Community Voices for Health Offers $660K Grant Opportunity

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In case you haven’t heard, the Community Voices for Health initiative is offering a large grant opportunity to strengthen engagement infrastructure. The initiative is supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), with technical assistance from NCDD member organization Public Agenda and Altarum. From the Community Voices for Health site…

“The goal of Community Voices for Health is to build stronger engagement infrastructure that involves a broader range of people, especially marginalized and underserved communities – so their voices are heard in healthcare policymaking decisions, their efforts to solved problems are supported, and their community networks are strengthened. Community-based organizations or networks are invited to apply for up to $660,000 to support projects spanning 30 months. A total of six grants will be awarded. ”

The application deadline is Monday, October 7th. You can learn more about the grant opportunity below and on the RWJF site here, and we encourage you to check out the Community Voices for Health site here.

Community Voices for Health 2019 Call for Proposals

Purpose

The overarching goal of this new initiative, Community Voices for Health, is to support ongoing ways for people to engage—to help their voices be a part of decisions around health care, social service, and public health systems; to support their efforts to solve problems; and to strengthen their community networks. We will award up to six grants, one per state, to lead organizations in 20 eligible states (see “Eligibility Criteria” below). Lead organizations should be public charities that are nonprofit community-based organizations or statewide networks of community-based organizations. Although the grant is awarded to one lead organization, each grantee will be expected to work with a range of partners and other stakeholders—such as public agencies; health care systems; public health departments and leaders; researchers; university-based centers; membership associations; and social service providers.

The initiative seeks to learn from a range of approaches developed by community partners, and acknowledges there are many approaches to meeting the goal. This call for proposals therefore allows for some flexibility in key areas, such as the geographic or issue focus. Specifically, while the project might start by focusing on a single issue such as housing or mental health, it should be designed to produce an infrastructure that can take on other issues affecting people’s health. Proposals can be statewide in scope or focus on a community or metro region, as long as they connect residents with state-level decisions and/or establish infrastructure that could be adopted in many other locations across a state.

Eligibility and Selection Criteria

All states face challenges with respect to increasing and sustaining engagement, but the nature of those challenges varies from state to state. To maximize learnings from this project, we took into consideration a number of factors designed to capture this diversity including, but not limited to, geography, demographics, and policy climate. Community Voices for Health grants are open to organizations based in and working in the following states: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, and Virginia.While each collaborating organization should be described in detail in the proposal, only one organization may represent the collaboration and be the lead contact in the application process. The applicant/lead organization must be recognized as a public charity under Sections 501(c)(3) nonprofit status.

In addition, the applicant/lead organization should have a demonstrated history of managing funds to support non-lobbying advocacy efforts or, a mix of lobbying and nonlobbying efforts. Applicants should also indicate whether they have an existing relationship with legal counsel with expertise in the lobbying and political activity restrictions that apply to public charities and private foundations.  A small portion of grant funds may be used to retain legal counsel with relevant expertise, if an applicant does not yet have counsel in place.

You can read this on the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation at www.rwjf.org/en/library/funding-opportunities/2019/community-voices-for-health.html.

We encourage you to check out the Community Voices for Health site at www.communityvoicesforhealth.org/.

The 2019 Florida Council for the Social Studies Annual Conference: Highlighting Some More of the Exhibitors!

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Good afternoon friends! Don’t forget that the 2019 Florida Council for the Social Studies Annual Conference is coming soon (and you can register here!). Not only do we have some excellent sessions planned, but we also have some fine exhibitors joining us. Today, we’ll highlight a few more (and don’t forget about some of the other ones that we covered earlier!).

The Florida Joint Center for Citizenship at the Lou Frey Institute

 
If you are reading this blog, you are likely familiar with the Florida Joint Center for Citizenship at UCF’s Lou Frey Institute. If you aren’t, take a look here and find out what we have to offer you to support your work in teaching civics, government, and US history. Or just visit our table at FCSS! We are excited to be able to still attend and support the Florida Council for the Social Studies and continue our outreach to teachers new and old!

Step Up America

step up

Step Up America joins FCSS at its annual conference again this year, and I know FCSS is happy to have them there. If you aren’t familiar with the good work that these folks do, be sure to check out their website and visit their space in the exhibit hall. Their Franklin Project is a unique learning experience that engages students of all ages. Ben Franklin comes directly into the classroom and interacts in real-time with students to present them with the civics and history lessons that are required by state standards. Be sure to stop by and say hi!

