APPLETON, Wis. A Wisconsin police officer was ambushed and stabbed in the police department parking lot. A second officer was injured while taking the suspect into custody.

The following information was provided by the Appleton Police Department on Tuesday:

On March 31, 2020, at approximately 4:15 A.M., an Appleton Police Department Officer was stabbed with a knife, after being ambushed in the parking lot of the Appleton Police Department. A second officer was also cut; while taking the subject into custody.

This morning, around 2:17 A.M., an officer, in a marked squad car, observeda vehicle following him for an extended distance. The officer drove toward the police department and notified other officers. Officers were advised of the vehicle being previously involved in similar activity in a different jurisdiction. An attempt was made to stop the vehicle. The driver fled but officers did not pursue the subject because of the lack of any serious charges.

Around 4:15 A.M., the officer, followed earlier in the night, was in the parking lot of the Appleton Police Department. When he got out of his squad he noticed a car parked in the street by the parking lot. It appeared to be the same vehicle that was following him earlier.

The officer saw a male standing near the employee entrance to the police department. When he tried to speak with him the subject charged at him. The subject had concealed his right hand behind his leg and appeared to be holding something in it. The officer created distance between him and the individual, while trying to identify what the male was concealing. The male attacked the officer. During the attack, the subject stabbed the officer several times with a kitchen-style knife. The officer fought back and brought the male on the ground. Additional officers responded and were able to get the subject under control and into custody. One of the other officers involved also suffered a cut, from the subjects knife, to one of their hands.

The male was taken to a local hospital for treatment. When he is medically cleared, he will be placed in jail. The Appleton Police Department will be requesting charges of Attempted First Degree Intentional Homicide and Battery to a Police Officer. Additional charges may be filed as a result of our ongoing investigation. The subject arrested is Troy J. VanGrinsven, a 49 year-old male from Kaukauna. The officers names will not be released. Both officers were medically treated and released.

It is only because of the outstanding tactical skills, and the mental and physical fitness of the officer involved, that this incident didnt end more tragically. These are the threats that all our law enforcement officers are facing more frequently. No matter what uniform they wear, we thank all of them, and their family members, for the sacrifices they make every day to serve their communities. Chief Todd Thomas

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Officer ambushed and stabbed in police department parking lot - LawOfficer.com

Atlanta's East Lake Meadows housing project, which opened in 1970, was demolished three decades later. Walter Stricklin/Atlanta Journal Constitution/PBS The new PBS documentary film from Sarah Burns and David McMahon chronicles the fall of an Atlanta housing project through the residents who once called it home.

Beverly Parks grew up in a house in Atlanta in the 1960s, where she and her siblings took turns sleeping in one bed. Huddling in the living room during the winter, shed take a breath and see the frost hang in the air. But in 1970, her family moved into the East Lake Meadows public housing development, and things changed. For $45 a month, her mother could afford a three-bedroom apartment.

When you come from an environment of no food, no heat, cold, to a housing project, that was just like heaven to us, she said.

The images of East Lake Meadows that linger in history books dont look like heaven: Nicknamed Little Vietnam within a year of its opening in 1970, it was one of the many American public housing projects cast as dysfunctional when crime, drugs, and government disinvestment both intentional and negligent tore through the property in the 1970s and 80s. Today, the neighborhood is unrecognizable: In 2000, the development was demolished and rebuilt as a mixed-income project. The original residents were promised they could return, but most were displaced.

In the new PBS documentary East Lake Meadows, directed by Sarah Burns and David McMahon and produced by famed documentarian Ken Burns, those former residents help trace the trajectory of East Lake Meadows with candor, revealing what made it such a special, and eventually, after years of negligence, such a horrible place to live.

Like the 2011 documentary The Pruitt-Igoe Myth, which centered on a St. Louis public housing project made famous in videos of its decline and subsequent implosion, East Lake Meadows uses the history of one development to explain the calcification of segregation in America and the damage thats done when divisions are drawn between a deserving and undeserving poor. Along with former residents, the film features a whos who of contemporary voices on American inequality, such as New York Times Magazine reporter Nikole Hannah Jones and historian/New Yorker writer Jelani Cobb. The feature film, which premiered on PBS this week and is available to stream online, also serves as a powerful call to action: The reason some public housing failed was not because it has to fail, but because there was a lack of will to make it succeed.

We could do this better. We could provide decent housing to the people who need it most, said Burns, who also co-directed the 2012 documentary The Central Park 5. Ultimately thats the message of the film: We could be doing this, we just have to decide we want to.

CityLab spoke to Burns and McMahon by phone their tour to promote the film was cancelled because of Covid-19 concerns, so the couple and their son were staying in with family in South Carolina.

The documentary used one distinct public housing development to tell such a sweeping story. Why did you choose to highlight East Lake Meadows?

Sarah Burns: We originally learned about East Lake because wed been told about the new community there the narrative that is out there about all the successes of the new community, and how much things have changed. But we immediately recognized that that was a really incomplete version of the story, and that in order to think about this place thats there now, it was much more important to consider the place that was there before.

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David McMahon: It felt like in this case that people who had a vested interest in the success of the place had been the ones who put the story out there. And it is an extraordinary success story in certain ways; as Ed Goetz says in the film, you could hardly believe you could remake a community to the extent that they did. But it was just a little digging and we discovered that it wasnt [a success story] for the people who had been living there when it was East Lake Meadows.

Why Atlanta?

Burns: While Chicago has been the focus of much of the academic research and writing about public housing certainly a theme is places like Cabrini Green because of Atlantas history of being the first city that started building these federally funded housing projects in the 30s, and then being so aggressive beginning in the 90s with tearing it all down, it was actually a great place for telling these stories.

We felt like in some ways we could have chosen any housing project and that we would have had stories from residents that we would have been able to explore many of these same issues. When we were sharing the film with public housing residents in other cities, people have found that they recognize something in these stories that they can relate to those experiences and feel in some way that its their story too.

How did you find so many former residents of East Lake Meadows?

McMahon: The tricky thing was that a lot of people did not come back: It was 20 years since the original housing had been bulldozed.

When they were in the 4th, 5th and 6th grade, in the late 90s, theyd begun doing video diaries of the experience of watching their housing come down around them their teacher had given them cameras and told them how to use them. The teacher eventually made the video diaries into a feature-length documentary which premiered at a local library.

We tracked the students down using a private investigator. It took months. Some of them gave us on-camera interviews, but they were there at the very end they had 9- or 10-year-olds perspectives. They werent going to be enough.

So we started, at the suggestion of our colleagues, a Facebook page. After a couple of days, something like 1,500 people had come to the page, all eager to share their memories: Many of them remained connected. In some cases [they left] in the late 70s after saving enough to buy a house; in other cases it was under, eviction or leaving with the sense that the housing was coming down and there was nothing left for them, in other cases it was a Section 8 voucher. We were trying to show there were a lot of outcomes over the years.

Burns: So many of the people we talked to said, Are you going to talk about the good stuff, too? Even the idea of that was really important to people. They recognized that the way their community had been portrayed, to the extent that it had been, was always with this focus on the Little Vietnam aspect of it the crime, violence, the drugs, the problems. It was really important to so many of the people we talked to that that not be the only thing that was covered, because that had been very much their experience so far.

And people were not shy about telling us about that stuff too: They werent saying that that wasnt the case. That there was crime and violence and it could be scary, especially for people who were parents there, the ways you try to protect your children. But that also there were also happy memories, and ways that people came together.

McMahon: Everyone talked in one form or another about how they were able to keep life moving there in the absence of services that other communities are provided or the businesses that we take for granted that grow around all of the communities that are not abandoned.

One of the most compelling figures was Eva Davis, a resident of East Lake Meadows and a fearless tenant leader whos described by her granddaughter, Evette El-Amin, as a fiesty young old lady. Shes the one who, by the end, convinces many tenants that demolishing and rebuilding East Lake Meadows is the only realistic way forward. How did you find her story? Were there other examples across the country of these strong matriarchs who led movements in public housing?

