Information about current Cornerstone Theater Co's community engagement process so far on specific projects. Search with project tag# for a particular project.
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Treva and I had agreed that I'd call her the day before to confirm us coming to talk during lunch and I called her yesterday and left a message.
She never called me back (and has never actually called me at all...) so I figured we had a 70/30 chance of stopping by and having it be totally cool.
Sigrid and I arrived at 11 and Treva was there, and told us that it wasn't a good day for us to talk to the seniors- her daughters are sick and she was leaving early, and that Monday would be a much better day.
So we booked Monday April 26th at 11:00am. It's official, it is on the front desk's calendar, and will actually happen.
So the bad of this was that we didn't get to talk to any seniors today (and that Juliette drove out to the center at noon and no one was there! )
But, the good was that we got face time with Treva and have an official booking for the 26th.
I met with Discovery Charter Prep today!While there are a lot of complicated elements to this partnership, I feel positive about our prospects for living at this campus this summer.
I will not recap all the various steps over many months except to say that in person communication is valuable and there hasn’t been enough.It was so fantastic to meet principal Dr. K Smith today.And the two assistant principals were there too-- Kristi M and Arie N—along with Sheryl S, the financial person for the school.
Dr. Smith repeatedly wondered at the church’s interest and support in our project when they seem not to care at all about the school except for their financial relationship. (“They don’t even let us use the kitchen!”)
I said that I think the church was interested in being heard and included in the project as representative of their community. Arie pointed out that this is a direct benefit to the church that they don’t get from the school relationship. (There is some potential to positively impact the relationship between the school and church.)
Discovery Prep is a major partner with Youth Speak Collective.I knew they were partners but was unaware of how integral that relationship is—Youth Speak is a key part of funding the school.YSC has a summer program- 9th Grade Academy-- at Discovery Prep campus.About 50 students for no more than 4 weeks and they are not on campus a lot of that time—they go on field trips a lot.
The school would like to do summer tutoring for 30 to 60 of their own students.It’s not a structured “summer school.”
They believe that we can share the campus—we would use 9 classrooms, the dining room and kitchen and set up our showers in the back left grassy yard.This is one classroom less than the ideal number.I estimated we would have 25-27 people living on the campus.
They are confident we would not need to go through the (costly and annoying) fingerprinting process.
I offered the alternative schedule for the residency-- July 1 through August 1, rather than July 8 through August 8. It's possible that ending on August 1 will be better for their facilities maintenance.
They are really interested in involving their students in the play.They used to have arts programs but they’ve been cut like crazy. They even have musical instruments they purchased awhile back that are collecting dust somewhere. Dr. Smith offered a space at a sister school in Burbank as a possible venue.
I mentioned more than once our desire for the students’ parentsfamilies to be involved as well.
Two people—Kristi and a facilities guy—expressed concerns about safety and security.The school has a number of connections with the Foothill Police Station and Dr. Smith thinks we should notify them and they will keep an eye on us.
The school’s biggest concern is cost.They are in a financial pinch as it is.
It’s possible that some non-money exchange can include
1- Us doing some stuff with students at the school this June, and
2- Doing a project or workshop(s) with the students in the following school year.
Dr. Smith says that we have good karma and that she things good things will come of our project and she wants her school and students to be a part of it.They all got caught up in thinking about possible venues, the most interesting suggestion being the unfinished and empty Children’s Museum at Hansen Dam park.
At any rate, Dr. Smith says she needs to get approval from the Discovery Prep board.Kenn Phillips their board chair is the person who enthusiastically started this relationship so I feel optimistic about that, though the timing is dependent upon the financial discussion with the church.
Next steps:
See the campus to confirm that we can make do with 9 rooms plus kitchen and dining room.(Also check in about restrooms & sharing!)
Sheryl/Reggie conversation about cost/payments between them and between CTC and one or the other of them.
Determine which residency dates are best for the overlap with the school.
Come up with an idea for community engagement element to do with Discovery students in June.
Wait for news of for approval from Discovery Prep board.
About 15 participants today, but this workshop was a bit of a mess. Very challenging because the kids were a lot less focused and interested than last time.We were not able to do all the things we’d hoped and those we did were not as complete and grounded as we’d hoped. I think Xanthia’s determination is accurate:the repeat kids were ready to go, much more focused. The new kids didn’t all want to be there and we think were told by Jessica that they had to be there.The new kids were unfocused and their energy messed up that of the others too.
We plan to do 2 more workshops.Because we are likely to have new people in the circle each time we cannot really do the cumulative arc we’d been thinking of for these workshops.
We're leading one workshop a week for 4 weeks with teens at the Boys & Girls Club of San Fernando Valley.
Workshop #1. Eleven participants plus staff member Jessica observed a lot of the workshop. One activity we did together was writing and sharing Your Five Senses of Pacoima.
What I See in Pacoima
Gangs, Cars, Girls, Gang violence, Football, Schools, Stores, House, Graffiti, Boys and Girls Club,Homeless People, Minority Races, McDonalds, Burger King, Park, Tagging, Cop, People, Girls and Boys