The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History

GL

FCSS is thrilled to have Gilder Lehrman joining us at this year’s conference. Be sure to visit their website as well as their space during the conference. Oh, and they are also doing what looks to be an excellent session!

The Arnold-Liebster Foundation

arnoldliebster

The Arnold-Liebster Foundation has a mission that is so important in this day and age. From their website:

The Arnold-Liebster Foundation seeks to promote peace, tolerance, human rights, and religious freedom by peaceful and nonpolitical means. Building on the Holocaust-era experiences of its founders, Max Liebster and Simone Arnold Liebster, the foundation supports historical research, teacher training, educational seminars, scholarly publications, roundtable discussions, museum exhibitions, film showings, and similar projects.

Through these activities, the foundation especially aims to help young people to repudiate racism, xenophobic nationalism, and violence, and to learn to listen to the voice of conscience.

Be sure to stop by and visit their space at the conference and see how they can play a role in helping your students understand their responsibilities in civic life and community.

And More! 

We’ll highlight additional exhibitors and sessions over the course of the next few weeks. Be sure to check this space for more! Register for the conference today! 

Learn here about the keynote!

Check out some of the sessions! and here!  and here! 

American Founders Month: Deborah Sampson!

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Check out the National Constitution Center’s biographies of the Founding Fathers! https://constitutioncenter.org/learn/educational-resources/founding-fathers

It’s Founders Month here in Florida! According to the Florida Department of Education,

Section (s.) 683.1455, Florida Statutes (F.S.), designates the month of September as American Founders‘ Month and s. 1003.421, F.S., recognizes the last full week of classes in September in public schools as Celebrate Freedom Week.

So what does this mean for our schools and kids and teachers? Basically, it’s time to do some learning about the men and women who have helped shape this state and this country. Here on our Florida Citizens blog, we’ll be doing at least two posts a week with a brief overview of a particular Founder, Framer, thinker, or shaper of this state or this nation and how they made an impact.

deborah sampson

Are you familiar with Deborah Sampson? If not, you should be, for we might consider her a Founding Mother, and certainly perhaps the first woman in US history to get a military pension.

She was born the poor daughter of a poor though preeminent family, a great granddaughter of founding Pilgrims Myles Standish and William Bradford. She was indentured at age 10, completing her service at 18 and then working as a self-educated teacher in Massachusetts. But in the heat of war, as the Revolution raged, she felt she had to do something more. She wanted to fight. But she was a woman, and that was impossible. Or was it?

She disguised herself as a man, and served as a light infantry scout, led men in battle, was wounded more than once (and taking care of the wounds herself, less her true sex be exposed) and served proudly as a soldier in Revolutionary Army. But then she fell ill and lost consciousness, and was then honorably discharged from the army. She married, had children, and traveled the new country telling her story.

“Four years after Sampson’s death at age 66, her husband petitioned Congress for pay as the spouse of a soldier. Although the couple was not married at the time of her service, in 1837 the committee concluded that the history of the Revolution “furnished no other similar example of female heroism, fidelity and courage.” He was awarded the money, though he died before receiving it.”

sampson marer

You can learn more about Deborah Sampson by visiting Mount Vernon’s excellent overview of her life and service! 

You can get a copy of the slide on Deborah Sampson here: Sampson AFM 2019

Join the Launch of Harwood’s New Book – Stepping Forward

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NCDD member Rich Harwood of The Harwood Institute has an upcoming book coming out that you won’t want to miss the launch of on Tuesday, October 1st! From The Harwood Institute announcement…

In Stepping Forward, Rich Harwood provides a new and inspiring blueprint for how we can rediscover what we share in common and build upon it in a way that engenders authentic hope.

Register below to join Rich on October 1 at 1 PM ET to celebrate the official launch of Stepping Forward! In a special online event, Rich will be discussing how you can begin to put the principles outlined in this book into action.

The launch of his new book will also kick off the Stepping Forward Campaign! We encourage you to read more about the book and the campaign in the post below, and explore even more on The Harwood Institute site here.

A New Path Forward

Many of us are frustrated by the divisive nature of our public discourse, mistrust and broken promises. We lack hope that we can bridge our divides, come together and get things done.

Rich Harwood offers a new path forward. He argues that we don’t have to accept the divisions, gridlock and negativity happening in our country. He knows, from working in communities for more than 30 years, that we can rediscover what we share in common and actively build upon it.

