Submit by Jan 18th to Win $50K in Engaged Cities Award!

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We love hearing about opportunities to award those doing great engagement work and want to ensure folks heard that the international Engaged Cities Award is now accepting submissions! NCDD member org, Public Agenda, shared on their blog that Cities of Service has recently launched the second annual Engaged Cities Award, given to those cities with successful engagement efforts to address a specific public problem, in order to create a template for other cities to use in their own communities. 3 cities will be chosen as winners and each winning city will be awarded $50,000 and will be announced at the Engaged Cities Award Summit in Fall 2019.

The award is open to cities in the Americas or Europe, with populations above 30,000 – and the submissions are due January 18, 2019. You can read more about the award below and find the original information on the Public Agenda site here.

Cities of Service Launches Second Annual Engaged Cities Award

Cities of Service, a nonprofit organization that helps mayors build stronger cities by changing the way local government and citizens work together, launched the application process for its second annual Engaged Cities Award. The international award program recognizes cities that have actively engaged their citizens to solve a critical public problem.

All over the world, city leaders and citizens are reducing community violence, producing better budgets, creating safer streets and building stronger communities together. The award shines a light on the engagement solutions that have worked for these neighborhoods. Cities of Service creates blueprints, case studies, and other resources that highlight winning cities’ solutions so other cities can replicate their projects and their impact. You can find resources from the 2018 award at engagedcitiesaward.org.

Engaged Cities Award applicants must address a specific problem that directly affects the lives of citizens, such as homelessness, neighborhood safety, or extreme weather, or impacts the city’s ability to deliver vital services to the community.

The Engaged Cities Award is open to cities with populations of 30,000+ in the Americas and Europe. Cities of Service, along with an esteemed group of experts, will choose three winning cities. Each winner will receive a minimum of $50,000 and be announced as part of the Engaged Cities Award Summit in fall 2019.

Are you a city leader engaged in this kind of problem-solving, world-changing work with your citizens? Cities of Service wants to hear from you! Just answer five short questions and submit your application by January 18, 2019.

For more information about the Cities of Service Engaged Cities Award, including guiding philosophy, criteria, eligibility, timeline, and past winners, please visit: engagedcitiesaward.org.

Looking to learn more about last year’s winners? Check out this blog from Cities of Service Award judge and Public Agenda Vice President of Public Engagement Matt Leighninger.

You can read the original announcement of this on Public Agenda’s site at www.publicagenda.org/blogs/cities-of-service-launches-second-annual-engaged-cities-award.

Support NCDD’s Fundraiser and Win One of Our Giveaways!

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NCDD is so very thankful to everyone who has donated, joined, and renewed their membership as part of NCDD’s End-of-the-Year Fundraiser! This week, we’re pulling out all the stops to help us meet our goal of raising $15,000 by the first week of January – by offering those who make a donation a chance to win a number of exciting giveaways!

Everyone who donates $50 or more to NCDD by December 31st will be entered into a drawing for one of the following 17 prizes from NCDD’s staff and some of our amazing members:

  • NCDD Member Mark Gerzon has contributed 5 copies of his book, The Reunited States of America: How We Can Bridge the Partisan Divide.
  • Free registration for NCDD Organizational Member Essential Partners’ Dialogue Across Differences workshop (there are two times it will be offered next year)
  • Three print copies of Essential Partners’ Nuts and Bolts Guide – a must-have!
  • D&D Care Package from Sandy – There will be a few surprises in here for you, but Sandy will put together a wonderful package of books, tools (like card decks!), and NCDD goodies.
  • D&D Care Package from Courtney – Courtney will put together a collection of books and NCDD swag for the winner!
  • Goody Bag for Organizing Freaks from Sandy – Some people are a little weirder about organizing than others, and Sandy has a fun goody bag in store for this winner – with cool sticky notes, notebooks and journals, books on managing chaos, and Action Stickers.  If you like organizing and planning, you’ll have fun with this prize.
  • Five special NCDD notebooks – an orange moleskin-style notebook with the NCDD logo embossed on the cover!

Winners will be drawn from donations received between Monday, December 17th at 9am Eastern and Monday, December 31st at 11:59pm Eastern. Winners will be notified the week of December 31st. Click here to support NCDD!

