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Tuesday, December 31, 2013
[Minnesota Rising Dispatch] December 2013
Monday, December 30, 2013
The journey
Copyright (c) 123RF Stock Photos
"It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters in the end."
-Ursula K. Le Guin
Friday, December 27, 2013
You're Invited | 2014 MMEP Conference: Education Equity in Action!
If the price tag is too much, consider requesting one last holiday gift in order to attend the 2014 MMEP Conference: Education Equity in Action! For educators, learners, and community leaders alike, this year's event features two stellar keynote speakers and session topics ranging from race equity and excellence policies and plans, how to end student discipline disparities in schools, and collective impact initiatives. Save the date for the premier multicultural multi-sectored gathering around education equity policy and practice!
Maria Hinojosa
A Conference Bringing together Educators, Community leaders, Students, and Advocates around Education Equity and Practice in Minnesota
MMEP’s statewide conference will be held at Coffman Union, at the University of Minnesota on Thursday, February 13, 2014– past MMEP conferences have attracted over 400 educators, policymakers, and community leaders, and students and garnered media attention from MPR and local media outlets to highlight the phenomenal keynote speakers, presentations, and community of collaborative leaders in addressing education equity and excellence in Minnesota.
The theme this year is “Education Equity in Action: A Conference for Educators, Community leaders, Students, and Advocates” – and will highlight emerging education equity work in Minnesota.
There will be plenary sessions throughout the day focusing on:
- School and Community Race Equity and Excellence Policies and Plans
- How and Why to End Student Discipline Disparities in Schools:
- Collective Impact Initiatives for Aligning “cradle to career” School & Community Action
- Pathways for Teachers of Color
Keynote Speakers
Dr. David Stovall
“Organizing Youth and Families to Address the Discipline Gap”
David Stovall is an Associate Professor of Educational Policy Studies and African-American Studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC). His scholarship investigates four areas 1) Critical Race Theory, 2) concepts of social justice in education, 3) the relationship between housing and education, and 4) the relationship between schools and community stakeholders. In the attempt to bring theory to action, he has spent the last ten years working with community organizations and schools to develop curriculum that address issues of social justice. His current work has led him to become a member of the Greater Lawndale/Little Village School of Social Justice High School design team, which opened in the Fall of 2005 where he also serves as a volunteer social studies teacher.
Furthering his work with communities, students, and teachers, Dr. Stovall works with a collective of college professors in California, Arizona, and New York who teach high school courses in addition to their duties and responsibilities as university faculty. “I’ve been working with this group for eight years. The idea is to provide historically underserved schools with college access through their interactions with us. We've been enrolling the students that take classes with us in our respective universities to get early college credit.”
Dr. Stovall, a native of Chicago graduated from Luther HS South in 1990. He received his undergraduate degree and Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. His motivation for going into the field was the combination of family members, neighbors, and members of community organizations that supported him in doing educational justice work without fear of persecution. Dr. Stovall is a very powerful speaker and champion of social justice.
Maria Hinojosa
“Demographic Shift and its Impact on US Education Policy”
Maria Hinojosa is an award-winning trailblazer in news and investigative journalism. Her over 25-year history reporting on critical issues and focusing on the changing cultural and political landscape in America and abroad have won her the highest levels of recognition in journalism, including: four Emmys; the 2012 John Chancellor Award for Excellence in Journalism; the Robert F. Kennedy Award for Reporting on the Disadvantaged; the Studs Terkel Community Media Award; and the Edward R. Murrow Award from the Overseas Press Club for best documentary for “Child Brides: Stolen Lives,” among other awards.
In April 2010, Hinojosa took her mission of reporting on stories ignored or overlooked by mainstream media to another level by creating the Futuro Media Group, a multimedia nonprofit production company based in Harlem with the mission of giving voice to the social and civic justice issues facing a more diverse America. In addition to producing Latino USA, Futuro Media is also developing America by the Numbers with Maria Hinojosa, a series for public television to be distributed spring 2014. America by the Numbers will be the first national programming dedicated to documenting and demystifying the dramatic demographic changes that are occurring in the U.S. and examining the new American mainstream – the growing numbers of Asians, Latinos, African Americans, mixed race, immigrants, women, youth and LGBTs who are increasingly determining the outcomes of elections and influencing arts, culture, and commerce. Futuro Media is also committed to training the next generation of journalists to become reporters, filmmakers, and multimedia producers, and using its media products to expand public space, staging civic engagement events to further democracy and enlarge the national conversation about policy and priorities.
Hinojosa has worked as an anchor and reporter for PBS’ Need To Know series and the talk show Maria Hinojosa: One-on-One from WGBH/La Plaza, as senior correspondent at Now on PBS and for NPR, and for eight years as CNN's urban affairs correspondent. In October 2011, she was the first Latina to anchor a Frontline report, “Lost in Detention,” exploring abuse at immigrant detention facilities. Hinojosa has documented hundreds of important stories - from immigrant work camps in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, to teen girl victims of on-the-job sexual harassment, to the poor in Alabama, and youth violence in urban communities.
She is currently the anchor and executive producer of NPR’s long-running weekly program, Latino USA, celebrating its 20 year anniversary and considered the program of record for Latino news, culture and issues of critical importance to the Latino community and that impact the US population.
Hinojosa has been a weekly syndicated columnist for King Features/Hearst and is the author of two books. She was born in Mexico City, raised in Chicago, and received her BA from Barnard College. She is currently the Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz Chair of Latin American and Latino Studies at DePaul University in Chicago, and lives with her husband, artist German Perez, and their son and daughter in New York.
Thursday, December 26, 2013
Accepting Applications: Lead a workshop, reading group, or class with EXCO!