McMahon: Eva Davis had died a year or two before we began production, and we found her family and her passing was very raw for everybody. It was not only the family. Everyone had something to say about Ms. Davis. She had impacted everybodys life there. And certainly across Atlanta and I think well beyond, projects have tenants association leaders, theyre often women and they often have political clout. They often are dealing with problems as diverse as how do we get people to stop buying drugs on our corner to how do we get a toilet fixed in the third building in 3C. All day long she was advocating for these people.

[Before moving to East Lake Meadows, Davis] comes up from a rural area south of Atlanta and gets engaged in civil rights actions there and really cuts her teeth marching with the ministers in Atlanta at the height of the civil rights movement. Shes a perfect person to begin organizing the tenants; she could get 400 people out to vote if the city councilman who represented the district was there to support them. She was a bulldog, as one of her daughters says. Ms. Davis is totally unique. Yet a lot of these spaces have a Ms. Davis, and often its Ms.

The film outlines a forgotten origin story of public housing, which was first marketed and intended as a home for respectable, middle-class-presenting, low-income white people. In the 1930s, for example, Atlanta bulldozed an integrated neighborhood to build Techwood Homes, a public housing development that was made for white families only. Why is that history important, and what does it say about public housing?

McMahon: Theres an evolution across the years of who we think deserves public housing. When [the U.S.] began public housing, we had identified a class of people, white people largely, who had fallen from the middle class in the Great Depression and perhaps lost their housing. It was thought we could give them a step back to the middle class. In designing it, they had to do it in segregated terms. With the societal trends of white flight and white people leaving the city [in the 1950s and 60s], there was a loss of a tax base, a divestment, a lack of commitment to [public housing]. That really happened when it was exclusively black and brown people.

Burns: The reason why we need to cover that history was both to know how different it was in the beginning, and that different intent, but also to understand that we can do this well. The image you get of public housing in the media over the last decades is the one of the Cabrini Greens, the East Lake Meadows, the Pruitt-Igoes these large public housing projects serving an extremely poor community, frequently one that is majority African American in population and that is challenged in many ways with crime and drugs. Thats what we see on the news and thats the sense we walk away from of what public housing is. It comes to define the whole of public housing.

Over the years its been done in different ways. There have been times when we have funded it and taken care of it and provided solid buildings that actually provide decent housing. There was a time when this served a different purpose that it served fairly well the people who lived in it, that it was safe and decent housing, and that it did help people as a sort of stepping stone. It was a different demographic that it was serving in that way.

To [New York Times Magazine reporter] Nikole Hannah Jones point: We could do this well. We have done this well. Weve just never done it well for the most vulnerable, for the people who need it the most.

McMahon: I also dont think we want to touch the entirety of public housing with this brush exclusively. There are 3,000 housing authorities across the country and some of them succeed beautifully. I think that that gets to how do we do this well going forward: that perhaps theres not a one-size-fits-all solution.

But it does seem to be a universal thing that if you decide to start tearing down the public housing, we know now to put the people who were living there at that time in the foreground, and make sure theyre engaged in the solution in a neighborhood thats not serving its residents very well.

Atlanta was doing something radical in the mid-90s: They had a dramatic plan to tear down all of this housing. I think its a cautionary tale.

Sarah Holder is a staff writer at CityLab covering local policy, housing, labor, and technology.

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'East Lake Meadows' Filmmakers on Race and Housing - CityLab

THESE are extraordinary times. As we take refuge in our homes to slow the spread of the coronavirus, life as we know it has drastically changed.

The Movement Control Order (MCO) was announced by the Prime Minister on March 16, imposed under the Control of the Spread of Infectious Disease Act 1988 and the Police Act 1967 from March 18 to April 14.

This partial form of lockdown has seen all places of learning, from kindergartens to higher institutes, and vocational schools closing for the duration of the MCO, with higher education institutes transitioning to online lectures in some cases.

All mass gatherings in the country, including religious, sporting, social and cultural events, have been (and should be, if they havent already) postponed or cancelled. All places of worship and businesses, excluding essential services, have been closed as well.

Through the MCO, the government has established a form of mitigation of flattening the epidemic curve to lower the odds of a spike in infected numbers which are even at this stage overwhelming the healthcare system.

As terrifying though the coronavirus may be, it can be turned back. China, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan have demonstrated that, with furious efforts, the contagion can be brought to heel.

For Malaysia to repeat her successes will take extraordinary levels of coordination and money from the countrys leaders, and extraordinary levels of trust and cooperation from her citizens. It will also require international partnerships in an interconnected world.

So how does that affect us? We. Need. To. Stay. At. Home. As limiting as it may feel, and while some of us may be experiencing a bad case of cabin fever, this may be our only chance of combating the spread of this pandemic.

With people being told to work from home and stay away from others, the pandemic has deepened reliance on services from the tech sector, with an array of lifestyle solutions making social distancing easier.

But more than that, now is the time we need to also spare a thought about how we can make the lives of the underprivileged easier. There are ways to do this, and there are new ways organisations are trailblazing to reach out to those in need.

Here are some examples of how people, organisations and businesses are spearheading and turning to ways into bringing services to the masses while observing the necessary precautions that have been set to protect people.

Theres a chance to stop the coronavirus. And we have a role to play in this.

DAILYMUSCLE GYM

Kimbeley Yap conducting one of Daily Muscle's virtual classes.

With the MCO announcement on March 18, gyms, fitness centres and even public parks are closed, making at-home workouts the only option if you wanted to get some exercise in.

Despite the availability of workouts on the Internet, lets be honest, its hard to stay motivated when you exercise alone at home and there are plenty of distractions.

Noel Maniraj Chelliah and Kimbeley Yap-Chelliah, the husband-and-wife team who run the DailyMuscle gym at Glomac Damansara, realised that their members would be missing out on staying active so they established [emailprotected], a series of live-stream group exercise classes run over video-conferencing.

Each class is 30-45 minutes long and capped at 30 people so that everyone gets individual attention, live feedback and coaching. The classes are designed so that they can be done in limited space, with zero equipment and at any time. Those who missed them can watch the class recordings to follow along.

I finally got around to work out at home when I saw that these classes were available. I appreciate the efforts of Noel, Kim and their team to keep us connected while were all quarantined at home. Even my two kids joined in the classes and they loved it! says Charlotte Robert, one of the class participants.

Since the launch of [emailprotected], DailyMuscle has gained over 30 new online members from around the globe, and Noel and Kim are eager to spread the happiness of fitness around.

Weve opened the classes to all so even if youre not an existing DailyMuscle member, we still want you to be able to work out with a community, says Noel.

BE INTENTIONAL ABOUT YOUR WELLBEING

Exercise aside, being deliberate about daily routines and habits during the MCO period is also key to maintaining good physical and mental health.

The extra time that we have at home now can be used to eat mindfully, move more when doing errands (such as walking to your TV remote), drink more water, and catch up on sleep. Our bodies fare best with structure, so we can use this time to train ourselves to build better habits, advises Noel.

Adding, he says: Its normal to feel more down than usual because our routine has been disrupted. Eating nourishing foods and keeping a daily gratitude journal help me stay focused and to serve our 400-plus member gym community who are all staying at home now, yet connected virtually, so we can come out of this season feeling like weve achieved something instead of just wasting time.

[emailprotected] is priced at RM97 for 14 days of unlimited classes, however it is now being offered for free to everyone who wishes to join. For more information, contact Noel at [emailprotected] or send him and Kim a DM on Instagram at @dailymuscle and @kimbeleyyap.

C3 (CHRISTIAN CITY CHURCH) RELIGIOUS ORGANISATION

C3 Senior Pastor Joseph Ramayah recording his sermons with the help of his wife Pastor Stella Ramayah.

GROWING THE FAITH VIRTUALLY

We had to be crystal clear when the MCO was given. We wanted to hear it from reliable sources as speculations were aplenty which only created fear. We want to work with wisdom and prudence, says senior pastor, Joseph Ramayah.

The leaders of his churches were assembled and put their heads together to figure out how to reach and encourage their many members spread throughout Malaysia. They used technology and social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and emails, and ensured that none were left out.

Some of the steps included counselling via phone calls and WhatsApp calls, and mobilising members to help the elderly in doing their shopping for them while observing the necessary social distancing and sanitising.