We are so excited to offer these giveaways during our end of the year fundraiser and we hope you will consider supporting NCDD into the new year. Remember all contributions are tax-deductible and if you’d like to join our ranks as a member instead of donating – that’s wonderful too! Learn about the benefits of being an NCDD member and join here!

Habermas with a Whiff of Tear Gas: Nonviolent Campaigns and Deliberation in an Era of Authoritarianism

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Just published: Levine, Peter (2018) “Habermas with a Whiff of Tear Gas: Nonviolent Campaigns and Deliberation in an Era of Authoritarianism,” Journal of Public Deliberation: Vol. 14 : Iss. 2 , Article 4. 

Abstract:

Authoritarianism is gaining around the world. Statistics show that deliberation shrinks when authoritarianism grows. In the face of authoritarian repression, directly promoting and organizing deliberation is likely to fail. However, Erica Chenoweth and Maria J. Stephan (2011) find that nonviolent campaigns have a strong record of success against authoritarian states. Although nonviolent campaigns are not themselves deliberative or aimed at building deliberative democracy, I argue that some of the reasons that make them successful also stand to benefit public deliberation. Thus the most promising strategy for expanding deliberation in an increasingly authoritarian world is to support nonviolent campaigns and to reinforce strategies of nonviolent confrontation that also yield deliberation. Jürgen Habermas anticipated this argument in his defense of social movements. Revisiting that aspect of Habermas’ thought challenges interpretations that treat him as a theorist of calm, rational discourse.

I’m grateful to the Journal of Public Deliberation for commissioning this piece. At first, I wasn’t sure I had an article to contribute, but now I see its thesis as fairly central to my political philosophy. I’ve long been drawn to deliberative modes of politics, in which people listen and learn before they act. But I have also always believed in contentious politics: nonviolent but confrontational modes like strikes and occupations. Here I put them together.

This is also the first appearance in peer-reviewed form of my “SPUD” framework, which has proven useful in more practical contexts. For instance, I presented it at an #Indivisible gathering that ended up in this Washington Post article.

Finally, I’m grateful to appear in the special issue on “Deliberative Democracy in an Era of Authoritarianism.” The other articles are good and make a coherent whole. A running question is whether carefully designed deliberative fora (“minipublics”) are part of the solution to authoritarianism, irrelevant to authoritarianism, or a potential tool of repression. If they are part of the solution, what else is needed to accompany them? I’m close to the part of the spectrum that says “they’re irrelevant,” but the range is helpful.

The Dangers of “Mega-partisan” Identities in the US

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A Summary of the NCDD Listserv Conversation Entitled: Democrats are wrong about Republicans and Republicans are wrong about Democrats

Listserv Contributors: Ken Homer, Tom Altee, Babara (last name masked), Peter Jones, John Backman, Bruce Waltuck, Rosa Zubizarreta, Dennis Boyer, Linda Ellinor, Dana Morris-Jones, Sarah Read, David Fridley, Kim Crowley, Steve Griffith, Chris Santos-Long, Terry Steichen, James Anest, Joan Blades, Kenoli Oleari, David Fridley, Deb Blakeslee, Britt Blaser, Eric Smiley, Howard Ward

In July, NCDD member Ken Homer shared a news article by Perry Bacon Jr. in the “Secret Identity” column from FiveThirtyEight.com which features articles discussing the role of identity in politics and policy.  This article entitled, “Democrats Are Wrong About Republicans. Republicans Are Wrong About Democrats” claims that the political divide between Republicans and Democrats in the United States has grown to “encapsulate all other divides” and is continuing to grow reinforcing negative partisanship and overall misconceptions by both political parties about the other and their membership. This article emphasizes how “the parties in our heads” do not align with reality and that these stereotypes are problematic.

As many fellow NCDD members weighed in, the issue of an increasingly polarized population in the United States was deemed concerning. Questions arose about who fuels the fire of polarization and whether the encouragement is intentional via a divide and conquer strategy of the political parties themselves. Other important actors include traditional media and social media which frame thinking and dialogue regarding politics. Market driven media has led to a system were it is very easy to only consume what we want to, including local and global news. Increasingly, it is becoming easier to remain in political comfort zones or “echo chambers” that reinforce our own beliefs, deface the political “other”, and facilitate less necessity to look at policy outcomes versus political loyalties. As NCDD member Peter Jones wrote, “The news is not an unbiased partner but a corporate instigator in search of clicks and attention.”

