[WARNING: Yes, I'm journaling for a class again. I'm not sure if these self reflective experiences find me or I find them. Nevertheless, I'm writing weekly reflection papers about a hands-on project I'm doing as part of Marshall Ganz's "Organizing: People, Power and Change" class at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. I've connected with a great AmeriCorps program in Lawrence, YouthBuild and we're working toward organizing young adults in Lawrence to have a stronger voice in their community. Sounds easy huh?]
Week 1 [02/20/08]:
As I stood in front of a room of strangers, a YouthBuild member asked me why I was there and it took me a second to answer. I came to MIT (and this class actually) on the advice of a good friend and confidant, Leo Burd. He and I shared a passion for not only making media and technology, but also empowering other people to use it to become more active in their community to enact social change. However, our shared values of individual voice, creativity, and authentic participation don’t always easily translate into a concrete (and explainable) interests.
Two factors led me to YouthBuild Lawrence. First, I’m rooted in Lawrence in my graduate studies because it is a site that holds both challenge and opportunity for my interests: economic inequality, established and new immigrant groups, and deep (but often spoken) narratives. Thus, I spent the last semester immersed in exploring the identities and interests of the key actors, such as public sector and community organization employees, youth workers, and youth themselves. Many of the accepted community leaders are concentrated on expanding business opportunities in the city, while the many of the citizens are working for their existence needs. But the youth, who I always seem to come back to, have the most fascinating interests. Many of them want their community to offer more opportunities for growth and empowerment but many of them just dream of “getting out.” They see corruption, poverty, and stagnancy in their parents, teacher, leaders, and peers and see their only mode of agency as escape, reflecting for me evidence of the third face of power.
So, what’s the second reason I’m at YouthBuild Lawrence? I think it’s rooted in my family’s value of service and that’s why I connected with the mechanisms of AmeriCorps, as a member and eventually a leader, without consciously realizing it. But I often struggled with a program that seems to benefit the participant more than the community he/she serves and doesn’t allow service to evolve in activism. YouthBuild Lawrence expressed an interest in moving toward their participants more towards activism, such a voter registration campaign. I wanted to start with an established group of youth who also valued service and individual empowerment, but want to take it a step further.
When I first arrived at YouthBuild, they threw me straight into the hot seat. Within twenty minutes, I was leading them in brainstorming session about the aspects they like and dislike about their community. Many of their frustrations with the political system bubbled to the surface, but I had to constantly ask them who the amorphous “they” many often complained about. The youth were frustrated with both the visible face and gatekeeper powers held by older adults in their community. But the youth group’s problem is one of collaboration because their common interest is not clear, and probably coupled with some education and technical needs as well. And thus my offer to help foster their voices and tools for activism was quickly accepted. I know why I’m there now; the next step is to demystify the abstractions such at the “they” who seem to hold the third type of power and narrow their frustration down to one issue with a tangible action to act.
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