Encouraging messages on social media are posted almost every day, including devotions and prayer. Sermons are pre-recorded from the pastors and leaders, and broadcast via YouTube and other platforms on Sundays.

Were focusing on building faith in God while respecting and obeying the instructions given by authorities. As this has never happened in our country before and everything is new, touching base with our members is important as we want our people to know that the church isnt a building but a community of people who are precious and important to God and to us, says Joseph.

The social recession, he points out, will hit certain groups especially hard older people, people with disabilities, people who live alone. But well all feel isolated to some degree. And as long as it remains unwise to gather in physical spaces, well need to create virtual spaces that can encourage and build our faith.

BE INTENTIONAL ABOUT YOUR SPIRITUALITY

Attending Sunday service online.

Plagues of global proportions might seem biblical, but coronavirus is creating new challenges for faith leaders. Many mosques, churches and temples have decided proactively to cancel their normal gatherings.

Resist panic. This isnt to say there isnt any reason to be concerned, or that we should ignore the sound advice of medical professionals and public health experts, says Joseph, adding: Panic and fear are not from God. Peace and hope are. And its possible to respond to a crisis seriously and deliberately while maintaining an inner sense of peace and hope.

Care for the sick and underprivileged. This pandemic may be a long haul. Do what you can to help others, especially the elderly, disabled, poor and isolated. Take the necessary precautions; dont be reckless and dont risk spreading the disease, but also dont forget that its our fundamental human duty to help others, he advises, before concluding: Well move through this together, with Gods help.

THE LOST FOOD PROJECT NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANISATION

The Lost Food Project practices social distancing when delivering food to their charities.

The Lost Food Project (TLFP) is still in operation as theyre deemed essential service, i.e. TLFP provides food for our charities. However, it is forced to minimise its operations due to food shortage as a result of the closing of Pasar Borong Kuala Lumpur, which was one of its main sources of fresh ingredients.

Usually the charities receive their vegetables weekly, however, this is no longer possible as they have to respect the actions taken by the government.

TLFP has 55 charities under its care that receive food and other goods weekly, but TLFP doesnt have enough right now to provide for all. Weve decided to focus on our most vulnerable charities; the ones with little support and rely mainly on donations for sustenance, says general manager Mohd Syazwan Rahimy, adding: The good thing is that were receiving lots of calls and people sounding out their support in wanting to donate food to our charities.

The support TLFP gets from people, points out Syazwan, is tremendous, be it from those who want to donate financially or want to contribute their time and energy for their cause.

This crisis has shown us that humanity isnt lost, and this is best exemplified by our volunteers, many of whom would go to great lengths to help us even during these trying times, says Syazwan.

A lot of their deliveries are still being conducted by their volunteers. Of course, he says, theyre reminded to always take precautions when carrying out their tasks, and theyre more than willing to follow advice given by (WHO) the World Health Organisation and the Health Ministry.

We realise this is a difficult time for everyone, especially for the underprivileged who are sometimes unable to provide for themselves in the best of times, let alone during a global pandemic crisis, says Syazwan.

As such, TLFP will continue to provide sustenance for the most economically-vulnerable members of the community and help alleviate some of the burden felt by the charities.

BE INTENTIONAL ABOUT YOUR RESOURCES

For anyone whod like to support this cause, TLFP is in need of essential foods like rice, noodle, cooking oil, milk products, canned goods and others, including vegetables, onions, potatoes, etc. which can be delivered to its warehouse located at Persatuan Bulan Sabit Merah Malaysia, 54 Lengkok Belfield every Monday and Thursday (9.30-11.30am).

You can email to [emailprotected]@gmail.com if youd like to identify the charities that you can deliver directly to. Donations are also welcomed so that they can continue operating during this crisis and after. Donations can be made to its Maybank account The Lost Food Project 514897068927.

There can be a temptation during times of crisis to think of oneself and ones family first; and depending on your situation, you may not have the resources to do more. But for people who do have the ability to support others, its a crucial time to do so, says Syazwan, concluding: You can still help and make a difference.

PIT STOP COMMUNITY CAFE SOCIAL ENTERPRISE

With the help of RELA members, Pit Stop Community continues to feed the homeless and the urban poor.

Malaysias my home, and this is my home improvement, Joycelyn Lee declared in an earlier interview, while explaining the start of the social initiative called Pit Stop Community Cafe.

Together with co-founder Andrew Tan, Pit Stop Community is a social enterprise focusing on homelessness, urban hunger, urban poverty and those with food security issues.

The social enterprise runs as a commercial eatery by day; by night, it turns into a soup kitchen of sorts where it serves between 130 and 180 people and up to 250 portions of food six days a week.

After a year of feeding the homeless (or street clients as Lee and Tan refer to them) and the urban poor, the cafehas now become a known place of refuge and respite among the community.

We also function as a food rescue facilitator, rescuing food for both our own use and for our partners and beneficiaries, including food banks, soup kitchens and other grassroot organisations dealing with marginalised communities, explains Lee.

But with the Covid-19 outbreak and with dozens of new cases confirmed every day, Lee knows theyd have to make changes. For decades, soup kitchens have relied on a cadre of volunteers who quite suddenly arent able to show up. With millions staying home during the pandemic, charities that help the countrys neediest are finding themselves in need.

We got feedback that food on the streets have dried up; no more random drive by groups, no more makeshift soup kitchens on the streets, wrote Lee on the social enterprises Facebook, adding: They were hungry, thirsty, tired, many with their shoulders slumped, some with their heads hanging down.

We have to continue helping, says Lee, pointing out that the social enterprise is now working closely with the Kuala Lumpur City Hall, the Federal Territory Ministry and the social welfare department to ensure the continuity of food supply on the street for the homeless and the urban poor.

Social distancing is a major challenge when dealing with hungry people but were managing, with the help of Rela personnel, courtesy of the ministry, says Lee.

BE INTENTIONAL ABOUT YOUR GIVING

For members of the public who want to help, please visit Pit Stop Community Cafes Facebook page at the Pit Stop Community Cafe and find out how you can contribute food/non-food items and even financially.

Furthermore, if you want to help and dont know where to go, visit http://www.kitajagakita.us, where theres a list of organisations there. Choose one closest to you if you want to donate items.

Please, please listen to the authorities, obey the MCO. Stay at home, pleads Lee, adding: Break the chain. We need everyone to be healthy so that we can take care of those who have the least.

[emailprotected]

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How you can make the most of your time and still contribute during the Movement Control Order! - New Straits Times

The fourth annual Wayne State UniversitySpiritofCommunityAwardshonormembers of the university for their community engagement efforts.

The awards is sponsored by theDivision of Government and Community Affairs (DGCA)in partnership with theOfficeofthe President,theOfficeofthe Provost, theAlumni Association, theOfficeofDiversity and Inclusionand theDeanofStudentsOffice.

DGCA will present Spirit of Community Awards to individual staff and faculty members and will also recognize one community service project. Other awards include the SpiritofCommunityStudent Awards, presented by the Dean of Students Office; the ChampionsofDiversity and Inclusion Award, given out by theOfficeofDiversity and Inclusion; and the Inspire from Within Awards, presented by the Alumni Association.

Although the ceremony scheduled for April 2 has been canceled at this time, the contributing offices are proud to honor the deserving individuals receiving Spirit of Community awards this year.

In the last of the 2020 Spirit of Community award announcements, the Champions of Diversity and Inclusion Awards recognize faculty, staff and students with an established and successful record in creating and sustaining a diverse, inclusive and welcoming campus. The goal of recognizing these leaders is to increase understandingandappreciation ofdiversityand inclusionefforts throughout the WSU community.