We share our wonderings together in our NCDD community via the discussion listservs.  Multiple contributors chimed in with stimulating perspectives and ideas. Here are some examples:

  1. John Backman asks, “Based only on my own observations over the years, I wonder if another divide—one we rarely hear discussed—is even more fundamental and defining: between urban and rural?”
  2. Rosa Zubizarreta brings up ideas for new voting options including “ranked choice voting” to help our society step away from mega-partisan tendencies. Looking for alternatives that eliminate the frequent bi-partisan voting complaint of needing to pick “the lesser of two evils.”
  3. Linda Ellinor notes the worthwhile exercise of intentional system designs that could facilitate large scale conversations that focus on inclusivity with the objective of better governance. Reiterating that we must remain diligent, persistent, and intentional, because “it always leads to better futures when we tap our collective intelligence…” David Fridley agreed and would like to work with others to begin designing and working on a collaborative project.
  4. Kenoli Oleari emphasizes the need for “standing assemblies” around the world–bringing diverse communities together physically to combat isolations which leads to polarization. As Kenoli states, “It may take a community to raise a child; it also takes a community to raise adults.”
  5. A discussion about how the “elites” and “masses” dialogue (or lack thereof) and the importance of how these dialogues can be improved as varying contexts delineate who belongs to the “elite” versus the “masses.” In other words, in some contexts an individual or group may be an elite, and in a different realm, they may be part of the masses. One way mentioned that the two interact are via media reporting and the groups reacting. (Kenolli Oleari, David Fridley, Chris Santos-Long, Howard Ward)
  6. Britt Blaser brings up the idea for having crowdsourced policy-making in the United States context.

The phenomenon of mega-partisan politics can spur a desire to look externally to blame, however we must also critically look at our own ways of learning and aligning our values to political allegiances. Many in NCDD brought up ideas for critical reflection and moving discussion towards doable positive action including ways to think about structural improvements to existing democratic systems, fostering more participation at the local level, and ways to create dialogues that are politically inclusive to determine mutual goals across political divides.

Want to follow the full thread of this conversation? Check out the NCDD Discussion List archives!

We want to keep the dialogue going!

What are your thoughts to the questions below? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below!

What are the consequences of political choices being closely (and falsely) tied to many other identities including one’s religion, race, zip code, sexual orientation, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, education level, etc.?

What does it mean for someone to vote based on political party versus personal values?

What are mega-partisanship and negative partisanship? What are the implications to society of each of these phenomenon?

With a society that is primarily bipartisan, what are the most effective ways to exercise voice among those who do not identify with either the Democratic or Republican party?

How can we as a nation move towards a less polarized environment? Can data help?

How do individuals and communities define reason? Values? Information? Facts?

How can we work to challenge our own “blind spots” when it comes to political stereotypes and speculation?

What can be done to cross the divide? What could be done to eliminate it? What can the role be for those of us doing dialogue and deliberation work?

What could accountability look like for news/media/government?

How can the disconnect between what the American people want and policy initiatives be reconciled?

Read On – Additional Resources on the Topic:

Haidt, J. (2012). The righteous mind: Why good people are divided by politics and religion. Vintage.

Haidt, J., & Graham, J. (2007). When morality opposes justice: Conservatives have moral intuitions that liberals may not recognize. Social Justice Research, 20(1), 98-116.

Javidiani, M. (2018) Beyond Facts: Increasing Trust In Journalism Through Community Engagement & Transparency. [MRP] Retrieved by: http://openresearch.ocadu.ca/id/eprint/2294/

Lessig, L. (August 10, 2017) TedTalk: How the net destroyed democracy. Retrieved by: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHTBQCpNm5o

McLuhan, M., & Fiore, Q. (1967). The medium is the message. New York, 123, 126-128.

