices and energy for change; this activity is meant to help encourage and grow that so that youth engage in their communities and promote social justice.

I wanted the pages to welcome diverse characteristics, perspectives, and creativity, which made me initially struggle with what images and words to use. I wanted to encourage freedom, not inhibit it, even while providing a framework of images and questions for reflection. This approach to reflection directly aligns with social work ethics and values, including human dignity and relationships, self-determination, diversity and social justice.

Awareness of self, communities, and one another is incredibly important for engaging community systems and encouraging participation, and those are the focuses I have tried to emphasize. The activities and questions are meant to encourage participants to articulate and develop this awareness on the individual level but also in conversation with one another. Nothing is meant to be done in isolation; individual reflection is an extension of community connectivity.

The coloring activity book and corresponding facilitation guide are also meant to be driven by the youth. While the facilitator helps guide the process, the heart of the activity is what the youth create and the discussions they have. This was a value that was important to our classroom experience this semester.

Personally, one of the key lessons I learned from this assignment was re-learning creativity. At the beginning of the semester, I was really excited about the freedom we had to choose our projects, because we do get caught in typical formal papers, presentations, and assignment boxes. I had a lot of ideas about how I wanted to approach this project, but I found it was surprisingly difficult for me to get started. I worried that the images wouldn’t look right and gave myself many excuses for why certain images (e.g. people, flowers, symbols) wouldn’t work to the point that I wouldn’t draw anything. In the end, I did the page with the community descriptor words first, and the rest fell into place. I became better and letting myself make mistakes and embracing imperfections. It seems like such a simple lesson, but this project made me realize that while I love creative projects, I don’t have many opportunities (time…) to do them to completion.

During the hours that I was making the pages, I also had a lot of time to think about the images and prompts myself. As we have moved through this course, and in my field, other classes, and reflections, I have become more conscious of all of these components in social work practice, and I think it will make me a better social worker and support to others in social change. It also made me excited about learning how youth might respond, what stories they would share, and what creative outputs they’d come up with.

Below are the coloring activity book pages, as well as the facilitation guide. I think they could definitely grow (e.g. reflect on privilege, concepts of “right” and “wrong,” etc.) but feel that I hit the main areas I wanted to.

Welcome your thoughts and feedback!

Neighborhoods & Community Change

It was a pleasure to facilitate class with the group today; I learned a lot from the team, research, and class. Prior to class, I was interested to see real-life news in the neighborhoods that we used for the class activity (Financial District, San Francisco; Cheesman Park Neighborhood, Denver; Franklinton Neighborhood, Columbus). The Financial District went through the dot com boom and is home to several Fortune 500 companies (I mean, the name…).

Financial District

Cheesman Park has an interesting/disturbing history (Google “cheesman park haunted”). It was particularly interesting that the large park in the community is not available for private, fee-based activities, such as events, sports camps, etc. Although not everyone was happy about this, decision makers were adamant about not wanting to monetize park activity.

Cheesman Park

Franklinton was the first Columbus neighborhood and has been seen as a prime location for young professionals commuting to the city. There is an interesting split between East and West sides of the neighborhood, divided by the interstate, where the East side has developed into an arts district and the West is low-income and depopulated. In the context of our group discussions, it was interesting to think about how the numbers compare with the stories.

At the end of 2017, Columbus city officials announced this massive construction project in the Franklinton neighborhood… It will include ~1,700 residential units (10% of project), and the rest will be for office space, a hotel, and store fronts.

Of course, I wish we would have had more time to talk in small groups as well as expand the larger group discussion. Although there was agreement about where Damazon should land (in Falling Water Springs aka Financial District), I would have liked to talk more about the problem of not being able to make decisions that way in real life, or about how other fields – such as business – don’t have the same way of thinking. It would have been interesting to relate it to Anthony’s discussion of collective impact approaches/processes. I love the concept of collective impact and hope we will have more opportunities to talk about real strategies to achieve it, because that kind of collaboration and buy-in is tough! But important. How could collective impact approaches support revitalization and jettison gentrification?

Imagining Solutions

Dave Loewenstein

The museum setting in the poem by Fanny Choi reminded me of the book Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel. It is an apocalypse or dystopia story, and there is a history museum of civilization that displays things that no longer exist like cell phones and newspapers. It’s interesting to put the present into a futuristic lens that way, and imagine the context that embodies that future. In the criminal justice breakout group, we considered prison abolition as the future radical space, but there were so many problems and barriers in the here and now.