Faculty award recipient: Jennell White, Ph.D.,Assistant Pharmacology Professor (Research),Wayne State University School of Medicine,Departments ofPharmacology/Pediatrics

Jennell White is being recognized for her leadership and tireless efforts in addressing the underrepresentation of minorities in research and for her work in reducing health care disparities.In an effort to support and encourage minorities in STEM careers, White developed the Biomedical Career Advancement Program (BCAP) in 2014, in partnership with Wayne State University School of Medicine, the Southeast Regional Center Area Health Education Center, Detroit Wayne Mental Health Authority and Detroit Public Schools (DPS).BCAP offers inner-city youth summer employment and an educational opportunity devoted exclusively to biomedical research, mentoring and training. The program is based on Whites understanding that an effective resolution to diversify individuals in STEM careers was to increase opportunities and improve science education early and ignite a passion for science.Since 2014, she has mentored more than 200 DPS high school students and established strong partnerships to continue her efforts.

Staff award recipient: Harmanpreet Singh,Academic Advisor,Department of Psychology

Harman Singh is an academic advisor with the Department of Psychology at Wayne State University. Singh is being recognized for going above and beyond in his outreach to and opportunities provided for students on campus, particularly those in underrepresented groups. His advising philosophy is to empower students to make informed decisions about their academic and professional goals, and challenge students to take a proactive approach in their education. As a proud alumnus of Wayne State University, Singh firmly believes in the university's mission and seeks to address issues of equity and inclusion through his work. Outside of his role as an academic advisor, Harman is the co-founder of Seva4Everybody, a nonprofit organization dedicated to serving the metro Detroit community.

Student award recipient: Laial Beidoun,B.A. in Political Science, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences,Class of 2019

Laial Beidoun is recent graduate of Wayne State University andis being recognized for advocating for peace, charity, and inclusion on Wayne States campus and throughout metro Detroit area.She grew up in Dearborn, Michigan, a metro Detroit suburb that is home to the largest Middle Eastern population in the United States. Giving back to her local community was a cultural and religious obligation, and in 2017 she decided to expand those efforts onto campus by founding local nonprofit organization, Mission: Possible (MPO). Initially a student organization, MPO has been extended onto five other university campuses and has reached State 501(c)3 status. MPOs mission concentrates on promoting harmony, equality and diversity within their team and the communities they serve, supporting unity among all races and ethnicities.

In her time at Wayne State, Beidoun pursued a bachelors in political science and participated in the departmental honors program. In addition to MPO, she has also founded the campus organization Together We Rise, which focuses on networking opportunities for female students and young professionals with campus and community events. As a continuation of her academic career, Beidoun will be pursuing her J.D. in fall 2020.

Team award recipient: Internationals@WayneThe student organization Internationals@Wayne is a platform for students who want to create lasting friendships with people from different cultures and backgrounds, build a global community, and explore the great city of Detroit together. Internationals@Wayne is being recognized for its work in supporting and enhancing an inclusive global campus environment for domestic and international students. Diversity and inclusion are the core values of the group, and its members work hard to promote these ideals through their functions, with the overall mission of working to increase cultural awareness on campus.

The organization was founded by German exchange students Constanze Febee Sabathil and Andreas Krug in 2016 with the guidance of Yuliya Harris, a former events and program coordinator for the Office for International Students and Scholars (OISS). Sabathil and Krug noticed that many international students only came together once a week for the OISS Coffee Hour. While they loved the weekly gathering, they thought they could enhance their experience in the United States by spending more time together, exploring more of Detroits beautiful spots and history, and learning more about one anothers cultures and traditions. Their initiative was supported by Harris and the OISS, who assisted in giving the students a greater ability to connect and form an international family on campus.

The Dean of Students Office honors three students who havedemonstrated exceptional commitment to service and community engagement at Wayne State University and in the Detroit community.The awards have been broken into categories, including theWarrior Spirit and PrideAward, theCampus Engagement and Community InvolvementAward, and the Student Wellness and Well-BeingAward.

The Warrior Spirit and Pride Awardrecognizes a student who demonstrates the honest meaning of being a Warrior through extra- and co-curricular engagement experiences.

Award recipient:Bailee Soper

Bailee Soper is a senior who will graduate with a bachelors in psychology this April. During her time at Wayne State, she has been involved with multiple different on-campus organizations. For the past year, she has served as the president ofWAYN Radio, the universitys student-run radio station, and during the last two summers, Soper worked as an orientation leader, where she focused her time on building lasting relationships with new students visiting campus for the first time. In this role, Soper also communicated to incoming and current Wayne State students all that the university has done for her personally throughout her undergraduate experience.

Soper takes immense pride in her commitment to Wayne State. Having been a member of the 2019 homecoming court, she is passionate about representing the university and is dedicated to being a Warrior for life. Soper will begin her Master of Social Work at Wayne State in the upcoming fall semester, and she is determined to stay involved through alumni relations and other campus-related roles.

Warrior Spirit and Pride Award Honorable Mentions:

TheCampus Engagement and Community Involvement Awardrecognizes a student who demonstrates initiative and shows a commitment to service at Wayne State and within the greater Detroit community.

Award recipient: Shanmin Sultana

Shanmin Sultana is a sophomore majoring in sociology with a double minor in public health and Spanish. Sultana works as a student assistant for the WSU Public Health Department and as a mediator for Science Gallery Detroit, an interdisciplinary exhibition where she facilitates STEAM conversations with visitors and Detroit youth. She also serves on the organizations Youth Advisory Board.

From 2018 to 2019, Sultana served as director of internal affairs for "Paani," a nonprofit fueled by student volunteers creating sustainable solutions to supply clean water and improve health disparities.Sultana helped secure funds for 20 water wells built in rural villages of southern Pakistan, as well as $2,000 worth of hygiene products for a female vocational school in Karachi. On campus, she co-founded "Replenish Detroit,"a student organization with over 100 WSU students, focused on bringing awareness to the Detroit Water Shut Offs through relief projects.

Sultana also co-founded a new student organization called Pauseitivity. Upon hearing news about two Michigan students who took their lives within one week this year, Sultanas goal was to improve the mental and emotional health of her fellow students. She works with volunteers to pause for a minute and share small acts of kindness while encouraging others to pass it along, too. She hopes to spread a positive atmosphere on campus, especially when academic stress can be overwhelming. In her free time, Sultana enjoys creating art, writing poetry and exploring the hidden gems of the city.

Campus Engagement and Community Involvement AwardHonorable Mentions

TheStudent Wellness and Well-Being Awardrecognizes a student who supports wellness and well-being opportunities for fellow Warriors through leadership and participation.

Award recipient: Nadir Fouani

Nadir Fouani is a senior who will graduate in April with a Bachelor of Arts in psychology and a double minor in sociology and public health. Fouani is actively involved with the campus community and has held many leadership roles during his time at Wayne State. Fouani has an extensive background in mentoring other students, working with diverse groups and fostering community engagement. He works hard to serve those in need and seeks to make a strong impact at Wayne State University through his efforts toward improving the overall student experience. His background includes working as a resident advisor, serving as a campus ambassador for international students, assisting incoming students with their transition to college as an orientation leader, and being president of Warrior Suicide Prevention.

In the past, Fouani has led a building-wide food and toiletry drive for the W Food Pantry, collecting over 400 donations. Fouani has won RA of the Year, the Be There award at the Student Center and was awarded a State of Michigan Tribute for his mental health advocacy on House Bill #4325.

These experiences helped Fouani decide to pursue a future in student affairs. He will begin his Master of Arts in student affairs administration at Michigan State University this fall. His ultimate goal is to work with underprivileged and disadvantaged students, particularly those who suffer from behavioral health issues and are in need of academic, personal, emotional and financial support.

Student Wellness and Well-Being Award Honorable Mentions

The Inspire from Within Philanthropy Award recognizes WSU faculty and staff whose philanthropic investments help strengthen the Wayne Statecommunity. Through significant and intentional annual giving, WSU faculty and staff have the opportunity to serve the university, illustrate the powerofgenerosity and inspire others to give in similar ways.

The 2020 honor goes to Professor Deb Habel, who is a member of the Mike Ilitch School of Business faculty. She has taught accounting information systems and principles of managerial accounting since 2014. Whether its her time volunteering as a healthy test subject in multiple medical studies, contributing to the efforts of a number of university and school committees, serving as faculty advisor to student organizations and Accenture-DTE intern cohorts, or soliciting the WSU community to participate in Heart Walk and Race for the Cure, her priority is student success, inside and outside Wayne State University.