Mounk, Y. (July 2, 2018). The Rise of McPolitics: Democrats and Republicans belong to increasingly homogeneous parties. Can we survive the loss of local politics? New York Times. Retrieved from: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/07/02/the-rise-of-mcpolitics

Wheatley, M. J. (2012). So far from home: Lost and found in our brave new world. Berrett-Koehler Publishers.

Entrepreneurship and Returning Citizens

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(I’ve spent a good deal of the last six months working on the Pivot Program that launched last month. Pivot combines internships with college-level classes in business, entrepreneurship, the liberal arts, and humanities. Now that journalists are starting to cover it, I can share some reflections from this work!)

Washington, DC has the highest incarceration rate in the country. And this country has the highest incarceration rate in the world. More than 8,000 people go to prison or jail from DC each year, and each year more than 5,000 come back.

That means that there are probably 67,000 “justice-involved” DC residents, and while we have fairly strong “ban the box” laws in place it’s clear that a history of incarceration still affects people’s prospects. From my work with incarcerated students at JCI developing the Prison Scholars Program and the UB Second Chance College Program, I’ve often heard from students inside that they want more training in business and entrepreneurship. They recognize that one way to avoid discrimination in the job market is to work for themselves. (There are still many other collateral consequences of a conviction that can trip them up.)

Now, most of my friends are in the liberal arts, and so we’re all just a little suspicious of business schools. The dismal science of economics as a kind of worldly philosophy makes sense to us: the myths tell us that the ancient philosopher Thales fell into a well while staring at the sky,  but his observations meant that he was also able to predict the weather and corner the market on olive oil presses. Business as a vocation (like law,  medicine, the military, or the clergy) is a modern fact that confuses traditionalists and enrages critics of capitalism.

Yet at its best, an entrepreneur is someone who looks around them and asks: what can I do to serve my fellow citizens? What can we do to improve the world? What should we do together? Many entrepreneurs do not start their own businesses: they work within existing institutions to change and improve them. Cultivating the entrepreneurial mindset is about helping participants see themselves as agents who can plan and co-create value with their customers, neighbors, and fellow citizens. Seeing oneself as efficacious and mutually responsible is thus an important element of entrepreneurship. 

If you’re a regular reader, you’ll recognize that what I described above is also the way that we in civic studies describe citizenship. It’s an idea from Hannah Arendt, Elinor Ostrom, and Jane Mansbridge: to act as a co-creator of our shared world. I think, at its best, that entrepreneurship is a particular approach to citizenship, and not simply a matter of disrupting older industries in pursuit of profit. It’s about trying to find new ways of being of use to each other. And people with a history of incarceration are increasingly marginalized and rendered superfluous in our society–they need and deserve a way of being treated as dignified and valuable.

Obviously, we cannot ignore the issue of race and racism. Mass incarceration has been called “The New Jim Crow” because it disproportionately hurts African-Americans and their communities. There can be no doubt that incarceration in the United States is driven by white supremacy, even in cities like Washington, DC that were majority Black during the time that they incarcerated so many. (See James Forman’s work for more on this theme!)

It also disproportionately targets the poor: one study found that over the past thirty years, between 40 and 60 percent of prison inmates were below the federal poverty line at the time of their most recent arrest. More recent work suggests that incarcerated individuals have pre-incarcerated incomes 41% lower than their non-incarcerated peers. Raising returning citizens out of poverty is a moral obligation, if for no other reason than to prevent further crime and incarceration!

Those least well-served by our District’s schools are also most likely to be incarcerated. Nationally formerly incarcerated people are twice as likely as the general public to have no high school credential at all, and more than six times more likely to have a GED. I think this means that incarceration is not (just) an individual failure, and we can be sure that its costs are not just born by the incarcerated. Children of the incarcerated are massively more likely to be incarcerated themselves, and neighborhoods with high rates of incarceration are made poorer by the loss of their neighbors. Each imprisoned man or woman has talents that are lost to their communities, and the stigma of a criminal record perpetuates that loss after their release.

Sometimes the rhetoric of “human capital” hurts my heart. Prisoners and formerly imprisoned people are not just lost wages and unfounded startups: they’re our fellow citizens, our fellow human beings. They’re my friends and my students! But in a world dominated by profit, loss, growth, and stagnation it seems to work better to make the argument about “hidden gems in the rough.” That’s fine: if that’s what it takes to oppose mass incarceration today, that’s what we’ll do. But the United States has millions more people incarcerated than it ought to have–and we need to tackle that sooner rather than later.

