E-Term 2021: Internships in Community and Social Change

One thing you learned (Note: This should be a concept or an idea, not a statement of fact.)

I am a big picture thinker!!! Rather than looking at the small tasks at hand I am often either enamored or utterly terrified with the “big picture” being laid out in front of me. What I took from these chapters is that while I should look at the big picture as it is an important part of making decisions and being productive, it is also important to look at the little things in front of me.

One thing you connected to your own experience. This could be a connection to your internship, to another activity, or even to something you’ve observed in the news.

I could really connect this to my internship because I, unlike some other students in the class, had one big project due at the end of the month rather than a few little projects to do throughout the month. I had to break down the big picture of it all and turn it into smaller chunks that were manageable. 

One question you have

How can I begin to have the conversation with people, like family members, to get them to think about the world in a complex way and not a complicated way? There are so many issues that are out there that can be solved if thought of in a complex way rather than complicated and I want to relay that to people who may not think so in order to help change their minds.

One question that I have is how we can get through new doors while we are in “the flow”

I am all for people getting time for for their crimes, but when Reagan wanted the judges to be "tough" on criminals, that mainly targeted POC. These longer and harsher sentences is why there is so many people in prison right now for minor crimes. For example, there are many people that are in jail for having marijuana. Since it is becoming legal in many states and being decriminalized, i believe the people that are in jail doing time just for marijuana should be free. 

Those are the same people that probably did not know where else to turn to too be able to provide for their families. They probably come from poverty and the only way they know how to get money is selling drugs. 

We need organizations such as CCDN because we give people financial assistance, mentoring programs, find employment, food, clothes, etc. Having this organization in the community is crucial to have especially with the community is surrounded by poverty. Kids need mentoring programs so they can learn leadership and be able to express their feelings. Parents need to be able to learn different methods from other parents to be able to navigate certain situations they may face with their families. CCDN provides that for the people in the community. 

Yes, the people that may sell or have sold drugs could be a part of the reason of why a community is failing, but where did the drugs come from? Why do POC run to selling drugs and playing sports as the only way out? Do you believe that prisoners that are serving time for marijuana should be free?  

One thing that I have learned from this chapter is that scale in ecological systems is a key component of resilience.(pg.206)

One thing that I was able to connect to my own experience at McCoy was when the author talked about the cross-scale change (pg.207). This interaction tied into my work at McCoy because at the center they have different activities that they create to help their clients with dementia and Alzheimer’s.

One question is how do social innovators manage the context when innovation will not seem radical?

One thing I’ve learned is the idea that you do not know if the door you’re picking is the right one, and you might never know until you’ve reached your destination after stepping through it. This is a new concept to me because it seems like as humans we always wait until everything is just right. We wait for the “right” moment to share a first kiss, move to a new city, or have a baby. But this is a refreshing reminder that there is no right time or right door. It’s a reminder that I don’t want to spend my life waiting for everything to fall into place. The only way for that to happen is to start moving and see where it leads you.

I have connected the idea of stepping through different doors to a YouTube channel I came across about a year ago called “Yes Theory”. The hosts were just 20-something year old dudes that decided they were going to start saying, “yes” to more things. This snowballed into not only saying, “yes” to situations they came across, but also creating new situations that put them out of their comfort zone. They emphasized the concept of “seeking discomfort”. The guys started walking through different doors, and even creating their own doors, which resulted in a massive audience and an entire company dedicated to their brand. They are a shining example of what can come simply by stepping over that first threshold.

My question is, if you do not know if you are stepping through the right door at the time, and if the focus is meant to be more on the journey instead of the end goal, how do you know when the right time is to close a door instead of riding it out to the end?

(All from Chpt. 8, no page numbers because listened to on Audible)

One thing I read that I could connect to an experience from the internship is that you should "avoid falling prey to and being seduced by success" (pg 214). It is easy to feel down about your work because only a few people attended your zoom call or you feel like no one is truly understanding your mission but this quote is very true in the fact that we should not get lost in success.

One question I have: Why is it that when social invocation succeeds, it is no longer innovation, but business as usual(pg. 212).

• One thing I learned was on page 221 where social innovators are not those that create new doors, but rather they see and believe that more doors exist. This is very true within the context of my own internship as it was entirely looking for possible doors that my organization could use in order to advance their existing mission. I was essentially not creating new paths for them, but creating a list of the paths that exist and what may happen if they chose to go down them. I really enjoyed doing this and it simplified many of my fears of not having enough previous knowledge. 
• One thing I connected was the concept presented in chapter 7 (p. 202) where we may not be able to see the peaks of our adversity and they are not set as mountains on a map, but rather they are affected by our current actions and evolve with us. This means that another layer of complexity is added in not being able to know when and where trials may occur. I related to this because the hardest part of this project was not the subject material as I thought it might be, but rather focussing my own thoughts into meaningful action. Only after I acted could I begin to plan and make progress toward an end goal that evolved over time. 
• How do we look for opportunities to let change find us through acceptance of indefinite unknown future problems?