Among her many accomplishments, Habel was appointed by the American Institute of CPAs to serve as an academic champion for future CPA and CITP exam candidates last year. In this role, she has formalized one-on-one mentoring with students pursuing accounting and technology consulting professions. Furthermore, the Excel proficiency crash-courses Habel initiated for students have evolved into a comprehensive required course for all incoming Ilitch School undergraduates.

As a member of the Learning Management System selection committee and a Canvas Warrior, Habel supplies support to her faculty colleagues through the migration of learning management systems, aiding in the shift from Blackboard to Canvas. Her advocacy for the Accounting Aid Society offers WSU students service-learning opportunities with their volunteer income tax assistance and financial literacy programs.

Habel has given more than just her time and expertise to Wayne State, though. She has also gone above and beyond to support her love for the university through philanthropic efforts. Her familys monetary contributions to the university allow students to reduce their dependency on student loans and part-time employment, enabling them to receive secure financial footing.

Celebrating Warriors engagement in the community, the first round of announcements for winners of the 2020 Spirit of Community Awards honor a Wayne State University staff member, faculty member and project. Presented by the Division of Government and Community Affairs, the Spirit of Community awards recognize members of the university who best demonstrate a commitment to service and community engagement. Nominations for this years awards were accepted last fall and were each judged by a unique panelcomposedof one student, staff member, faculty member, alumni and community leader.

Staff Winner:

Associate Vice President of Enrollment ManagementDawn Medleyspends much of her time leadingeffortsto help students at Wayne State Universityand the surrounding community further their education by targeting the re-engagement of adult students and debt forgiveness.

As the creator of the Warrior Way Back program the nations first student-debt-forgiveness program Medleyoften collaborates with other academic institutions to help supportreturning students. Leading a social justice model to prevent barriers that block students from educational access,Medleyhelped create the Wayne Access tuition pledge, which provides free tuition toWSUsneediest students. She is also the visionary behindthe Heart of Detroit tuition pledge, which provides the option of subsidized tuition for Wayne State-bound students who live in Detroit or graduate from a Detroit high school.

Throughout her professionallife, Medley has supported women andunderrepresented students, and promoted access to higher education. In addition, she actively participates in theW Food Pantry, Warrior Wardrobe, and serves as a mentor. She is a member of the Detroit College Access Network (DCAN) and Michigan College Access Network (MCAN)leadership boards,volunteered for the Human Rights Campaign, andmade over 20,000 phone callsduring the 2018 elections.

Medley provides pro-bono college advising and sponsors scholarships in her hometown. She is one of 69 members of the Leadership Detroit Class XLI, which challengesemerging and existing community leaders to bring about positive change in the community through informed leadership.

The Honorable Mentions for the staff award are:

Faculty Winner:

DianeCress became heavily involved in community engagement when sheestablished the firstservice-learningrequirement in the Department of Nutrition and Food Science (NFS) by requiringstudentsin her course,NFS 6850: Controversial Issues in Nutrition, to complete a community volunteer experience. Cresshas developedcommunity partnerships across Detroit with such organizations as Gleaners Food Bank, Forgotten Harvest, Earthworks, Detroit Food Policy Council, Eastern Market, Make Food Not Wasteand The W Food Pantry. Through the service-learning requirement, herstudents have contributed over 600 hours of service to the Detroit community over the past three years.

Cresstookher work further andbuilt internship programsto create ongoing community experiences for exceptionally motivated students.Two of themost successful internships she developed arewith theW Pantry and the Fueling Station. In the pantry, two interns work with the staff each semester to create menus and nutrition education for students utilizing those resources. At theFueling Station,studentscollaboratewith the WSU athletics departmenttoprepare and distribute food and provide general nutrition information to NCAA collegiate student-athletes.

Cress work has helped students learnhow food systems contribute to health; specifically, to the health of the Detroit community.She has increasedstudent participationand activismin the communityand provided studentsan opportunity to observe the work the people of Detroit are doing to advocate for policies that foster access to healthfulfood and healthy living.Shehas securedfour extramurally funded grants, which have solidified a Wayne State Universitynutritionalresearch presence in the community, creating awareness for health disparities throughout Detroit.

The Honorable Mentions for the faculty award are:

Project Winner:

Established eight years ago, S.A.V.E.T.H.E.Ms"Stomping Out"projectis an annual High School health fair and step show competition that engages metro Detroit high school students.Organized by Wayne States College of Nursingfaculty, staff and students, this annual event gathers thecommunitytosupport students as they artistically express themselves, while educating their peers about health issues specific to their age group.

Using an evidence-based approach to health education, Stomping Out puts a new spin on traditional health education by creating a fun and engaging activity that brings over 40 vendors and health organizations together annually. This event reaches over 300 individualseach year and providesinformation, resources and health screenings to the attendees. Stomping Out targets the adolescent population, which reaches their families and community, providing a safe and non-threatening environment to learn and ask questions.

TheCollege of Nursingand the programs more than 40 community partnershave the shared goal of educatingand empoweringlocal youth. In2016,theCollege of Nursing partnered with theCollege of Education to conduct a needs assessment for the event and published an evidence-based article describing the positive impact that Stomping Out has had on the community.This projecthas also provided an annual practicum placement for undergraduate students in Wayne States public health programs, providing a truly interdisciplinary, hands-on learning experience for WSU students.

Honorable Mentions:

See the article here:

2020 Spirit of Community Award winners announced - The South End

Jack Palen and Elsie Mares

Kennedi Hewitt (K.H.): What made you decide to run for ASLMU?

Jack Palen (J.P.): I had, especially in my time with the InterFraternity Council, really just fallen in love with working with my peers around me and working to empower everyone around me. I had an interest in running. Elsie and I had known each other since freshman year because we were sort of in the same major track and fell into the same learning community and had a bunch of classes together. So when I was thinking about running, she was one of the first people I thought of. I reached out to her and we made it happen.

Elsie Mares (E.M.): For me, I was honestly a little bit hesitant about running I really love to do behind the scenes work like policy, event planning, things like that. So, once I talked to some past vice presidents, they reassured me that that is really more so what the goal of vice president is That made me really excited because I feel like its the best of both worlds and you get to really introduce policies and initiatives that impact the communities I care about and have been working with during my three years at LMU, while not having to necessarily be the face of ASLMU.

K.H.: Why do you think ASLMU is important on campus?

J.P.: I think ASLMU is important because with student government, you have the opportunity to institutionalize support Everything weve done outside ASLMU is very important, but when it comes to the conversation of what student government can look like at its best when you bring that support to the highest levels in involvement, thats when you can really take it to the next level and turn it up a notch whether that's in terms of funding, visibility or sharing that funding and visibility with the groups prior to ASLMU that Elsie and I have been working with and supporting.

E.M.: I think that this years administration was a really good example of the power that ASLMU can have for really important issues that affect a lot of the student body. Next year were getting housing that doesnt have transphobic rules, at least a section of housing and hopefully that extends to all of on-campus housing. I dont think that would have been possible without advocacy on behalf of the people who have been in positions of leadership. Which is really unfortunate because there had been people doing that work way prior to that and advocating for that way prior to that, but it really does sometimes take people within positions of leadership to take that fight to another level and use their access to administration to advocate for things of that nature.

K.H.: How will you bring about change in this role?

J.P.: One of the main goals that Elsie and I have is the ability to bring agency to a lot of student organizations on campus. Its not like I plan on stepping into the role of ASLMU president if we happen to win the election and just write in policy that I deem to be important to students who live very different lives and have completely different identities than I do. Its more my goal to get into that position and empower them as much as I can and give them the agency to write and take action that reflects what the organization needs and what the organization is interested in.

E.M.: We want to bring change in that ASLMU is used more as a tool for advocacy and improving the lives of students on the margins and basically improving the lives of students in general. So anyone who is in an RSO, we want them to know that ASLMU is there to support them. Anyone who is trying to find their place on campus, we want them to know that ASLMU is there as a resource. Anyone who is facing structural challenges that the institution is causing, ASLMU is your advocate.

K.H.: What do you think qualifies you to be President and Vice President?