We know that the Pivot Fellows can be leaders. I’ve seen this firsthand with the Friend of a Friend Program and the Alternatives to Violence Project. Incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people who succeed in college courses develop the leadership skills that are useful both inside and outside the prison system. Imprisoned college students and graduates frequently become positive role models for younger prisoners, and have created service programs that focus on conflict resolution, youth development and other issues that are critical to personal transformation. Formerly incarcerated professionals like Dwayne Betts, Shon Hopwood, and Chris Wilson are both positive role models and reminders of that lost talent locked away in our nations’ prisons and jails. But these extraordinary men are not so unusual–there are tens of thousands more like them behind bars. I am certain that the Pivot Program will be the incubator for some who I will soon be glad to list alongside them.

Georgetown is making great strides in its Jesuit commitments to “visit the prisoner.” We’ve developed credit-bearing courses at the DC Jail, and a Paralegal Studies Program for former jailhouse lawyers in partnership with the Mayor’s Office on Returning Citizens Affairs. I’m incredibly proud to work with the team at the Prisons and Justice Initiative and the McDonough School of Business.

you can go home again

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(Syracuse, NY) I’m in the city where I was born and raised but haven’t resided in 33 years. 

One result of this kind of visit is to make the intervening years fold away like a picture book put back on its shelf. When we travel to foreign places, I find that all the vivid new experiences stretch time. The journey feels long; regular life feels distant. But as soon as we’re in the airport on the way back home, the days of travel shrink to a finite memory, as if we’d had a few moments away.

The same can happen to decades. A third of a century seems rich and complex while you live it, but returning to where you began shrinks those years back to size.

Another result is a reminder of how little detail we retain. I once knew all kinds of information: What would you see if you turned that corner? Who lives in that house? What minor joy or sorrow once accompanied that building for me? It’s all flattened by the slow passage of years.

See also Mike Kelley, Jim Shaw, and memories of Rust Belt adolescence; the Times’ poverty map; portrait of a library; my home as described by Stephen Dunn; and three poems about the passage of time: nostalgia for now; echoes; and the hourglass.

AllSides Updates: New Students Website & Is Civility Bogus?

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In an era when the mainstream media is hyperpolarized, it is vital to our societal and democratic well-being to have access to news sources with more balanced viewpoints. AllSides provides news sources from across the center-left-right spectrum and works to improve civil discourse, and they just announced exciting news and posted a great article exploring civility!

The new website, AllSides for Schools, offers resources for students to improve their media literacy, build empathy, and have tools for engaging in civil discourse – read more about it in the post below! Listen to the archive of our TechTuesday here featuring AllSides’ student-focused programming, Mismatch. 

They also shared the article, Is Civility a Bogus Concept After All?, which explores the challenging arguments around civility on if it’s possible and how it can be best utilized. You can read the article below and find the original on AllSides site here.

Brand New AllSides for Schools Website!

America, we need to talk. Our democracy is increasingly media-driven and polarized. How can we prepare young people?

We’re so excited to announce the launch of our brand-new AllSides for Schools website, featuring updated tools and resources to help students gain the media literacy and critical thinking skills they need to improve our democracy long-term.

We worked hard to launch our new Schools site, and we can’t wait for you to see it.

Featuring a clean new design, AllSides for Schools features nearly a dozen resources to make media literacy fun and engaging. Students can take AllSides’ bias quiz to find out where they fall on the Left-Center-Right political spectrum, then browse our Balanced Dictionary to see how people across the political spectrum define, think and feel differently about the same term or issue.

Plus, our Mismatch program and Civil Conversation Guides ensure students get the guidance they need to build relationships with people who are different from them. And it works — a whopping 92% of students who tried our Mismatch program said they better understood another person or perspective after just one conversation.

Through a revealing look at today’s news media and memorable experiences of respectful dialogue, AllSides for Schools equips students to navigate the complexities of modern media, social networks (on and offline), and personal relationships.

Join the 12,000 teachers and students in 47 states who are already using our tools every week. We hope you’ll enjoy them as much as we enjoyed making them.

