Friday, August 14, 2009
Danielle Gram
12:00PM
Present: Barbara Fields, Danielle Gram
Current projects:
Kids for peace: Over 50 chapters around the world. Aug 8 was great kindness challenge. Internet system keeping track of people signing up.
B: FYI- Nipun Mehta has group called charityfocus.org, he created the smile cards, helpothers.org; all about acts of kindness and generosity
- D: Also this past summer worked at abused children’s centers; they had no curriculum whatsoever. Very surprising and I was inspired to bring kids for peace curriculum to them- nonviolence communication, yoga, etc. I was also studying at a mission center; they want to spread it to some orphanages.
- Tweaking KFP curriculum to bring into abuse centers, working with professors at Harvard education school, completely doable to give free resources to bring nonviolence education. Really want to start taping into school resources and professors. It’s especially important to bring nonviolence to the places with the deepest need.
- KFP is officially a 5013c, but calling in resources/funding is important for this next year. Received first grant from Hasbro. Also need help with website; still in beginning stages, only 3 years old.
B: AGNT has some amazing nonviolence connections; Ela Gandhi; (granddaughter of Mahatma) was in South African parliament for 25 years. Most of the programs for abused women/children have been spearheaded by Ela. She has tremendous resources for the areas you’re talking about. We can help you make connections like that.
- D: Harvard Humanitarian Initiative: think tank that focuses a lot on Sudan, DRC, Crises, thinking scientifically about how we can respond to these disasters. Teaches me to think about a lot of these same issues in scientific and academic ways.
- One project is helping Darfur refugees by sending text messaging to warn via satellite where road blocks are. Also in DRC training doctors to treat rape as a weapon of war.
- I am one of their only permanent staff members. All communications; website, outreach, youth letter, events, fundraising. They have a lot of big brains/ professors, but it is still so small; a lot of information without the capacity to disseminate to the right audience.
DESIGN IDEA
***time to talk about actual need- state upfront and give people a chance to respond***
(We’ll put a draft design of the meeting together and send out to everyone to tweak.)
***Section to talk about challenges and how to overcome this***
Difficulties that come up being a young person heading an organization and managing older people. It takes a while to prove that our visions are not naiveté; they have substance and we really are creating change.
Idea of what event you’re coming to:
D: Spending a lot of time sharing and learning with each other.
B: There is no pre-existing design; just when and where we’ll be together; we’ll put more structure on it in coming times. And we’d like to let the process speak to us a little bit. Stay with the idea that has energy. And we’ll invite some people from the community so they can benefit, but still keep it small.
How do you see this group staying connected after the meeting?
D: I’ve seen a lot of overlap in the projects we’re doing. It would be great to have joint events, programs. Especially those working in media/ documentary. KFP has a few things in the works- books, theatre/artsy stuff. KFP also wants to have a page on their website for links to other youth peace work.
B: AGNT has the benefit of a large network. How can we all strategize to connect in a way that is mutually beneficial, so that we’re not competing for resources/funding etc.