Our group started to talk about criminalization with marijuana and associated records, arrests, and incarceration. It made me think of a policy initiative in Michigan to provide citizens with the opportunity to use marijuana recreationally, which is planned for the November ballot. The initiative would “de-criminalize” marijuana use so that citizens could not be arrested for mere possession and use of the product. Drivers also could not be arrested for having a minimal amount of THC in their blood. Instead, it would have to be shown that they were “substantially impaired.” This would reduce the number of people incarcerated for marijuana violations. Some members of the coalition wanted to include provisions for nullifying past convictions for marijuana possession but they were convinced to abandon these provisions to help ensure that the initiative was passed.

The ballot initiative does not address racial inequities in a substantial way. The main aim of the initiative is largely based on economic gains. First, an implicit outcome of the initiative is to create a greatly expanded marijuana industry, one that would undoubtedly reflect the current inherent racial bias of business in Michigan – and the U.S. in general. It would contribute to the increasing income and wealth inequality resulting from biased economic policies; e.g., reductions in corporate taxation with the burdens falling on the poor and marginalized. Second, this initiative doesn’t fully address the gross inequities in arrest and incarceration of people of color related to marijuana. Although the ballot initiative eliminates the unreliable measures currently used to determine marijuana use (the “substantive impairment” measure focused on drivers) it does not address racial inequities that can flow from police discretion. And then finally, there seems to be little or no desire on the part of the initiative groups to address past marijuana incarcerations once the initiative is passed.

This is an initiative that is still operating within the system. It is concerned about legalization but is in many ways limited to what they think they can get buy-in for. So is this initiative really a step in the right direction, or is it more of the same? Do we take “wins” where we can (e.g. recreational legalization)?

Anyway, that’s what came to mind. I loved radical imagination as the focus of the activity and appreciated the exercise of briefly thinking outside of and breaking down our typical systemic boxes.

Art, Community, and the Stories We’re Told

Like many of us expressed, I thought the video was a great illustration of how graffiti and graffiti artists are criminalized. In only a few minutes, the news source managed to weave a layered narrative to convince its audience that graffiti is bad, artless, and harming the community. It incorporated fear, money, concern for city beauty…

It was interesting that the “victims” of this were not only the community members who had to suffer eye sores and pay for graffiti to be painted over, but also the workers whose turmoil is characterized by having to climb a “rocky slope” up to the underpass to paint. The drama of this was ridiculous, because I highly doubt the intended audience of this video would otherwise be concerned about the city workers, except to further their own demands and argument. Over break, I finally read Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng, and seeing this video and seeing this video, especially the way workers were represented, made me think THAT IS SO SHAKER HEIGHTS OF THEM. Where there is a strong narrative of right and wrong, criminal and “good,” and people become instruments to perpetuate it.

Watching the documentary in class that also inspired this group’s topic made me similarly interested in the use and definition of public and private space in gentrified neighborhoods. I believe that graffiti is art that should not be criminalized on the basis of it being graffiti. But what about when it is used in public spaces that the community does not support? And what happens when a neighborhood is gentrified and – as shown in the documentary and discussed in class – the community voice is subjugated by the voice of the gentry?… We know the answer, right?

I thought the facilitation brought up some great ideas and discussion. I personally get uncomfortable with competitive activities, but I think the appeal for funding activity was useful for getting us to think about the topic differently and brought up additional interesting reflections. For example, it was interesting to reflect on the language we used to “sell” our ideas to the funding panel, which brought up thoughts about catering to the system in order to do the work. I also appreciated the exercise of thinking carefully about the terminology we use (e.g. graffiti, street art, murals), and the questions posed, like “What is good for a community,” and “who decides?”

The class also reminded me of a TED Radio Hour interview with the artists Titus Kaphar. His TED talk is below.