You can check out the new Allsides for Schools website at www.allsidesforschools.org

Is Civility a Bogus Concept After All?

By Julie Mastrine

We built AllSides in part because we believe in the power of civility and civil discourse. AllSides helps people build relationships with those who are different from them, which we believe will ultimately improve our democracy.

But, could we be wrong? What if civility is actually a sham?

A TED Talk by political theorist Teresa Bejan raises this very question. Bejan studied and wrote a book about civility — particularly, religious tolerance in early modern England and America — because at the time, she thought that civility was, as she puts it, “bullsh*t.”

Yet how wrong she was.

After concluding her studies, Bejan learned “the virtue that makes un-murderous coexistence possible [in society] is the virtue of civility,” as she states in her TED Talk. “Civility makes our disagreements tolerable so that we can share a life together, even if we don’t share a faith — religious, political or otherwise.”

Still, she says, when most people talk about civility today, they are talking about something different than this. While civility is the virtue that “makes it possible to tolerate disagreement,” she says, “talking about civility [today] seems to be a strategy of disengagement — its like threatening to take your ball and go home when the game isn’t going your way.”

Often, she says, today’s “civility talk” is used as a way to “silence, suppress and exclude” those people we disagree with. (It’s a concept AllSides refers to as “tyranny of civility.”)

“Civility talk” or “tyranny of civility” gives people the feeling of the moral high ground while also allowing them to paint those they disagree with as offensive, or uncivil.

“Some people use “civility” when they want to communicate that certain views or people are beyond the pale, but they want to save themselves the trouble of actually making an argument,” Bejan says.

This is why some people (like Bejan in the past) roll their eyes at the call for civility.

“It seems like “civility talk” saves us the trouble of actually speaking to each other, allows us to talk past each other, signal our superior virtue, and let the audience know which side we’re on,” she says. In this way, “civility talk” can actually deepen divisions.

Instead of civility talk, Bejan argues we need what she calls “mere civility.” This type of civility is not the same thing as being respectful, because “we need civility precisely when we’re dealing with people we find it the most impossible to respect.” And it’s not the same as being nice, either — “because being nice means not telling people what you really think about them or their views.”

Mere civility means “speaking your mind, but to your opponent’s’ face, not behind her back…Being merely civil means pulling out punches but not landing them all at once.”

The point of civility, she says, is to allow us to “have fundamental disagreements without denying or destroying the possibility of a common life tomorrow with the people we think are standing in our way today.”

In this way, civility is closely related to courage.

“Mere civility is having the courage to make yourself disagreeable and to stay that way, but to do that while staying in the room and present to your opponents,” Bejan says. “If you’re talking about civility as a way to avoid an argument, as a way to isolate yourself in the more agreeable company of the like-minded who already agree with you, if you find yourself never actually speaking to anyone who fundamentally disagrees with you, you’re doing civility wrong.”

You can listen to Bejan’s TED Talk in full below.

You can read the original version of article on the Allsides Perspectives blog at www.allsides.com/blog/civility-bogus-concept-after-all.

ENGAGING IDEAS – 12/14/2018

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Democracy

Congress thinks the public is way more conservative than it actually is. Deep-pocketed lobbyists are to blame, according to new research. (Washington Post)
Senior staffers in congressional offices hold highly inaccurate assumptions about what voters in their districts actually want when it comes to policy. They tend to believe that voters support much more conservative policies than they actually do. Continue Reading

Can Socialism Save Democracy? (Common Dreams)
If socialism is going to save democracy, it needs to bring about equality without snuffing out freedom, and it needs to respect the role of markets without letting them dominate society Continue Reading

Mapped: Why Voting Anomalies Are Impossible to Ignore in North Carolina (The Upshot)
After a long election season, there is just one House race where the result remains in serious doubt: North Carolina's Ninth Congressional District. The state's Board of Elections has refused to certify the narrow 905-vote lead that the Republican, Mark Harris, holds over the Democrat, Dan McCready, and is investigating allegations of absentee ballot fraud. Continue Reading


Opportunity/Inequality

From foster care to college (Hechinger Report)
Western Michigan University is one of several colleges that have started programs to help foster youth earn degrees Continue Reading

