Session Host: jesikah maria ross
\nSession Reporters: Celeste Hamilton Dennis & Melia Tichenor<\/p>\n
Participants:
\nDesiree Gutierez
\nWendy Willis
\nJacob Caggiano
\nElaine Cha
\nLevander Voo
\nMichal Wilder
\nMelia Tichenor
\nCeleste Hamilton Dennis
\njesikah maria ross<\/p>\n
Question: How do we create in-person and online public convo events that combine art\/data\/storytelling? <\/p>\n
One thing people want to walk away with:<\/p>\n
What have you done or observed that has worked? What strategies and tips are effective?<\/p>\n
Desiree \u2013 Strategy observed when convening people who don\u2019t necessarily know each other but awkwardness of breaking the ice. Ask a broad question that has four possible answers. Event with Troop 1500 and they\u2019ll go visit their moms in jail. To break the ice, ask people to identify their favorite girl scout cookie and go to section of room. People have to get up out of seats, introduce to one another. After the film and other activity when it comes time to be engaged they already know each other. <\/p>\n
Celeste \u2013 Cash mob for struggling stationery store owner in Levittown, New York. Seeded plants of Mystery, fun, surprise. <\/p>\n
Michal \u2013 Around Jewish holiday of Purim school organizes carnival students come up with ideas for community service projects. Gift baskets for people, danced with elderly in homes \u2013 tapped into existing traditions. <\/p>\n
Elaine \u2013 Had event space that was our own. Worked with talk shows. New biography that had come out on James Brown. Person who wrote book was music journalist. Rather than have book event with moderator on stage but had music contributor who was also a DJ\/Professor moderate. Brought in drum kit. Had three of them talk with each other, drummer played sound breaks. Not just way to talk about James Brown but look at social history. People of all ages there. Also showed footage of concert. Sold a lot of books that day. Very diverse group as well. Really fun event. And it was free. <\/p>\n
jesikah \u2013 Free event, music when people came in, food and flowers on tables. Pop up art exhibition. In beautiful hall. Visual and sound when came in. Played two-minute stories of people grappling with hunger. Four lightning responses. People at table would talk about how that affected them personally and professionally. Art at table to engage. Strategies notice that worked well was that it moved along quickly. All those together made it more energizing and different than regular public convo. <\/p>\n
Melia \u2013 Theatre piece How to End Poverty in 90 Minutes. Theatre crowd used to patronize theatre partnered with 20 nonprofits dealing with poverty in the community. Actors would do vignettes about what different issues would look like, and orgs answered snippets about what they did to address poverty. Everyone was invited to participate using post-it notes \u2013 dotmacracy – questions unsure not have a meal, unemployed. See not all privileged theatre goers, people in room still experiencing poverty. Two worlds who didn\u2019t interact but did. Learning station and stats on wall and Googlers. Game show style to donate money to. Every night one strategy is chosen. Everyone left with pamphlet with org that participated profiled. A lot of cool dialogue around which strategy need to choose. <\/p>\n
Elaine \u2013 One of benefits of dotmacracy is have to be discreet with questions but in satisfying way. Opens up potential for convo. After event told people about which dots they choose, way to keep people engaged. <\/p>\n
Kaylee – What\u2019s the goal for longer follow-up? How do we go from event to next step?<\/p>\n
Meghann \u2013 Surveyed people before event and then after we held a theatre presentation. How much info they retained? Would share email and phone? Follow up with them. What we haven\u2019t figured out is what else different can we do than email? Give people opp to hear if this impactful to them. Bandwidth question \u2013 have to decide whether to source this out to larger community.<\/p>\n
jesikah \u2013 Created info zones and kiosks. If you got jazzed about food pantry, go here. Asked them to have three things on handbill to take away. Not say take action, there are opps to learn more. Not fiscal partners. <\/p>\n
How can we use art to engage people at these events?<\/p>\n