Plans for the Final Project

For my final project, I am making a coloring activity book to encourage youth to think about community and community action. I started out thinking I would make an art journal, but moved toward something participatory rather than personal as the semester went on. The idea is that youth (probably fifth grade and up) could work on the books in a facilitated group, which would guide self-reflection, give space for coloring and doodling to encourage brainstorming and creative expression, be a social activity for youth to connect with their peers, and promote community reflection and civic participation. It will cover themes like “What is a community,” to “What communities are you a part of,” to “What is something you can do for your community…”

It has been surprisingly challenging to work on, because I am struggling to balance the structure of a coloring book – with words and images already in place to be filled in – and freedom for creativity and self-expression. I really admire artists like Lynda Barry who excite curiosity and creativity in other people through unconventionality in her art, and I want to give space for that kind of free creative process for young people. Some of the questions brought up in class yesterday also play into this. In particular, who decides what art is, or what good art is? I want to move away from “good” and “bad” and just give space to reflect and make meaning.

One of Lynda Barry’s books:

Alongside the activity book, I plan to draft a facilitator guide for a teacher or youth leader. The guide would include instructions for the book to share with the youth (e.g. this is your book to do with what you want, the intention) and additional questions or activities for the group. In addition to the personal reflection piece of working on the book individually, I envision the group also talking among themselves at their work spaces about their thoughts and experiences, sharing with partners, and interacting as a group. By making it interactive, the goal is to encourage story sharing, perspectives, and personal truths, as well as an awareness and celebration of other people. I hope it would help youth to be both learners and teachers.

Leadership in Action

I appreciated Grace Lee Boggs’ point that we need to rethink the concept of leaders, both to recognize that we are leaders and to not mistake leadership as a hierarchy, where one person’s leadership necessitates another’s follower-ship. We tend to uphold “leaders” and “heroes” as Western ideals – individuals who stand above the rest, perpetuating single-centered narratives rather than group or community ones. These narratives feed popular media that centers on one main character and a supporting, supplementary cast, and group and community narratives are unusual. Black Panther, for example, centers on community and culture, rather than an individualist perspective or agenda.

Similarly, a question that I am helping my field agency explore is how to encourage youth civic participation, especially when preparing them to be active and informed voters as adults. A key of this is youth recognizing themselves as leaders while engaging with people. Wernick, Woodford and Kulick talk about the limitations of progressive theater initiatives that encourage LGBTQQ youth participation but not youth autonomy (I like that the article distinguishes between ideas of leaders and “powerholders”). Instead, youth – like those who were interviewed in the Matrix Theater Company – are energized by their relationships with one another, personal agency, decision power, creative freedom, relationships with supportive adults/”powerholders”, social responsiveness, and collective impact.

I also liked thinking about Castells’ point – in addition to identity, recognizing that “social movements are emotional movements” and “a social movement starts with the transformation of emotion into action” (13). It makes sense that theater and media, which are expressive and emotional outlets, can be a powerful mode for social response.

Maintenance

One of the reasons I admire One Love Global, where I’m doing field work, is that they are collaborative and coalition-driven. They are thoughtful about the need to work with others and to help them work with each other, from community members and youth, to grassroots organizations and religious institutions, to political leadership and government institutions, and so on. I find this unusual among nonprofits, at least in my experience, because of competition for funding, brand recognition, and programmatic reach.

I am becoming more involved in the coalition building and maintenance work, and, in line with the readings this week, am thinking about what I/we can be doing to support coalition member engagement. Some of the challenges I am noticing early into this work is low turnout for monthly meeting calls and disengagement among members who span across the state, which I know are interrelated issues. I think part of it is that we focus too much on steering the work and reporting out to members, rather than creating space for shared stories and learning. There is the added complexity that Butterfoss and Kegler talk about of different levels of roles and engagement among members, which to me – an unfamiliar newcomer – are still unknown, and organizationally are undocumented.

Over the coming weeks, I will be reaching out to coalition members to hear about their communities, work, strengths, and needs in relation to the coalition mission and milestones. In other words, how can we facilitate cooperation and better pool resources, mobilize talents, and create synergy?

Once I’ve connected with more coalition members, I think a key will be facilitating check-ins, information sharing, and saying thank you often. I like a case example on the Community Tool Box website re. coalitions that talks about the human elements of coalition maintenance and how a manager made sure to check in often, say thank you often and congratulate, and let people know they were needed. The coalition also “practiced maintenance regularly through restatement of the mission, goal-setting, communication among members and with the community, follow-up, and constant reevaluation of the Coalition’s goals and direction.” I’ll be working on integrating these practices into my every day.