How Urban Core Amenities Drive Gentrification and Increase Inequality (CityLab)
A new study finds that as the rich move back to superstar cities' urban cores to gain access to unique amenities they drive low-income people out. Continue Reading

City Governments Should Focus On Opportunity, Not Income Inequality (Forbes)
The common belief today is that income inequality has exploded-the rich are getting richer while the incomes of the middle class and poor stagnate. But a new study from the Urban Institute reviews several studies on income inequality and finds that this perception is not accurate. Continue reading


Engagement

Durham's New Blueprint for Equitable Community Engagement (Next City)
Beyond the blueprint, city leaders have taken a hard look at racist policies and how they inform inequities in Durham. The city joined the Government Alliance on Race and Equity; it formed a Racial Equity Task Force; many city staff now go through race equity training. Continue Reading

Term Limits Heighten Need for Community Boards to Become Data Literate (Gotham Gazette)
Communities are empowered when their community boards are equipped with both the knowledge and the resources they need to challenge information practices that ignore or misrepresent people and problems in their neighborhoods. Continue Reading


K-12

How the stress of state testing might make it harder for some students to show what they know (Chalkbeat)
The annual ritual of state testing in elementary and middle schools often comes within an unwelcome side effect: jittery, stressed-out kids. Now, a first-of-its-kind study documents some of what's actually happening to students. Continue Reading

Survey: More than half of US teachers concerned about language barriers with ESL parents (Education Dive)
A recent ClassDojo survey of more than 560 randomly-selected teachers nationwide indicates 71% of those surveyed have taught students for whom English is a second language in the past three years, and 56% worry parents of these students don't have enough English language skills to effectively participate in parent-teacher conferences and other aspects of school communication and experiences, according to a press release. Continue Reading


Higher Ed/Workforce

As Labor Market Tightens, Women Are Moving Into Male-Dominated Jobs (The Upshot)
Widening opportunities do not automatically translate into better pay or a decline in gender discrimination. Continue Reading

OPINION: 3 ways that colleges can support underrepresented students after the Harvard case (Hechinger Report)
New research shows that even with a chief diversity officer in place, significant gains in faculty hires that are multicultural and diverse are lacking. At schools such as Yale, Harvard and Stanford, faculty from underrepresented backgrounds account for 7 percent or less of the total. A lack of influence over diverse faculty hires can be troubling. Continue Reading

The Degree Rules, for Now (Inside Higher Ed)
College credentials still loom large in hiring. But a new survey of HR leaders finds growing interest in skills-based hiring, online microcredentials and prehire assessments. Continue Reading


Health Care

How to Cut U.S. Drug Prices: Experts Weigh In (New York Times)
A look at policies and possible trade-offs, including the risk of hampering innovation. Continue Reading

Health insurers look to digital tools to improve customer experience (Modern Healthcare)
Health insurance customers generally report poor experiences with their health plans. Only utility and internet and television service providers have worse customer service scores, and that's saying something. But health insurers say investing in digital tools and other technologies can help them fix this and give their customers a personalized, frictionless healthcare experience. Continue Reading

1 in 5 patients at high risk of socioeconomic health problem, survey finds (Healthcare Dive)
A study of 500 random patients found that 68% suffer with at least one social determinant of health (SDoH) challenge, with 57% having moderate-to-high risk in at least one of the following categories: financial insecurity, social isolation, housing insecurity, addiction, transportation access, food insecurity and health literacy. Continue Reading

SFU Extends Nominations Deadline for Int’l Blaney Award

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Our friends at SFU Morris J. Wosk Centre for Dialogue – also an NCDD member organization, informed us they have extended the nominations deadline for the 2019/20 Jack P. Blaney Award for Dialogue! We encourage folks to nominate individuals, from anywhere around the globe, who have demonstrated excellence in utilizing dialogue to advance complex social issues and increase mutual understanding. Awardees are given a programming residency at SFU to continue their work, a CAD10,000 cash award, and more. Make sure to submit by the new deadline, January 14, 2019! You can read about the award in the post below and find the original on the here.