Stepping Forward shows us how to channel our frustrations, energies, and aspirations to get on a more hopeful path. This book shows us how we can step forward to —

  • Turn Outward to see and hear each other again and afford every person human dignity
  • Rediscover what we share in common by focusing on our shared aspirations, even amid our real difference
  • Recognize we must tap into our innate capabilities to produce meaningful change
  • Forge a new shared responsibility to marshal community resources to solve problems and harness people’s yearning for genuine engagement
  • Create a new can-do narrative by focusing on civic parables that remind us that we can be actors, shapers and builders of our shared lives

To get the country moving in a better direction, these efforts must start in our local communities. Then we can restore our can-do spirit and faith in ourselves. You don’t need to wait. STEP FORWARD.

Stepping Forward Campaign Launches October 1!

A book tour asks you to listen. We’re asking you to step forward.

The Stepping Forward Campaign is a national call to action. Rich Harwood is embarking on a two-year campaign to speak about how we can put our communities and our country on a more hopeful path.

This campaign can help you:

  • Take a leading role in improving people’s lives and doing that work in a way that builds the community
  • Mobilize community leaders and others to take action and improve your community
  • Stop feeling stuck and provide a clear path to move forward
  • Build momentum towards positive, lasting change

The Stepping Forward Campaign launches on October 1, 2019. Be one of the first to host a campaign event and bring this important message to your community.

You can learn more about the Stepping Forward book and campaign on The Harwood Institute site at www.steppingforwardbook.org/#about-the-book-section.

community engagement and student success in college

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You can now get the recording and associated slides for the AAC&U webinar entitled “The Confounding Promise of Community: Why It Matters More Than Ever for Student Success.” I was a bit of an outlier because I talked about college students’ learning in social movements, taking as my text a 1961 article by Martin Luther King, Jr. on that topic. My comments were based on my article, “Another Time for Freedom? Lessons from the Civil Rights Era for Today’s Campuses.” For me, “community” meant social movements that may target institutions for change.

The excellent other presenters mainly discussed projects that are based in their colleges and engage the communities around them: Ventura County, CA, San Diego, Newark, NJ, and Queens, NY. I thought they demonstrated that their institutions are components (or even “anchors”) of those communities. So instead of saying that their students “go into” communities, we might conclude that their students belong to communities and learn beyond the classroom.

American Founders Month: The Sons of Liberty!

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Check out the National Constitution Center’s biographies of the Founding Fathers! https://constitutioncenter.org/learn/educational-resources/founding-fathers

It’s Founders Month here in Florida! According to the Florida Department of Education,

Section (s.) 683.1455, Florida Statutes (F.S.), designates the month of September as American Founders‘ Month and s. 1003.421, F.S., recognizes the last full week of classes in September in public schools as Celebrate Freedom Week.

So what does this mean for our schools and kids and teachers? Basically, it’s time to do some learning about the men and women who have helped shape this state and this country. Here on our Florida Citizens blog, we’ll be doing at least two posts a week with a brief overview of a particular Founder, Framer, thinker, or shaper of this state or this nation and how they made an impact.
Sept 14 Sons of Liberty

American Founders’ Month in Florida continues today with a look at the Sons of Liberty. The Sons of Liberty were a sometimes controversial secret society devoted to combating what it perceived as British oppression by any means necessary.

While they may be most famous for organizing boycotts of British goods and dumping tea into Boston Harbor, they also took sometimes-violent action against people seen as serving British interests. We all recall, for example, those images from the era that illustrate Sons of Liberty tarring and feathering British tax collectors.

Philip_Dawe_(attributed),_The_Bostonians_Paying_the_Excise-man,_or_Tarring_and_Feathering_(1774)_-_02

The Bostonian Paying the Excise-Man, 1774 British propaganda print, referring to the tarring and feathering, of Boston Commissioner of Customs John Malcolm four weeks after the Boston Tea Party. The men also poured hot tea down Malcolm’s throat

The Sons of Liberty were sometimes extreme in their pursuit of liberty; was that extremism always justified? How can we really say, from our own vantage point today? What a fascinating discussion we can have! You can learn more about the fascinating Sons of Liberty and its role in the Boston Tea Party from the Massachusetts Historical Society. 

Grab the PowerPoint slide featured in this post: Sons of Liberty AFM

Wednesday Webinar Roundup ft September Confab and Many More!