J.P.: I think Elsie and I have such a large network that if we do have a goal were able to sort of bring everyone into the fold using that network. I also think Elsie and I have so much experience already working with students in the capacity of different leadership roles that were able to bring to ASLMU the same energy we've been bringing over the past three years. Just again circling back to the different level of abilities that come with student government and were able to take it that much further. Elsie and I won't be doing much differently, we will just be doing it with a student government and therefore doing it to a greater extent.

E.M.: I think what should motivate people to run is the general interest and impacting certain communities and certain areas. I think Jack and I both have a genuine passion for the people around us and the quality of life that students at LMU have and are experiencing. So I don't think that's necessarily a qualifier but I think that's the motivation. And I think when that motivation is really pure and there, that's what leads to really authentic leadership and a leadership that doesn't burn out when it gets difficult.

Alex Smith and Elsa Wilson

K.H.: What made you decide to run for ASLMU?

Alex Smith (A.S.): Being involved in ASLMU really contributed to this decision. I remember in the fall how I just started working with Ken and Emily and how excited I was for that position. I thought, I have an extra year left and I think itll be really cool if I did this with someone else like Ken and Emily did. So I thought of Elsa. Elsa and I had a very memorable conversation at the Lair over some chicken tenders one day and it kind of started from there and weve been planning since the fall.

Elsa Wilson (E.W.): As two out-of-state students, we were both pretty nervous to make that jump. LMU has really become a home for both of us so to be able to have the opportunity to do everything we can to make it that much better for incoming Lions and those with a few years left, we were just so excited about that opportunity. And to do it with one of my best friends makes it that much better.

K.H.: Why do you think ASLMU is important on campus?

A.S.: I'd say ASLMU is all about promoting the student experience. I think right now that's exactly what we need for when we get back to campus in the fall after all of this craziness is over. I think ASLMU and their decisions and programs such as Fallapalooza and After Sunset get the students involved and are very popular and fun. ASLMU is also responsible for initiatives like the menstrual hygiene initiative and Divest LMU and everything else weve been working on this past year.

E.W.: ASLMU is the direct way for students to talk to the administration and higher ups who are in control of decisions happening to the University. So if students have a personal problem, it's the ASLMUs president's job to bring that to the University president and the board of trustees.

K.H.: How will you bring about change in this role?

A.S.: Definitely through our initiatives and platforms, I think we have some really good ideas for that. One of the bigger ways in how we're going to bring about change is Elsa and I both have experience in ASLMU and we both understand how it works and how to talk to the LMU administration and make sure these ideas get by. I think our Lyft initiative will definitely help in regards to transportation and making our campus safe. I think we have a good idea with the pop-up thrift shop Everything we have is tangible and definitely doable and well thought out and I think that is the best way to get stuff done.

E.W.: The big thing that were stressing is that we want students to directly feel the effects of student government whether that be through the involvement fund where ASLMU will pay a portion of the dues for students to join an RSO, or the Lyft initiative that Alex was talking about to provide a cheaper resource for students to get around our little corner of L.A. So were really stressing equity. We both know how this works so everything that we're presenting is very feasible and likely to get done if were elected.

K.H.: What do you think qualifies you to be President and Vice President?

A.S.: First and foremost I like to say that everyone running against us is very qualified and we have a lot of leaders on campus who are qualified for the role of President as well. However, I think what sets us apart is our relationship with each other and we have a lot of good ideas and a lot of plans on how to incorporate leadership into that role. Half of the role is working on our initiatives and the other half is how to be a leader, how to treat others with respect and how to listen.

E.W.: It wasn't a strategic choice to run together, it's that we work really well together and we have a lot of similar ideas. We act in a lot of the same ways and one thing that we both stress is being intentional with everything we do. So we're not running just to say our senior year of college we were in charge of the student body, were intentional in everything we do and we're doing this because we really care about LMU.

Anya Montgomery and Taylor Pajunen

K.H.: What made you decide to run for ASLMU?

Anya Montgomery (A.M.): We are currently both on ASLMU and have, for the full year, been working up to this point together. We've been really engaged with the initiatives of this current administration. I love the work that they're doing and have been concerned about those values being upheld in the future. For me personally, I recognize the really big importance in having people of color and queer people representation in high leadership roles, like I'm non-binary, my pronouns are they/them. It's really important for the maintenance of health and safety and wellness and empowerment of our students.

Taylor Pajunen (T.P.): I joined ASLMU towards the end of my freshman year so it's kind of been my home and I've seen how student government can be a positive and a very negative thing I don't think that we should be the ones taking and doing, I think we should be the ones uplifting and supporting other groups that are already doing that work.

K.H.: Why do you think ASLMU is important on campus?

A.M.: ASLMU is the biggest and the most impactful bridge between the student body and administrative bodies. There's a lot going on at LMU. LMU is a business as well as an institution of learning so there needs to be some sort of liaison creating that transparency between students and administrators.

T.P.: A lot of initiatives that student organizations have started have been amazing but due to people graduating or movements dying off, ASLMU, due to how grounded it is in the University, is able to continue these movements.

K.H.: How will you bring about change in this role?

A.M.: Our platform is largely based on uplifting and empowering voices and creating and maintaining community. We want to be as open as possible and have our doors open to student perspectives and hear about their experiences. We do not have every experience in the world and therefore cannot speak to it and we do not want to speak to it over someone who can tell their own story.

T.P.: Weve also been thinking a lot about what the word inclusive means. I feel like this is a pretty big buzzword. Yes, our goal is to have a very welcoming LMU community, but we must recognize that we should not be making people conform to what LMUs standards are. We should be transforming and making ourselves more accessible to people.

K.H.: What do you think qualifies you to be President and Vice President?

A.M.: We are doing the work. I think in doing this campaign we've learned so much about ourselves as leaders and how much we care. We are in community. These things we are fighting for are things that we have recognized as needs for ourselves during our time at LMU. We are thinking critically about our own experiences and are engaging in conversations to expand our knowledge of student needs. And we have ASLMU experiences such as ASLMU secretary and the athletics senator.

T.P.: During my time in ASLMU, Ive seen how ASLMU works, but also how a broader student government works. A lot of action does not happen in student governments across the country due to the short time that we have. It takes a long time to get comfortable and to actually be productive in a position within student government I started my freshman year and I didn't feel fully into it until the middle of my sophomore year. But here I am now, my junior year, and I feel like I made these connections and I made relationships and I know how to write legislation. I recognize that doesn't make me holier than thou or better than, but it makes me someone who's done the prep work and is ready to continue this work.

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ASLMU candidates speak on their platforms | News - Los Angeles Loyolan

3.26. 2020Written By:John Tyson354Times read

As COVID-19 spreads across the globe, dilemmas of significant moral and theological gravity have surfaced.

I find one such dilemma, raised recently in our cultural conversation, especially troubling. Public officials have begun suggesting that Americans must choose between sacrificing economic progress or sacrificing human life. This was uttered first by Dan Patrick, the lieutenant governor of Texas, who made the claim that lots of grandparents would willingly sacrifice their lives to save the economy for their grandchildren. A similar suggestion, though less crass, was made March 24 by President Donald Trump in an interview, when he announced that he would love to have the country opened up and just raring to go by Easter. This is an ambitious timeline not currently supported by public health experts or epidemiologists.

The rationale behind this line of thinking is captured well in the presidents Tuesday tweet: THE CURE CANNOT BE WORSE (by far) THAN THE PROBLEM!

Empathy is owed to those who fill leadership positions in the public and private sector in the midst of this crisis. From the President to small-business owners, the economic fallout of this public health emergency contains catastrophic potential. As one whose family has been directly impacted by the sudden economic downturn, I understand the urge to open up the country to commerce. But when the known result of such a choice would put an unprecedented number of human lives at immediate risk of death, a decision to open up the country would be an unequivocal moral evil.

Under no circumstance is an act of moral evil a legitimate cure for any problem.

The spread of COVID-19 is a natural evil. Fueled by climate abuse, a hurricane or a tornado is also a natural evil. Like COVID-19, they inflict horrors and sometimes death, but there is no moral agent that can clearly be held responsible for them.