SFU’s Morris J. Wosk Centre for Dialogue is now accepting nominations for the 2019/20 Jack P. Blaney Award for Dialogue

Know someone who demonstrates excellence in their use of dialogue? Nominate them ahead of January 14, 2019 (Deadline extended!) for the next Jack P. Blaney Award for Dialogue.

The Jack P. Blaney Award for Dialogue is presented every second year to an individual who has demonstrated international excellence in the use of dialogue to increase mutual understanding and advance complex public issues. Nominations are encouraged from around the world in the fields of international diplomacy & conflict resolution, climate solutions, diversity and inclusion, democracy and civic engagement, and urban sustainability.

CRITERIA USED TO SELECT THE RECIPIENT INCLUDE:

  • The candidate’s demonstrated international excellence in the use of dialogue to increase mutual understanding;
  • The global significance of the work in addressing complex and profound public issues; and
  • Related programming opportunities.

ABOUT THE AWARD:

Far more than a simple ceremony, the Blaney Award includes a short programming residency in Canada that builds upon the recipient’s work to achieve tangible outcomes, reflecting the mandate of Simon Fraser University to be Canada’s most community-engaged research university. The award endowment includes funds to cover recipient transportation and associated programming costs, as well as a CAD10,000 cash award.

Recent Blaney Award programs have engaged thousands of participants through the hosting of international announcements, book launches, capacity building workshops, and participatory research.

NOMINATION SUBMISSION GUIDELINES:

*Nomination deadline extended*: January 14, 2019 at 17:00 (Pacific Standard Time)

Inquiries: Grace Lee, Program Lead for Signature Events and Endowment, eunhyel@sfu.ca , +01 778-782-4893

VIEW PAST AWARD RECIPIENTS

You can find the original version of this SFU announcement at www.sfu.ca/dialogue/awards/jack-p-blaney/call-for-nominations.html.

armchair quarterbacking Chuck and Nancy

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Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer left the White House with a priceless quote from Donald Trump: 

 And I’ll tell you what, I am proud to shut down the government for border security … So I will take the mantle. I will be the to shut it down. I’m not going to blame you for it. The last time you shut it down it didn’t work. I will take the mantle of shutting down, and I’m going to shut it down for border security.

It’s no surprise that after the meeting, Trump hopped around the West Wing flinging papers like Rumpelstiltskin. I also appreciate why people are expressing support and solidarity for Nancy Pelosi after she got talked over by the world’s most blatant sexist mansplainer.

Still, I thought the two senior Democrats talked like professional politicians in ways that are problematic.

  • Don’t say that you want to have the discussion in private. That looks like a shady preference for backroom deals. I understand that the future Speaker wanted to get a real deal that would keep the government open–thus helping millions of Americans–and she feared that Trump would back himself into a corner in a public argument, thus preventing a deal. Her motives were good. But you don’t say that you want to meet in private. If the meeting is going to be televised, you use it as a public debate about what is best for the country.
  • Don’t say “The Washington Post today gave you a lot of Pinocchios.” That creates a conflict between Trump and a media product (the Post’s Fact Checker feature) that many will not recognize and few will trust. Simply state that Trump has not built any of the wall. Dare him to claim that he has. Ask him what proportion of the 2,000 mile border he thinks he has already walled. 
  • Don’t get into a debate about whether the House should vote or not. Trump is right that his bill can’t pass the Senate without Democratic votes. Which body votes when is Inside Baseball. Stick to the substance. The wall is a bad idea and you will oppose it.
  • Don’t quip, “When the president brags that he won North Dakota and Indiana, he’s in real trouble.” Sen. Schumer knows that these are red states that the Republicans were expected to win. But he sounds like a New Yorker with contempt for two states in the Midwest. Or, at best, he sounds like a competitor in the sport of winning the most elections. The issue is the wall. Is it good or bad for America? Is it worth a government shutdown?
  • Don’t miss opportunities to score debating points. “I thought Mexico was going to pay for the wall, Mr President?” “Here’s a deal, Mr. President–you can say you already built the wall and we won’t have to pay for it.”

Perhaps I am asking for more rhetorical vim, and that’s not a fair demand of two consummate legislative tacticians. But I think I am also asking for leaders who talk to the American people as citizens rather than as spectators of the game of politics.