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As part of our Wednesday webinar roundup, we are excited to announce our September Confab call featuring Purple Project for Democracy. Purple is a non-partisan coalition, campaign and movement to rediscover and recommit to democratic values and institutions. Learn more about the opportunities for the dialogue and deliberation field to contribute to the November launch campaign and the next phases of this effort. This free call will be on Monday, September 30th from 1-2 pm Eastern, 10- 11 am Pacific. Register today so you don’t miss out on this exciting opportunity!

Here are the upcoming D&D online events happening over the next few weeks, including NCDD sponsor org The Courageous Leadership Project, NCDD member org  National Issues Forums Institute and Living Room Conversations, as well as, from the International Association of Facilitators (IAF) and the International Associate for Public Participation (IAP2).

NCDD’s online D&D event roundup is a weekly compilation of the upcoming events happening in the digital world related to dialogue, deliberation, civic tech, engagement work, and more! Do you have a webinar or other digital event coming up that you’d like to share with the NCDD network? Please let us know in the comments section below or by emailing me at keiva[at]ncdd[dot]org, because we’d love to add it to the list!

Upcoming Online D&D Events: Living Room Conversations, IAF, The Courageous Leadership Project, ICMA

September Confab about Purple Project for Democracy

Confab bubble image

Monday, September 30th
10 am Pacific, 1 pm Eastern

We are excited to announce our September Confab Call, featuring a new initiative that is preparing for  November launch – Purple Project for Democracy. Purple is a non-partisan coalition, campaign and movement to rediscover and recommit to democratic values and institutions.  The folks behind the project are building momentum for their November launch, and on this Confab we’ll learn more about how dialogue and deliberation can play a role in it.

Purple is aiming to help people recommit to democratic values, but also to stimulate civic engagement. During the month of November, Purple hopes to have local conversations which can help to stimulate the national effort. The hope of the organizers is that members of NCDD will participate in this effort by hosting conversations in their communities.

REGISTER: http://ncdd.org/30320

International Association of Facilitators webinar – The Power of Choice

Wednesday, September 25th
6:30 am Pacific, 9:30 am Eastern

By 2020, there will be five generations working side-by-side in the workplace. We are all different and unique, but with this comes different ways of working, approaches, mindsets, feelings, behaviors,  motivations and needs. This can lead to assumptions, misunderstandings, miscommunication, conflict and under-performance.  Building a culture of psychological safety, where everyone feels accepted and respected, allows everyone to work in harmony, makes the most of their differences and drives a sense of empowerment to achieve anything. In this webinar, we will explore the strength of working in a team that is diverse and inclusive. You will discover how to value difference to build connections that enable collaboration, healthy challenge and powerful outcomes towards common goals.

REGISTER: www.iaf-world.org/site/events/webinars

NIFI CGA forum: Future of Small Towns

Wednesday, September 25th
11:30 am Pacific, 2:30 pm Eastern

NIFI would like to invite you to participate in an online forum on the future of our small-town communities. These forums are a project of the German Marshall Fund alumni network, and are going on throughout the US and even in Europe. The results from these forums will be reported to a new generation of leaders focusing on urban/rural issues who will be making policies that directly affect our communities, our economies, our families and our day-to-day lives. This online forum is for women from rural communities and small towns.

REGISTER: www.nifi.org/en/events/future-our-small-towns

September CGA Forum Series: Safety and Justice: How Should Communities Reduce Violence?

Wednesday, September 25th
4 pm Pacific, 7 pm Eastern

Please join us for a Common Ground for Action (CGA) online deliberative forum on Safety and Justice: How Should Communities Reduce Violence? If you’ve never participated in a CGA forum, please watch the “How To Participate” video before joining. You can find the video link here. If you haven’t had a chance to review the issue guide, you can find a downloadable PDF copy at the NIF website here.

REGISTER: www.nifi.org/en/events/september-cga-forum-series-safety-and-justice-how-should-communities-reduce-violence

International Association of Facilitators webinar – What facilitators can do in disaster situations? (English)

Thursday, September 26th
6:30 am Pacific, 9:30 am Eastern

In this webinar we will invite the participating colleagues to reflect together on different ways in which we can support communities that face situations of disasters or other crises, applying our knowledge and experience as professional facilitators. In addition, we will present the principles of the Model of psychosocial intervention in crises and disasters of the Global Facilitators Serving Communities – GFSC network. This Model, called Crisis – Change – Choice, has been successfully applied in many countries around the world, allowing to strengthen the resilience and autonomy of various types of communities, in response to different types of crises and disasters.

