We are now halfway through the fall term Inside-Out Alumni Book Club with the youth at Serbu. This time around we have twelve youth and eight Inside-Out Alumni! We are reading Calvin and Hobbes, and the term is going amazingly well. Melissa Crabbe held a second Inside-Out facilitator training for the alumni who are participating, and this was a fabulous opportunity to work through best practices and trouble shooting, in addition to gaining the skills Melissa was teaching. We are becoming quite the team of alumni together.
Only two I/O alumni were able to participate who had been involved over the summer. Ted and myself are therefore leading the group, with the new participants as extremely active members of the group. Five of the youth are participating again from the summer, and only one summer participant chose not to rejoin the group (the others were released). The more balanced numbers are great: we have done wagon wheels, held small group discussions, and overall had a much more involved and integrated feeling in the room with the balance of youth and I/O Alumni.
Two weeks ago, we had a half-hour discussion of the ideas of "fate" and "destiny," inspired (of course) by Calvin and Hobbes. We talked about free will, and about the possibly contradictory idea that everything happens for a reason. The youth were eloquent on both counts, reflecting both a desire to feel control over their actions and a need for the security of a guiding plan to life. The level of dialogue, consistent with our own Inside-Out experiences, was much higher than what is often achieved in a college classroom. On Friday, we discussed war and peace, our tendency to turn violence into entertainment, and the damage this has on individual lives. People were so willing to be vulnerable, and to ask questions (the comic dealt with Mutually Assured Destruction and the Cold War, which the youth knew nothing about).
We'll see what comes up in the comics next. I'm hoping to have a conversation about bullying sometime in the next couple of weeks. I'm also hoping develop a final project, hopefully to include some comic strip writing and drawing of our own.
If anyone has suggestions for material, projects, or activities, I would love to hear them. In the meantime, expect more updates soon!
Katie D, University of Oregon
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Developing Inside-Out Alumni Guidelines
Hey everyone! There is a developing group of Inside-Out Alumni, working together to put together protocol and guidelines for alumni groups. So far, the leadership is coming from the Inside-Out Center at Temple University in Philadelphia, and at the other strong alumni site in Oregon. We are working together to create not only the guidelines for new groups, but also ideas for how to best support our alumni and to encourage future work on Inside-Out related projects and reflecting those values.
If you have suggestions for us, or want to be involved, please write to us! We can't wait for a time when there are dozens of authors on this blog, and hundreds of voices across the country contributing project ideas and program support.
If you're like me, you know that what you learned in Inside-Out has changed you in a fundamental way. You also probably know that you have learned things that have the potential to change the world. Now the point is to find a way to do that together.
Please send your feedback and suggestions, keep checking this blog, and help get this off the ground!
Write us at nationalinsideoutalumni@gmail.com and encourage your local professors to get involved with the Alumni subcommittee.
If you have suggestions for us, or want to be involved, please write to us! We can't wait for a time when there are dozens of authors on this blog, and hundreds of voices across the country contributing project ideas and program support.
If you're like me, you know that what you learned in Inside-Out has changed you in a fundamental way. You also probably know that you have learned things that have the potential to change the world. Now the point is to find a way to do that together.
Please send your feedback and suggestions, keep checking this blog, and help get this off the ground!
Write us at nationalinsideoutalumni@gmail.com and encourage your local professors to get involved with the Alumni subcommittee.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Nathional Inside-Out Newsletter
Hello, everyone!
If you haven't gotten a chance to read the first ever national newsletter from the Inside-Out Program, check it out here!
If you haven't gotten a chance to read the first ever national newsletter from the Inside-Out Program, check it out here!
Oregon Book Club a success!
This summer's Alumni Book Club pilot project was a true success. Four Inside-Out Alumni worked with approximately ten youth, reading The Ultimate Spider-Man. The group discussed topics as varied as responsibility, teen relationships, trust, gang violence, capitalism, and the makings of a hero. The reports from all participants were very positive: for the youth it was a chance to add an activity to their days, to read an interesting book, and to talk with new people. For the alumni, it was a chance to create a new program, engage in dialogue, and learn from the youth about teaching and facilitating.
