Celebrating commitment to community
By definition, compassionate action is rooted in what is best for community. It requires an understanding of our human tendency to act for selfish reasons along with a desire to know what the community says about what is best. In4All’s community is comprised of local businesses and their members, K-12 schools, the students who attend our schools and the families that they represent. Mobilizing this group in an effort to connect students who have been historically excluded with programs that expand classroom content through hands-on learning and activities implemented by professionals in their communities is challenging. Mobilizing community while holding space for growing and deepening our relationships with our student community who are the focus of what we do – is critical to accurately understanding the impact of our programs.
In the history of business involvement in education there has been a tendency for business to over promise and under deliver and to center involvement on the benefit it will bring to their company. Businesses are often encouraged to “spread their wealth” by providing smaller services, products, and volunteer hours to a wider audience of students. Or to be mobile: fund this initiative for a year or two, and then move to another initiative. This leads to the perpetuation of access gaps. Where some students, those whose schools are resourced in such a way that their students by and large already own the latest and best products and are doing hands-on and experiential learning inside and outside of the classroom, and by default do not necessarily need additional resources from business. “Spreading the wealth” perpetuates harm in communities that have and continue to be excluded. It erases community agency by assuming that we know what is best and where wealth should be spread. These behaviors are often centered on what is best for the person spreading the wealth, not on what’s best for those who make up the community. Real change takes time – and, well, that takes commitment and a willingness to stay in place. This is key to developing long-lasting relationships.
In4All partners have engaged in this work of understanding the importance of year over year commitment. As we look forward to another year of school programs, one that is complicated by Delta and potentially other COVID variants, we pause to celebrate the partners who make us In4All. Many of our businesses are embarking on five or more years of bringing programs to their community school – made possible only by the teachers who welcome them into their classrooms. They have and continue to lean in at a time when we are all feeling exponential video meeting and COVID fatigue. Ever centered on a commitment to stay in place and focused on the understanding that change takes time. It is this posture that represents the compassionate action of the adults that link arms for students each year, understanding that the barriers they navigate are structural and have nothing to do with their innate talent or ability.
In4All volunteers and teachers represent the businesses and the schools who are the scaffolding for our year-over-year and stay-in-place work. Our impact circles are designed to share the story of In4All’s commitment to mobilize our stakeholders within specific communities in Oregon to localize action. They highlight the businesses, schools, and individuals who support our work via their time, their talent, and their financial gifts. As a resident and member of the North Portland community, I recognize my neighborhood schools, Chief Joseph, George, Ockley Green, and Rosa Parks, and the businesses who are committed to them, Daimler Trucks North America, Glumac, Grummel Engineers, KPFF, and New Relic. Daimler has been bringing our STEM Connect program to Rosa Parks 4th and 5th graders for over nine years. Grummel and New Relic signed on as new middle school, Design Thinking partners during a global pandemic and will hopefully meet their students and teachers in-person for the first time later this school year!
While I recognize the partners who comprise my In4All impact circle I must also center my knowledge of North Portland’s history of displacing Black families in the work. Urban renewal and development efforts: Interstate 5, Emanuel Hospital, and the Memorial Coliseum erased entire communities. New development raised housing costs and property taxes making it unaffordable for the families who had spent their entire lives calling this community home. The resiliency of culture and community are also evident here. It is visible in the Charles Jordan Community Center, the activities at Columbia Park, and through the work of Imagine Black whose initiatives are developing future leaders and advocating for anti-displacement, environmental justice, and policies impacting Black families. As a member of the community I am also committed to recognizing the ways in which my identity as a white, middle-class, cis and hetero woman, are connected to and responsible for the displacement of Black families and to understanding that my compassion must always center on the innate talent and beauty of the Black lives in my community.
The greatness of the communities In4All’s work focuses on is not reliant on us – it IS already. Apart from us. The work is in the realization that Oregon will thrive when the lives of the students that have been excluded are valued and their family, culture, and community rhythms are amplified. This is why we bring adults together to highlight pathways for students through our elementary, middle, and high school programs. It is one small, and very important, piece of the puzzle that can mobilize people with the power to effect change. The intention is compassionate action – not to be right but to get it right.
I invite you to join us in our effort. Start by visiting our Community Impact Circles web page to find your community and to understand which school our programs are being implemented at and the businesses that sponsor them. Then, do some work to delve into its history, learn about community events happening that you can engage in that help you to understand the community capital of the folk who make up that community. Finally, share your learnings back with us so that we can share it with others!
Together, we can, and we must, work to realize a future of limitless possibilities for our youth. One community at a time.