REGISTER:www.iaf-world.org/site/events/what-facilitators-can-do-disaster-situations-english

September CGA New Moderator Workshop

Thursday, September 26th
9:30 am Pacific, 12:30 pm Eastern

Join this workshop on how to moderate a Common Ground for Action (CGA) deliberative forum. This is a TWO DAY, TWO PART workshop. Part 1 is Wednesday September 25th at 7:00p ET/4:00pm PT; Part 2 is September 26th at 12:30p ET/9:30am PT. Please plan to attend both parts of this workshop.

In session one (Sept 25th) we will participate in our own CGA forum. In session two (Sept 26th), we will discuss how to set up a CGA, what the responsibilities of a CGA moderator are, and hacks and tricks for moderating. We will then work in partners to set up and moderate a forum. We will conclude with a questions and answers about how to integrate CGA into your practice, classroom, and/or community work.

REGISTER: www.nifi.org/en/events/september-cga-new-moderator-workshop

September CGA Moderator Practice Sessions

Friday, September 27th
9 am Pacific, 12 pm Eastern

This is an open practice session for new and seasoned Common Ground for Action online deliberation moderators. We will play around with features, workshop deliberative questions, and get practice moderating a robust online deliberative forum.

REGISTER: www.nifi.org/en/events/september-cga-moderator-practice-sessions

Living Room Conversations Training (free): The Nuts & Bolts of Living Room Conversations

Thursday, October 3rd
2 pm Pacific, 5 pm Eastern

Join us for 90 minutes online to learn about Living Room Conversations. We’ll cover what a Living Room Conversation is, why we have them, and everything you need to know to get started hosting and/or participating in Living Room Conversations. This training is not required for participating in our conversations – we simply offer it for people who want to learn more about the Living Room Conversations practice.

Space is limited so that we can offer a more interactive experience. Please only RSVP if you are 100% certain that you can attend. This training will take place using Zoom videoconferencing. A link to join the conversation will be sent to participants the day before the training.

REGISTER: www.livingroomconversations.org/event/training-free-the-nuts-bolts-of-living-room-conversations-19-2/

Online Living Room Conversation: Relationships Over Politics – 90-Minute Conversation w/ Optional 30-Minute Q & A with Hosts!

Thursday, October 3rd
4 pm Pacific, 7 pm Eastern

Is it possible to use Living Room Conversations with our families and close friends? It is ultimately challenging, because family are more likely to break ‘host and guest’ social norms. The emotional stakes are higher, conversations are colored by long, deeply personal histories and it can feel easier to ‘take the gloves off’ and fight dirty, unconstrained by the politeness usually offered acquaintances. How might we hold the tension of our differences while working to repair connection and not further deepen division within our circle of family and friends?

All sorts of people tell us they want to use the skills they practice in Living Room Conversations to help restore connection with friends and family. So, let’s use a Living Room Conversation to talk about just that! This Living Room Conversation will help us listen and learn about where we have different opinions, along with shared ideas about how to best navigate time with family & friends (who may not share our view of the world). HERE is the conversation guide.

REGISTER: www.livingroomconversations.org/event/relationships-over-politics-90-minute-conversation-w-optional-30-minute-q-a-with-hosts-2/

Online Living Room Conversation: Race and Ethnicity – A Special Three-Part Series

Tuesday, October 8th
10:30 am Pacific, 1:30 pm Eastern

Check out this four-minute video from our first Race & Ethnicity Conversation Series to get a taste of this conversation! In this series of three conversations, participants explore the complexities of the concepts of Race, Ethnicity, and their impacts on people from all walks of life. We will cover new questions from the three Race & Ethnicity conversation guides found here. The following conversation series will occur on October 15th and 22nd.

REGISTER: www.livingroomconversations.org/event/race-and-ethnicity-a-special-three-part-series/

IAP2 Monthly Webinar – 2019 IAP2 Projects Of The Year (USA & Canada)

Tuesday, October 8th
11 am Pacific, 2 pm Eastern

We are excited to feature the two Core Values Award winners for Project of the Year.

The Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) won the USA Project of the Year award for “PedPDX”. This project addresses discrepancies in pedestrian infrastructure around the Rose City, and involved people of a variety of different ethnic and social groups. One city council member referred to the public engagement process as the most robust and comprehensive he had ever seen.