We learned that working independently of a professor and starting a new program is both difficult and extremely rewarding. We have developed a very positive working relationship with the staff and leadership of the institution there, and have abundant and growing support for this program at the University, which purchased the books for the class. We learned a lot about the differences of working with youth as opposed to the adults in Inside-Out classes, and will continue to learn how to best design the program to meet everyone's needs.
Most important, for me, was a chance to get back into the classroom in an Inside-Out format. I love digging deep meaning out of a simple storyline, and inviting others to respond in kind. It is obvious that some of the youth have never had any kind of creative space in their own learning, and to be asked their opinion and encouraged to disagree is a novel thing.
We will begin the book club again in October, to run for eight weeks. We hope to have a larger number of alumni participants, and to generally improve the program.
Please comment with any questions or suggestions!
We learned that working independently of a professor and starting a new program is both difficult and extremely rewarding. We have developed a very positive working relationship with the staff and leadership of the institution there, and have abundant and growing support for this program at the University, which purchased the books for the class. We learned a lot about the differences of working with youth as opposed to the adults in Inside-Out classes, and will continue to learn how to best design the program to meet everyone's needs.
Most important, for me, was a chance to get back into the classroom in an Inside-Out format. I love digging deep meaning out of a simple storyline, and inviting others to respond in kind. It is obvious that some of the youth have never had any kind of creative space in their own learning, and to be asked their opinion and encouraged to disagree is a novel thing.
We will begin the book club again in October, to run for eight weeks. We hope to have a larger number of alumni participants, and to generally improve the program.
Please comment with any questions or suggestions!
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Alumni Training held at the UO
In preparation for the Serbu book club project, five Inside-Out alumni at the University of Oregon participated in a mini facilitation training hosted by Melissa Crabbe, Inside-Out Assistant National Director.
Over the course of two meetings, we learned basics of group fascilitation and discussed many of the techniques, questions, and potential problems that arise when conducting Inside-Out-style programs. We brainstormed issues that might arise through working with youth instead of adults on the inside, and worked together to troubleshoot our classroom practices. Melissa led us in a discussion about diversity and the difficult conversations that could arise.
In addition to the practical and much-needed information we gained from our six-hour training, we also had a chance to bond as a group of leaders. Inside-Out has an incredible model of self-leadership for trainings, so that we spend most of the training session imagining potential questions or issues, and then brainstorming solutions. Melissa was the facilitator of our collective learning process, which also provided a model for our own class meetings.
As our group grows over the coming year, we hope to hold future trainings for the outside alumni to be trained in leadershp techniques and program ideology and practices. We also hope that someday in the future these trainings might be led by alumni themselves, and that the students in the trainings might eventually include the incarcerated youth who participate in our book club.
All future plans and dreams aside, we entered our first class as leaders with some practical and exciting new skills and group unity. We are so lucky that Melissa is willing and available to help us! I look forward to sharing stories of future training programs in the future.
Over the course of two meetings, we learned basics of group fascilitation and discussed many of the techniques, questions, and potential problems that arise when conducting Inside-Out-style programs. We brainstormed issues that might arise through working with youth instead of adults on the inside, and worked together to troubleshoot our classroom practices. Melissa led us in a discussion about diversity and the difficult conversations that could arise.
In addition to the practical and much-needed information we gained from our six-hour training, we also had a chance to bond as a group of leaders. Inside-Out has an incredible model of self-leadership for trainings, so that we spend most of the training session imagining potential questions or issues, and then brainstorming solutions. Melissa was the facilitator of our collective learning process, which also provided a model for our own class meetings.
As our group grows over the coming year, we hope to hold future trainings for the outside alumni to be trained in leadershp techniques and program ideology and practices. We also hope that someday in the future these trainings might be led by alumni themselves, and that the students in the trainings might eventually include the incarcerated youth who participate in our book club.
All future plans and dreams aside, we entered our first class as leaders with some practical and exciting new skills and group unity. We are so lucky that Melissa is willing and available to help us! I look forward to sharing stories of future training programs in the future.
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