I connected with pg 229 where it says "There are no perfect people. There are no perfect projects. We are not measured against perfection, only called to do what we can, to set out on an exploration to an unimagined destination, an imagined good." This is something that I can connect with because personally I often times try to do things perfectly and end up being too hard on myself when it is not. Having this reminder that nothing is perfect is good because it reminds me to slow down in a way and just do the best I can because that is all anyone can do. 

Question: How can one suggest to someone to start looking at the complex relationships, if they haven't ? Is worth trying to change the world if you are unsure of the outcome or if you'll even be around to see it?

Ch. 7 & 8

Something I learned

I really enjoyed learning about the concept of a fitness landscape, which teaches us to be prepared to adjust as it is impossible for our plans to predict the future (202).

Connection

Off of the discussion on fitness landscape, I connected to the comparison it provided to raising children on page 201. As one of four children, I can attest to the fact that we each posed our own challenges and came out of childhood as four very different individuals. It made me have more appreciation for the patience my parents had with us.

Question

What obvious possibilities am I ignoring or dismissing in the context of Beloved?

Connected: "When a person is good at getting things done, or at helping others to do them, he or she can come to think they are responsible for what happens. And they're not. Whether the outcome is good or bad, it is hubris to accept too much blame or praise." (page 199) I think like this sometimes when I am helping a friend do a task whether it is big or small, even at my work outside of school. I think it is just my frame of mind. I work efficiently and try my best to be successful. Having this mindset that when things don't go as planned they are not successful, is not always positive and leads to more conflicts than resolutions. 

Question: How can we become more focused on positively impacting others instead of sticking to a routine formula that we think paints the perfect picture of society? 

One thing you learned (Note: This should be a concept or an idea, not a statement of fact.)

One thing you connected to your own experience. This could be a connection to your internship, to another activity, or even to something you’ve observed in the news.

One question you have

Learned: I didn’t know that dare was created in 1983, this is a large and influential drug resistance program that I went through as a kid and I didn’t realize the politics that surrounded it was symbolic on the war on drugs era. Growing up I enjoyed the program and it led me to make smarter well informed decisions as I grew up, It is interesting to learn that the program is linked closely with the war on drugs which is a controversial and racist program that has been use to target minorities and the poor while lifting up the industrial prison complex.(193)

Connected: Complacency kills. This part of the chapter referring to Icarus and connecting him to NASA(197) connected to myself because I have always thought that a good leader and someone who wants to constantly improve should always take constructive criticism and question his/herself. I have also always thought that the fundamental problem in our society with concern to disasters is complacency, the inability to think the unlikely will happen. I am a strong supporter of regulatory boards and think that when they work correctly to hold our systems in check they are conducting one of the most vital jobs in our society.

Question: Should industries be torn down that show a complete lack of accountability and systemic corruption or should industries that have become complacent and stagnant be reformed? 

I connected with the line "Because the place you arrive at is not what you expected when you started out does not mean your journey has failed" (p. 90 E-book) because  I have seen many people, including myself, get discouraged and give up on a certain something because we did not get the outcome we had hoped to get. We tend to regret ever doing it and we're filled with so much resentment towards the people who encouraged us to do it because the time and effort and everything else we invested seems to just go to waste. It's kind of encouraging to learn that even social innovators do not sometimes get to their 'actual destinations'. There are no perfect people or perfect projects or a fixed address to success., but if we don't try, we risk not realizing our potential (p. 83 and 89 E-book).

In chapter 7 we are told to "avoid falling prey to and being seduced by success" (p. 85 E-book). But what if your attraction to success is the only driving force that motivates you to do something like social innovation, what could be done about it?

Connection: The quote, "Indeed, one might say an innovation is successful, it redefines the landscape in which it has emerged, assuring that its immediate success is short-lived even as the foundation has been laid to take on new challenges" stood out to me in our reading (Pg. 205). This quote reminded me of the process of getting an education. High-school students always have their eyes fixed on one goal: graduation. Every class a high schooler takes brings them a little closer to graduation, and eventually, the goal is met and graduation arrives. Success has been reached, at least until the following August, when the educational process starts over again as one enters into college. High school becomes a memory with only a diploma to represent it. I went into college with a similar mindset from high school: get the credits, graduate, receive a degree. But now I am beginning to see that success is not a fixed location. Once I graduate college, I will move on to graduate school. Once I finish grad school, I will start my career. Once I achieve one goal, a new one will always arise. There will be no one point in time in which I can deem myself "successful." Just like the social innovators in the book, I'm beginning to learn to focus on the process of receiving an education, rather than on the end result. I'm learning to focus on how these years in college can help me fulfill my purpose, rather than constantly be waiting for the moment I receive some sort of esteemed degree.

Question: How can the lessons in this book apply to people who do not feel currently called to start some grand social innovation? How can the lessons in this book apply to students, people with regular careers, and people who don't feel called to start their own nonprofit? (not from a specific page, just a reflective question from the reading as a whole)