The Canadian Partnership Against Cancer used a variety of techniques and approaches in reviewing Canada’s Cancer Strategy, focusing on “underserviced” populations — people in remote areas, Indigenous people, new Canadians, LGBTQ people, for example — often don’t get the same level of cancer care and treatment that others do. The Partnership managed to bring these voices to the table and help re-design a cancer strategy that puts them on an equal footing.

REGISTER: https://iap2usa.org/event-3404391

International Association of Facilitators webinar – Becoming a CPF with the IAF

Tuesday, October 8th
3 pm Pacific, 6 pm Eastern

Making the decision to seek the IAF Certified™ Professional Facilitator (CPF) accreditation can be hard. Common questions people ask are What’s involved? How much time will it take? Will I meet the requirements? and What if I don’t pass? In response to strong interest from members we will be exploring these questions at a webinar with hosts that have years of experience as professional facilitators and as IAF Assessors.

REGISTER: www.iaf-world.org/site/events/webinars

The Courageous Leadership Project webinar – Brave, Honest Conversations™

Wednesday, October 9th
9 am Pacific, 12 pm Eastern

Some conversations are hard to have. Fear and discomfort build in your body and you avoid and procrastinate or pretend everything is fine. Sometimes you rush in with urgency, wanting to smooth things over, fix them, and make them better. Sometimes you go to battle stations, positioning the conversation so you have a higher chance of being on the “winning” side. NONE OF THIS WORKS. Instead, it usually makes a hard conversation harder; more divided, polarized, and disconnected from others. The more people involved, the harder the conversation can be. I believe that brave, honest conversations are how we solve the problems we face in our world – together.

In this webinar, we will cover: What is a Brave, Honest Conversation™? Why have one? What can change because of a brave, honest conversation? How do you have one? What do you need to think about and do? How do you prepare yourself for a brave, honest conversation?

REGISTER: www.bravelylead.com/events/bhcfreewebinar

for Irina

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Little Irina Antonovna, six,
Took it upon herself to write to her aunt,
Laboriously addressing it to:
"Region of Petrograd, Max Heltz factory."

Why did she write this letter? Well, her father:
Ten years in the camps for being a scholar,
Dead by now. Her mother: dead. Neighborhood:
Wall fragments, smoke, equipment shards, Nazi bombs.
Grandfather: died of rickets while walking
Irina to safety. Grandmother: same.

The letter worked; Irina lived. Married
Dmitri, who never asked her opinions,
But did write Number Nine for her and maybe
Heard her when he wrote the gentle cello drone
That supports the opening. Or the polka--
Why couldn't that frenzied part be Irina?
Why assume she was always soft, helpful?

A young, diverse American quartet
Exhumes Dmitri and Irina for us,
His black notes crisp on their iPads, their bows
Vibrating like cicadas, their eyes flashing
Recognition, assent: one to the other.

They are pillowed in layers of safety.
A clean, bright stage, a tidy concert hall,
An audience that has heard it before
And knows just when to leap up for applause:
White-haired burghers of this college and town.

Irina's professor father would have fit
Right in, if he hadn't been starved or shot.
Little Irina would have liked to hide
Beneath that concert grand, so solidly framed.
A campus cop waits, unworried, outside.

This place is not real. What's real is in the notes.
They know starvation, midnight knocks on doors,
Cities murdered from the sky, orphans' fears,
They know, too, the terrors of the audience,
Shrunken in their seats, nervous to drive home.

Phones still ring with sad news; death sentences
Come in biopsy results. And beyond this room
A billion new Irinas plead to be spared.

See Stephen Harris, “Quartet Number Nine,” “Interview of Irina Shostakovich by Alexandre Brussilovsky,” and also “voices,” and “a poem should.”

Apply by Oct. 9th to Host A Nevins Fellow *for Free*!

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NCDD Member Organization the McCourtney Institute for Democracy is again offering the incredible opportunity for D&D organizations to take advantage of their Nevins Democracy Leaders Program. The 2019-20 application is open now through Wednesday, October 9th, for organizations who want to host a bright, motivated, D&D-trained student at no-cost!

The Nevins Democracy Leaders Program was founded in 2014 after a gift from David Nevins, President and Co-Director of the Bridge Alliance, an NCDD Member Org. The program provides Penn State students with education and ­training in transpartisan leadership skills by exposing them to a variety of viewpoints and philosophies, as well as teaching critical thinking along with the tools of dialogue and deliberation.