Elaine \u2013 Sometimes when it comes to engagement of outreach team, sometimes we plan with only diverse communities in mind. Case for trying to engage people from everywhere. Power of art comes in. Don’t have to identify one kind of driving community. \u201cHere\u2019s a young people\u2019s event.\u201d Bullshit. Can\u2019t think of millennials as being a commodity. Folks hearing each other will engage on their own. Don\u2019t have to control engagement.<\/p>\n
Meghann \u2013 There is room for certain audiences. Youth, who don\u2019t get a chance to speak. They run it, adults don\u2019t control it. To them, from them. Hey, we want to empower you to do this thing. Authentic, creates space where they can own it. How do we empower? Kind of weird because it\u2019s for them.<\/p>\n
Kaylee \u2013 When you\u2019re trying to reach out to marginalized communities it\u2019s not like we created a space, come on in! But people involved in the process in every stage of that. <\/p>\n
Meghann \u2013 We\u2019re such owners. But there\u2019s a million orgs working with young people. Come into event in a way that\u2019s respectful. Already stuff going on. <\/p>\n
Elaine \u2013 Go to where they are. <\/p>\n
Desiree \u2013 Detroit SOUP. $5 dinner in a space in the community, people present four projects, low barrier to access.<\/p>\n
jesikah \u2013 Better understanding, make face-to-face connections. <\/p>\n
Elaine- Sloup. Wonder to extent these gatherings bring together like-minded individuals of similar socio-economic backgrounds, give to whoever pitch this idea. Those who help and those who receive help. <\/p>\n
Desiree \u2013 Comes down to authenticity. Who\u2019s being brought into the room, who\u2019s presenting. <\/p>\n
Jacob \u2013 Speaking out requires courage. Chance of having meaningful impact more than chance of backlash. Risk scenario. Fast in head. Want to maintain status quo. Liability calculation. Safe space. If you\u2019re finding a way to elevate emotions it doesn\u2019t have to be so aggressive. People have legitimate reason for being upset. Don\u2019t want to hamper rage. People who make decisions don\u2019t show up to those things. Empty echo chamber. Don\u2019t know what motivates people in power to make decisions.<\/p>\n
Wendy \u2013 Worked with journalists to plan event Candidates Gone Wild. Journalists + City Club of Portland, Bus Project. Whole idea was to destabilize power between candidates and people. Designed to get at how candidates feel. Game shows, video clips of poems,
\nPeople watched on TV and theatre. Way for decision makers to reveal something in way that\u2019s not shaming. Ground rules among planners if go for it on someone needs to be around their position on something not something that\u2019s intrinsic to them, their person. Cat steps to bed, one candidate. Human governance. <\/p>\n
Lee \u2013 House not clean. Get at truths of who people really are. Incredible event. <\/p>\n
Elaine \u2013 People afraid of speaking up, make sure not going to them for one time. Journalism one time or twice so people feel like not commitment to community. Ways to think about cumulative communication. Accountability, innovation. Creating more than one opportunity to voice thoughts. Multi channel.<\/p>\n
Desiree \u2013 Anonymously express self without fear of backlash. Problematic in digital space, trolling happens. Maybe one of only ways people can feel comfortable. <\/p>\n
jesikah \u2013 Has anyone used Facebook groups to engaged and involve people that has worked well?<\/p>\n
Lee \u2013 Embedded in Facebook group, made comments while reporting. Direct engagement with audience. Had an event with band, launch party with org, rolled out story in slideshow. More social media engagement cutting newspapers and radio out of equation, doing it just with people with cell phones. Don’t want to overuse it, has limitations. Clear I\u2019m a reporter. Almost like a Reddit. Black Portlanders is becoming a meme. <\/p>\n
Michal \u2013 Humans of New York page conversation in comments section, actual convos happen. More orgs could utilize that method.<\/p>\n
Jacob \u2013 Self-generating theme or idea. Bangladesh project<\/p>\n
Elaine \u2013 Facebook. So much emphasis on quantitative the qualitative gets overlooked. Making qualitative measurement as much as part of convo it\u2019s a huge victory.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Session Host: jesikah maria ross Session Reporters: Celeste Hamilton Dennis & Melia Tichenor Participants: Desiree Gutierez Wendy Willis Jacob Caggiano Elaine Cha Levander Voo Michal Wilder Melia Tichenor Celeste Hamilton Dennis jesikah maria ross Question: How do we create in-person … Continue reading