Though tempered with the sadness, it’s a great joy to see this program achieve its conclusion. It’s been only a month, and a quick one at that, but I don’t think I overstate myself in saying this project has been an incredible sequence of events, and for me, personally, quite an emotional experience. Through this program, I’ve seen a lot of Mexico. I’ve witnessed this country’s horrifying diversity, extreme wealth, crushing poverty, radiant joy, desperation, and as I said in my first entry, these, this country’s many faces, compile the paradox that makes it so beautiful. As I also said in my first entry, this perfect paradox is brilliantly characterized by the complexity of the people, and as such the participants I’ve had the privilege to work with haven’t yet ceased to impress me, with their passion, young wisdom and hope. They’re very obviously teenagers, I should admit, and their natural spirit of rebellion can be at times tough to teach at, especially when it’s ten in the morning and the class is absolutely unresponsive because they didn’t sleep at all the night before. But I’ve seen in them such bold brave souls that I can’t help be let my teacher’s frustration resolve into admiration, particularly this week as they took the spirit of the course into their own hands with their work on their own social develop projects, the final step of Integrando a Mexico’s mission to allow the complex brilliance of this country to become its own savior.
This week, we led the participants through the process of creating a project for social change, and the curriculum, quick but concise, proved quite effective. Participants were divided into groups and led through brainstorming sessions meant to draw out their interests and potential project ideas; they were then individually supported in the creation of a vision statement outlining their goal for the future of their community, a list of long term objectives, a list of short term actions leading up to each individual objective and a mission statement that suggests in a few words how these objectives’ respective actions leads toward the vision. Participants were also taught how to organize a team, fundraising techniques and other relevant management techniques like strategies for risk assessment and project sustainability. The week concluded this Saturday with an open day where participants were able to present to an audience of friends and family summaries of the workshops they’d participated in, and in conclusion, their project plans.
As a conclusion to our project, I found the open day a truly satisfying success. The participants shared their nearly finalized project plans and most if not all were thoroughly impressive not only for their thoroughness but for their strength in passion and rigor. Some participants intend to fight for solidarity and national identity with work in elementary and secondary schools, where workshops everything from anti-bullying to artistic expression are intended to act as tools for the development of self-awareness, individual identity, creativity and constructive interaction with the community. Others want to focus on marginalized communities, such as indigenous groups or immigrants, and will strive to spread their stories amidst the centralized Mexican community with the hopes of generating empathy and acceptance. Others intend attack social issues that augment such socio-cultural conflicts by focusing on a community in their home state and attacking issues like poverty and illiteracy directly.
I was particularly excited by two projects from the latter group planned by participants I had in both my poverty workshop and project development workshop were. One will begin with workshops teaching literacy skills to both build trust between community and project facilitators, and prepare their project participants for later workshops which will provide further academic support for the children of these families and resource management training for the adults. The other, more specifically, will attempt to act as an advocate for microfinance in its respective community, to bring both resources and a sense of empowerment to local famlilies living below the poverty line. The project hopes to raise awareness within the local banking community, perhaps even creating a link with the microfinance bank Fundación Realidad which in partnership with the international microfinance web acting through the website www.kiva.org, relays funds from donors around the world to communities like those in Guerrero, where with project will take place. It will also attempt to culture skills necessary to apply these micro-loans for progress and sustainability, and possibly, as a final goal, encourage the sustainable living technique of the permaculture movement as such application.
Projects like these were particularly inspirational for me, as a facilitator, because in addition to watching these young people, in their projects, embrace, with such intention, real hope, I was also able to watch these individuals, as my students and friends, apply the ideas we’d discussed for the last four weeks, turning theory into reality. With the two mentioned projects, I watched participants take ideas from the consumerism awareness activities and discussions from workshop sessions on poverty in Mexico, and apply them to their strategies for change, planning to teach literacy as a strategy against Oscar Lewis’ ‘Culture of Poverty’ and the application of Muhammad Yunus’ microfinance (covered in the poverty workshop) and permaculture as a dual strategy to bring funds into a community made capable for change and simultaneously leading this community away from the culture of consumerism so often exhibited by the economic class they will hopefully enter. Seeing this as a facilitator was an incredible experience, as I can think to myself, somewhat egotistically, that I contributed to the formation of this powerful plan for action. But beyond this selfish satisfaction, these projects leave me in awe and admiration, for in addition to mastering the concepts covered in our workshops, these participants have plans to actually apply these ideas, something I, personally, can only hope to do in the future. These participants embody a spirit of both hope and action, which, as this project ends, gives me great hope for the work that is to come.
This, of course, is one of the most important parts of our project: success of Integrando a México will not, of course, be measured simply by the size of the dreams presented at our open day. Rather, the defining characteristic will be the number of projects that are actually attempted. Many projects seem much too good to be true, so it’s easy to be skeptical of some of the plans, with school starting this week and the all too discouraging resistance to change yet to be tested. But I choose to believe our participants will at least try. As I’ve written for the past four weeks, I’ve met beautiful people in my time in Mexico, and if there’s one thing we’ve achieved in this small community of social entrepreneurs, it’s a sense of hope for their hope. As I’ve said before, these young people understand the painful paradox that is this country, they’ve experienced it first hand, and yet they’ve somehow maintained a belief in a better future matched with the willfulness to carry it through. With this as their grounding, I believe that they like our project’s leader Patricio Provencio, can match passion with reality and strive for real hope in their future.
With this as encouragement, I watched the first of the participants depart for home with a sense of satisfaction and pride. I don’t mean to take credit for the participants’ initiative, nor for their spirit, we had an incredible group, and much of our work merely helped them on their way. But to see them leave so hopeful and simply excited, I can’t help but think this project achieved at least the beginnings of its goals. We wanted to culture a mindset of openness, hope and readiness for action all necessary for a successful social entrepreneur, and these participants embody this mindset. Even if some of their projects fail, the raw energy that drives their present will for action doesn’t seem likely to die out, and until they finally realize the beginnings of the change they want to see, I have faith this energy will continue to motivate them. If this is true, we’ve achieved all we could have hoped for, and in this way, I think my fellow facilitators would agree, we have reason to feel content.
No comments:
Post a Comment