But the flagship work of fostering the next generation of democracy leaders centers on the yearly initiative to place Nevins Program students in unique fellowship position with organizations focused on D&D, transpartisan dialogue, and civic renewal – that means organizations like yours! Stipends and living expenses are provided to the students through the program so that organizations can bring these bright, motivated students into their work for a summer at no cost. The McCourtney Institute provides $5,000 toward the cost of hosting a Nevins Fellow for a summer internship. Students come to their internship sites well prepared and ready to get to work.

Fellows have interned at the following organizations, just to name a few:

  • Everyday Democracy
  • Participatory Budgeting
  • National Institute for Civil Discourse

Much like students apply for the fellowship, organizations apply to host a fellow. Nonprofits, government organizations, or other groups committed to building and sustaining democracy that would like to host a fellow can apply here!

NCDD hosted a Confab Call last September with Chris Beem from the McCourtney Institute, who covered lots of the important details about the program. You can listen to the recording of that call by clicking here. You can also check out this blog post from a 2017 Nevins Fellow about their summer fellowship with the Jefferson Center, to get a better sense of the student’s experience. We also encourage you to watch this video from 2019 Nevins Fellow John Villella, who did constituent engagement work for the Baltimore City Council.

It’s an amazing opportunity for everyone involved!

We can’t speak highly enough about the Nevins program’s students or about the value of this program’s contributions to the D&D field. We know that these young people will be great additions to organizations in our field.  We encourage you to apply today!

American Founders’ Month: Patrick Henry!

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Check out the National Constitution Center’s biographies of the Founding Fathers! https://constitutioncenter.org/learn/educational-resources/founding-fathers

It’s Founders Month here in Florida! According to the Florida Department of Education,

Section (s.) 683.1455, Florida Statutes (F.S.), designates the month of September as American Founders‘ Month and s. 1003.421, F.S., recognizes the last full week of classes in September in public schools as Celebrate Freedom Week.

So what does this mean for our schools and kids and teachers? Basically, it’s time to do some learning about the men and women who have helped shape this state and this country. Here on our Florida Citizens blog, we’ll be doing at least two posts a week with a brief overview of a particular Founder, Framer, thinker, or shaper of this state or this nation and how they made an impact.

Sept 23 or 24 Henry

American Founders’ Month continues in Florida, and it coincides with Freedom Week. There may be no quote more famous in our nation’s history than Patrick Henry’s “…give me liberty or give me death!” It is perhaps an appropriate way to start off our celebration of Freedom Week as we wrap up American Founders’ Month.

Patrick Henry, like many of his peers, was a man of many talents, beliefs, and contradictions. He was a brilliant orator, fiery and powerful, but few of his speeches survived him, as he rarely wrote anything down. Unlike his contemporaries, he did not write many letters, so we have few primary sources to consider him with. A passionate advocate for liberty, he was, like many of his elite contemporaries from the South, a slave holder. Like many of them (though not all!) he recognized the evils of slavery without necessarily choosing a path towards relief of his own complicity. A believer in strong bonds across the states, he was embittered by what he saw as New England’s reluctance to contribute fairly to the national project under the Articles of Confederation.

His passion for liberty led Henry initiallt to the Anti-Federalist camp; he did not trust those working in Philadelphia at the constitutional convention, and he did not trust the new Constitution.

 This Constitution is said to have beautiful features; but when I come to examine these features, Sir, they appear to me horribly frightful: Among other deformities, it has an awful squinting; it squints towards monarchy: And does not this raise indignation in the breast of every American? Your President may easily become King: Your Senate is so imperfectly constructed that your dearest rights may be sacrificed by what may be a small minority; and a very small minority may continue forever unchangeably this Government, although horridly defective: Where are your checks in this Government? Your strong holds will be in the hands of your enemies: It is on a supposition that our American Governors shall be honest, that all the good qualities of this Government are founded: But its defective, and imperfect construction, puts it in their power to perpetrate the worst of mischiefs, should they be bad men

Ultimately, however, he sided with the Federalists, in part because of rivalry with his fellow Virginian Thomas Jefferson. He is, without a doubt, a good person to begin this Freedom Week with. You can learn more about Patrick Henry’s famous ‘give me liberty’ speech with this close reading plan here!

Grab the PowerPoint slide featured in this post: Patrick Henry AFM