On the other hand, a moral evil is when a destructive outcome can be tied to the intentional action (or inaction) of a moral agent. Applied to the dilemma at hand, it would be an intentional act of moral evil to open up the country while knowing that elderly, immuno-suppressed and other vulnerable populationsalready at increased riskwould likely die by the hundreds of thousands, if not millions.

It is horrifying to hear government leaders flirting with this possibility. Yet, in these unprecedented days, we who seek to live in communion with the Prince of Peace should be prepared to resist such action.

From beginning to end, Scripture makes clear that extending hospitality and care to the least of these is an expression of faithfulness. The vulnerable in this moment of crisis are the elderly, the immuno-suppressed and those who live in under-resourced and oppressed communities. In my tiny corner of the world in Des Moines, Iowa, we are exploring what it means to extend care and community creatively amid the spread of COVID-19 while not opening our doors and exposing ourselves until all of us can worship free from known medical risk.

Moreover, Scripture also makes clear that Christians are called to care for those experiencing economic hardship. Thus, for Christians the choice between sacrificing the economy or sacrificing human life is always a false choice. Christ modeled a life of care for all people, no matter their social circumstances. This is summed up best by the Apostle Paul in Galatians 6:2, where the church is called to bear one anothers burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.

Our faith teaches us that the moral cure for hardship is found in expressions of empathy, solidarity and love. How our congregations and communities go about this work specifically, now and beyond this crisis, depends on their context. It likely means joining broad-based efforts to reknit the social fabric and strengthen bonds of social solidarity. It likely means pulling resources together in a common purse to assist those in need. It likely means proceeding with awkward virtual gatherings for longer than desired. And it certainly means rejecting the false choice between economic sacrifice or the sacrifice of human life.

After all, on Easter morning we celebrate our Lord, who overcame death so that no such sacrifice is necessary. We have hope not because the economy is strong but because Christ rose again. With resurrection hope, we navigate these difficult times, proclaiming that no member of Christs body is expendable. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it (1 Corinthians 12:26). We are one body and are in this together.

John Tyson is pastor of Des Moines (Iowa) Mennonite Church.

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Sacrificing the economy or sacrificing human life? It's a false choice. - The Mennonite

Many restaurants operate on a first-come, first-served basis. Shoppers in the United States expect this; however, this orderly approach to gaining access to service lost standing in Italy. As COVID-19 spreads throughout the Italian countryside, the demand for respirators and ICUs exceeds the supply. In this case, if demand exceeds supply, it increases the risk of death, especially for the elderly.

Evidence from the outbreak indicates older adults experienced higher death rates from the virus. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Italys population is the second oldest in the world behind Japan. Combined with a strong family culture where young persons engage with their grandparents and older relatives, it creates a condition ripe for the spread of the virus.

The Washington Post reports that in the midst of the shortfall of intensive care capacity, the Italian Critical Care Society endorsed using age guidelines regarding access to oxygen-generating machines. Specifically, the group supported doctors that assign priority ICU access to individuals with greater life expectancy. Enter triage and young adults first; exit first-come, first-served.

The experiences in Italy and in other countries represent important lessons learned for residents of this country and the St. Louis region.

For example, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) COVID-19 Response Team reported that in China the vast majority of severe cases and fatalities occurred among the older populations. In contrast, people 19 years old and younger have had milder symptoms, and this age group only makes up 0.1% of deaths. This suggests that age is directly related to the severity of COVID-19s impact on individuals in the United States and the rest of the world.

Many commenters jumped to the wrong conclusion, insisting that the virus did not harm young people while ignoring the potential for long-term damage to vital organs. Furthermore, too many failed to take seriously the role that children, teenagers, and young adults play in transmitting the virus to older adults. Pictures of beaches filled with young adults affirm the lack of understanding of their role as virus transmitters.

The CDC study provides insight into the United States context. Officials analyzed COVID-19 cases in China by age group and severity in the period between February 12 and March 16, 2020, with a total of 4,266 cases reported in the United States. Of the deaths reported, 80% of the people were at least 65 years of age. Only 5% of the reported cases occurred in people between 0 and 19 years old. Additionally, 65 plus-year-old patients made up 31% of cases in the United States at the time45% of the hospitalizations and 53% of the ICU admissions.

The CDC report acknowledges the lack of data in some areas, such as information related to underlying health conditions. This limitation is important as older patients with diabetes, high blood pressure, heart problems, and other chronic illnesses have higher risk of more severe outcomes if infected with the virus.

The total number of St. Louis city residents at least 65 years of age equals roughly the enrollment of 15 Marquette High Schools, 20 Mehlville High Schools, 39 Clayton High Schools, or 2.6 St. Louis Universities. None of these communities would consider it acceptable to place their students at higher risk of virus contraction.

To limit the severity of virus outcomes within this age group, we must understand their behavior. The National Health and Aging Trends study offers insight into the favorite practices of older adults. [WT1]Many of these practices do not align with social distancing.

For example, some sports, socializing in person, many forms of travel, shopping in stores, dining out, volunteering, and attending religious events in person increase the risk of acquiring the virus. However, with modification or imagination, these activities can continue in different forms. Continue to golf, jog, and walk. Socialize using social media platforms. Shop online. Order carry-out. Serve as a virtual volunteer. Move religious gatherings online.

Virtual strategies offer opportunities to socialize for many in our community. Others lack internet access. According to the American Community Survey, over 33,000 households in St. Louis city dont have internet access. This represents 23% of the households in the city. Most of these households reported annual income less than $20,000. And nearly half of the households without internet access reside north of Delmar. This health crisis reveals cracks in our society.

Social distancing is highly recommended for people of all ages in order to protect those who are especially vulnerable. Older adults should have at least 30 days worth of essential and necessary medications, avoid crowds, stop nonessential travel, end cruise excursions, and stay home whenever possible to decrease exposure potential. Long-term care facilities such as retirement and assisted-living homes should especially be cognizant and intentional in preventing the virus from spreading further among high-risk individuals. It is important that everyone, regardless of age, participates in social distancing.

Italy and China provide invaluable lessons. Italys overwhelmed healthcare system applied a triage strategy that prioritized its young persons. We submit that now is the time to prioritize our older adults before it is too late. Lets help our healthcare professionals by flattening the curve. If we put others first now, it will position us to provide needed ICU treatment in a fashion that honors and supports people of all ages. And that is the American way.

William F. Tate IV is dean and vice provost for Graduate Education; Edward Mallinckrodt Distinguished Professor in Arts & Sciences; and faculty scholar, Institute for Public Health, at Washington University in St. Louis. Find him on Twitter @WFTate4.

Kally Xu is John B. Ervin Scholar and Gephardt Institute Civic Scholar at Washington University in St. Louis, where she is a candidate in the 3-2 Masters of Public Health in the George Warren Brown School of Social Work and the A.B. program in International and Area Studies and Asian American Studies.

For more information, see Severe Outcomes Among Patients with Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) United States, February 12March 16, 2020. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep 2020; 69:343-346. DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.mm6912e2.

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Now is the time to prioritize older adults before it's too late - St. Louis American

Ive thought and Ive thought and Ive thought about what in the world I want to use this space for today.

This week Ive had so many thoughts. Ive wished more people were taking the coronavirus pandemic more seriously. Id be lying if I hadnt had some thoughts of fear because Im immune-compromised as is my family. Ive worried about others who are at risk. Ive thought about my role as a journalist and how important the news is right now. Ive thought about the kindness so many have displayed and how wonderful our community is.

On top of that, Ive asked so many questions: How long will this last? What does our future look like? How will our communitys economy survive? What does this mean for our education and healthcare systems?

COVID-19 has taken over the world in a way thats truly unfathomable.

In Alabama, students and faculty wont return to school; theyll do it all from home through the end of the school year. Athletes wont return to the fields. If high school students are even able to have a prom, it certainly wont be the one theyve dreamt of. Plans are still being made for how if at all graduations will be held. Educators are heartbroken; the classroom is their sanctuary and their students are their families. Everyone is hurting.

I have to be honest; I cant pinpoint what I want to say because I dont know. Everything is so uncertain and surreal.

Like so many right now, Im just lost.

