Conversation Starters

A Brief Re-Thinking of Public Safety Policy Problem Definition, Assessment, and Description The debate over how best to approach and carry out equitable public safety has endured since before the founding of the United States of America.  While safety is a fundamental human need, a simple scan of the social horizon reveals that safety is not an automatic guarantee for all people, especially for those whose racial identity isn’t white (Kahn, 2020).  The history of inequities related to non-white residents stretches back for centuries but became especially illuminated over the course of 2020 as Black Lives Matter protests against the murder-by-police of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and others drew continuous media and social attention that has yet to abate.  More than ever, dialogue and debate has overwhelmed the airwaves as options ranging from a complete abolishment of the police to doubling down on the amount of money municipalities should invest in so-called “Blue Live...

 Originally published on The Community Innovation Network website. I Am What I Think You Think I Am Sarah Wolf , MFA, MSSA Candidate Community Innovation Network Graduate Student Research Assistant February 8th, 2021 On February 1st, we launched our brand-new Foundations of Collaborative Community Change (FC3) with the first workshop, Change Agents Unite. As a Graduate Student Research Assistant at Community Innovation Network, I was so ready to be part of this incredible group of participants from all over the United States. We gathered in a virtual space ready to be inspired by the facilitators -- CIN Founder Dr. Mark Chupp and his Mandel School colleague Dr. Adrianne Fletcher -- and inspired by each other. To spark new joy into our community work. To aid in that process, Dr. Chupp and Dr. Fletcher guided us in thoughtful dialogue -- and introduced some very poignant exercises. Namely, we did “ The Looking Glass Self Exercise ,” something always available in our  CIN Toolki...

This morning I watched a documentary called  Risky Drinking  that profiled maybe five different people with varying degrees of binge drinking habits or lifestyles.  My experience viewing this film left my stomach feeling a little swishy because nearly all of the vignettes felt like they could have been lifted from my own life experience in some way shape or form... But what actually got to me?  Right at the very end when the filmmakers added some notes about "where these people are now," the final screen read like this: The first half of the message displayed first and it gave me pause in the same way the word "help" in this context gives me pause anymore.  I can tell you from very personal experience how futile and useless the word  help  is.  You can help someone paint a wall.  You cannot help someone see things they don't want to see, change things they don't want to change, make choices they don't want to make.  You can support, you ...

How many of you have watched  The Queen's Gambit  limited series on Netflix?  How many of you fell in love with the beauty of the cinematography and the choreography of chess?  How many of you dusted off your old chess set or went out and bought your first one as a result of your binge-viewing?  How many of you were enchanted by the story of orphan Beth Harmon (played by Anya Taylor-Joy) and how her stoicism and hardship was rewarded by an international platform where she was paid to play mind-games? Raise 'em high, friends.  I know you're out there. I'd heard from many friends and saw folks on social media gushing about the series and so when I ran out of free episodes of  Survivor  right at the end of my semester (don't tell me things don't line right up in this life), I decided to check it out.  I'd heard mostly good things but one sort of sardonic and vaguely scathing review from Louis Virtel on the podcast  Keep It  where he wa...

Stocking My Community Practice  Theoretical Frameworks Toolkit While there are many theoretical frameworks and contexts readily applicable to my projected future life as a social worker, this essay will examine two umbrella theories: Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD) and Critical Social Theories, especially Critical Race Theory, Feminist Theory, and Intersectionality.  By utilizing these frameworks and lenses, my goal is to see beyond the surface and discover places to dig deep into the work of supporting community groups and policy initiatives in such a way that it is the impacted community members themselves who self-determine who they are, what they stand for, and what goals they’d like to set to strengthen their shared world. Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD) In 1993, Kretzman and McKnight wrote a “guide about rebuilding troubled communities” that was meant to be “simple, basic, and usable” with “wisdom flowing directly out of the experience of courageous and...