It's the time of year where sharing is caring, and EXCO invites you to share what you know! Submit your application today to lead a workshop, reading group, or class in 2014. EXCO supports people to teach or facilitate free classes and workshops in their communities, and is building a community around education for social change!
Lead a workshop, reading group, or class with EXCO!
At EXCO, everyone can teach or take classes and all classes are free!
EXCOtc is Experimental Community Education of the Twin Cities. We promote visions of a better world, offer free and open classes, and are building a community around education for social change.
See our website - www.excotc.org - for more info and to register for classes, or contact us at 651-998-9268 or excotc@gmail.com
Keep up with us on facebook. Like our page!
Wednesday, December 25, 2013
Given with affection
Copyright (c) 123RF Stock Photos
"Every gift which is given, even though is be small, is in reality great, if it is given with affection."
-Pindar
Tuesday, December 24, 2013
December Update from Leaders of Today & Tomorrow
On the eve of a day when we all typically get gifts, the Leaders of Today and Tomorrow (LOTT) program provides an update on their exciting news-to-date and invites you to make a gift to support their programming before year's-end. Read on for details about the LOTT mentorship program and for a glimpse of the excitement on the faces of this year's Fellows and Mentors!
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Monday, December 23, 2013
Thursday, December 19, 2013
Accepting Applications: Call for "Toward a More Perfect Union" Host Communities
The Minnesota Humanities Center wonders whether our communities feel a common connection to the Constitution. Not quite sure where you land on the topic? Join a groundbreaking "community of Minnesota communities" who are talking about the United States Constitution and host your own conversations with your local community. More details below and online!
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[Blog Buddies] Built to adapt
The Minnesota Rising 2013 Un/Conference: Cultivating Capacity for Collective Leadership was a great success, by the numbers and beyond the benchmarks. Read below from my recent YNPN Twin Cities blog post, "Built to adapt," about how emerging leaders in Minnesota are beginning to envision and live into a new future for our state!
Monday, December 16, 2013 at 9:24PM
by Diane Tran
follow me on Twitter: @MinnesotaRising
Built to adapt
Monday, December 16, 2013 at 9:24PMby Diane Tranfollow me on Twitter: @MinnesotaRising
Hosted on November 16, 2013, the Minnesota Rising 2013 Un/Conference: Cultivating Capacity for Collective Leadership was a great success by the numbers, featuring 125 attendees, 14 breakout sessions (including 4 Open Space sessions generated that morning), 9 sponsors, and 27 Network Partners. Workshop topics spanned the art of facilitating conversations that matter, low-cost or no-cost spatial analysis and mapping tools, building networks and careers through peer mentoring, and philanthropy trends for the rising generation. The agenda was jam-packed and fast-paced, and per the evaluation comments, sparked innumerable connections, newly highlighted incredible organizations and opportunities, and prompted lots of fun and merriment!
While these individual connections and takeaways are of critical importance, more valuable yet was the shared emphasis throughout the day on a future focus and concern for the whole of Minnesota. The morning kicked off with a rousing keynote by Sondra Samuels, President and CEO of the Northside Achievement Zone, a collaboration of organizations and schools partnering to prepare children to graduate from high school ready for college. Sondra spoke to the myriad skills she employs to bring partners together to end multigenerational poverty within North Minneapolis using education as a lever, acknowledging that the leadership of an organization determines the culture. In quoting an old maxim, she made one point that particularly resonated with attendees: “People don’t fear change. They fear loss.”
This admission led to the proposal of an open space session entitled, “What are we willing to lose?” which sought to discover what we are truly willing to give up in order to bring about the change that we seek in the world. In the spirit of appreciative inquiry, this question continues to be at the heart of Minnesota Rising’s exploration, rearticulated to acknowledge that when we are willing to give up the comfortable and familiar, we can open up space for a new world that perhaps looks more like the one we are seeking to emerge. To this end, we can instead ask:
- What do we stand to gain by losing what we have, especially when what we have now smacks of partisanship, disparities and achievement gaps, and broken systems?
- How can letting go of the idea of building permanent things (buildings, institutions, organizations) allow the values and principles we admire to sustain over the long-term?
- How can shedding the belief that we know what leadership looks like (and if you don’t bear a resemblance, you’re not a leader) allow ever more people and more expansive ways of contributing and giving to flourish?
This line of questioning also took root in a rapid-prototyping activity following the lunchtime Show and Tell session at the Un/Conference. After the release of the initial findings of the “Our Minnesota” Cascading Conversations Tour, small groups gathered and used human-centered design methodologies to develop prototypes illustrating the future of education, government and public policy, the arts, healthcare, nonprofits, and more in Minnesota. Teams created mixed-media posters and fashioned pipe cleaners into symbols depicting more connected, values-based, and innovative solutions to the sectors and issues they care most about, taking the first step toward collectively imagining a different future for our state and communities.
As we continue examining how we might cultivate capacity for collective leadership, we must remember that change will come whether we welcome it or not. As the old proverb advises, “This, too, shall pass.” Holding too tightly to a past that isn’t serving every last person in our communities well, will not serve us well. By recognizing that we collectively stand to gain even in the midst of loss, by letting go of facades of perpetuity in favor of enduring values, and by expanding our definitions of what leadership looks like and welcoming a broader diversity of contributions into the fold, our generation can move beyond “built to last,” and help Minnesota become a place that is “built to adapt.”
Wednesday, December 18, 2013
You're Invited: 2013 Homeless Memorial March and Service
In the midst of a season of holiday spirit and giving, it is important to give pause and thanks for the gifts that we are given and the people who cross our paths. The annual Homeless Memorial March is a 2.5 mile silent march and vigil to honor those who have died in 2013 while homeless, formerly homeless, or advocating for the homeless community. See below for additional details to participate and consider submitting a name for inclusion in this year's service.
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