Ive always been intentional with my space on this page. Sometimes its simply sharing my life experiences but in everything I write, I try to help somebody in some way. Maybe my words will make someone smile; maybe my little ole words of wisdom will be the advice someone needs; or maybe somebody can just relate to what Ive been through and know theyre not alone.

So thats what Ill do try to help.

I like to offer solutions when I can, and right now Im unfortunately not full of them. None of us is. But I do know one thing for certain: We will get through this.

Our communities will survive. Were strong and come together when we need each other most. Limited public contact hasnt been a barrier so far for local civic clubs, organizations and individuals to provide assistance to others. In times of trouble, unity is formed. I have no doubt well figure out how to maneuver through this together.

We cant come apart, not now. The only way were going to get through this is by working together. As President Donald Trump said Friday, Republicans and Democrats have even come together right now because we dont have another option. Its so good to see people already coming together especially in our community and everyone lending a hand where they can. And we have to continue that or were not going to make it.

My advice is for us to lean on one another well, not literally, yall social distancing please. But really, we have to stick together through this. Although we cant physically be together, the only way were going to survive this is by standing tall with that unity weve shown we can display time and time again.

We have to be kind, offer help where we can, take care of ourselves and do all we can to stay positive.

We dont know what the future holds but we do know weve got each other. Lets follow the rules to prevent spreading this disease and keep it that way.

Santana Wood is the managing editor of The Outlook.

Continued here:

Stick together now even though we're lost - The Alexander City Outlook

How can we proactively address the inevitable and unfair gaps caused by school closures?

President Donald Trumps announcement to extend nationwide social distancing guidelines until at least April 30 prompted Arizona to join Kansas, Oklahoma, Virginia, New Mexico, and Vermont in shutting down schools for the remainder of the school year. California and New York are leaning in a similar direction, and almost every state has closed schools at least until the end of April. Over 55 million students in the United States are currently out of school. The prospect of nationwide school closures is no longer a matter of if, but when.

In the weeks since school closures commenced, the glaring inequities that have always existed in our educational system have been highlighted to the less familiar. Questions of access and equity have underlined the unprecedented nationwide shift to distance learning: how do we make sure students do not go hungry? How do we bridge the digital divide that impacts countless low income and rural communities? How do we effectively serve students with special learning needs whose needs were a struggle to meet even in a brick and mortar environment? How do we train millions of teachers overnight to use tech tools they were often reluctant to use before this crisis? Even if school systems miraculously fulfilled all these prerequisites to equitable distance learning, the how behind supporting student learning at home for students without enough family support in the process adds an almost insurmountable layer of complexity. Not to mention figuring out how to support students through all of the trauma, suffering, and fear that comes with working through the worlds largest health crisis in 100 years.

Without downplaying the superhuman efforts of so many education systems across the country to do everything in their power to provide learning opportunities for their students, we are in a context where mandating learning is simply not going to happen. This means that students who need meaningful learning opportunities the most will will likely lose between two and three months of education this school year. There is undoubtedly an unequal cost to school closures. But acknowledging these inequities comes with an important responsibility: doing something about it.

Some might argue that the impact of schools closing is overblown. After all, even if all schools decided to shut down today, over 70% of the school year has been completed. The case for doing nothing falls apart when we start to dig into the the reality of what even two to three months of lost time means to specific groups of students. For instance, with what we know about how much childrens brains develop before age 5, two to three months means a lot for the nations students enrolled in shuttered prekindergarten programs. For college-bound high school seniors, especially first generation college students, missing out on college advising, completing college prerequisites, and all of the other nitty-gritty aspects of smoothing the transition to post-secondary education means a ton. Especially when it literally still pays to go to college. And think about what losing two to three months of school means for students who struggle socially who were just starting to feel accepted and students who struggle academically who were just starting to hit their stride. Considering this impact, the idea of doing the same thing we have always done as we ramp up for a new school year is unfathomable.

If doing nothing is not an option, what should school systems do to recover lost educational opportunities when they reopen after the coronavirus pandemic? There are at least 3 areas schools can consider to make the best out of an unprecedented situation by proactively addressing the inevitable and inequitable gaps caused by school closures.

High-quality summer school can be a powerful solution to avoiding what education advocate Dale Chu refers to as the coronavirus cliff. A six week summer school program targeted towards the students most likely to struggle the most from missed learning opportunities has an estimated price tag of over $8 billion. This is probably a stimulus-worthy investment, because it can provide an invaluable return to structure and support for students and families at a time when the nation will hopefully be rebounding from the current economic standstill. Smaller class sizes and clear, focused, learning goals might allow some students to not just make up for lost time, but possibly pick up ground given the glaring gaps existing in education prior to this pandemic. With there being mixed data around the value of extending the length of school days, with some evidence suggesting that longer school days increase performance for struggling learners and other studies suggesting more mixed results, summer school might be the most feasible way to close gaps more quickly.

The Achievement Gap starts early. This is why kindergarten readiness matters. Up until third grade, students typically learn to read. after third grade, they read to learn. This means fourth grade readiness matters as well. To avoid the minefield ninth graders walk into across the country, where students fail ninth grade than any other grade, high school readiness must also be prioritized. With about half of first-year college students needing remedial education in math, English, or both, the transition from high school to college needs to be a focus as well. School systems looking to recover lost educational opportunities should prioritize these important transitions however they can. This could look like innovative partnerships with higher education institutions to address remediation challenges. Dedicated support for transition grades can be delivered during Saturday or after-school programs. For many school systems, the default expectation is that students grow at least 1 grade level during each academic year. Education leaders may want to consider how systems can be shifted to change this expectation to 1.5 grade levels per year over a two year time period for students in these transition grades who are far off the target.

A silver lining to this is that we can no longer deny the impact of families on student learning. Before the coronavirus pandemic, the prototype of an involved parent was a family member who volunteered for the school carnival or organized the bake sale. Now, we have to accept that for our families with the capacity to do so, education leaders can and must see that true student learning cannot happen their authentic involvement on the academic side.

We have also seen the vastness of the digital divide as leaders scramble to provide students with devices and connectivity to access learning in the distance learning context. Technology-assisted learning is not the be-all, end-all in education. But leaders should not overlook a powerful outcome of this unprecedented time: teachers across the country have had no choice but to develop at least a basic understanding of how to use a wide variety of educational technology products and services. Post-pandemic, educators should see how using these resources strategically can be another resource to recover lost learning opportunities due to school closures.

School systems who struggle are used to saying theres always next year when it comes to implementing strategies to improve. But this years version of theres always next year must recognize that a this year spent tackling a global pandemic that completely stopped the economy and shut down schools for months requires an even more intense focus. Doing nothing is not an option. Doing the same thing we always do misses the point. Education leaders must be intentional about addressing the unique challenges posed by the unequal costs of school closures.

Excerpt from:

Theres Always Next Year: 3 Ideas To Recover Lost Educational Opportunities Post-Coronavirus Epidemic - Forbes

Theres a red, industrial looking building right next to a cemetery just off Highway 254. Thats home to Numana.

Many are not sure what it does and when asked around town, many did not even know it was there. As Numana celebrates their 10-year anniversary, that has not stopped them from helping anyone and everyone.

This is our opportunity to step up, Numana Inc. Executive Director Ashley Burns said.

With the COVID-19 pandemic griping the nation, Numana has stepped up to the plate, not only internationally but locally.

The company provides meals for people who are in need. Whether it be a single mom wondering how theyre going to put food on their table as schools have closed (yes schools are providing lunches). Numana has stepped up. They prep food packages and ship them all around the world, not just in El Dorado. However, during this time, the focus has turned to supporting their own.

A Wildcat by birth, Burns has seen it to be her mission to help her El Dorado family out. She wanted to make an impact throughout the community and sees Numana as that way. Last year, Numana did three million meals around the world, with 90 percent of them internationally and 10 percent are back home.

Weve been keeping our eyes and ears open for where we are needed most, Burns said. We really want to be growing within El Dorado and the surrounding communities.

The Meals are simple. Theres a recipe sheet to follow, the meals are nutrition based, meaning they can be prepared or eaten as is. They also they pair with other foods that can be acquired at food banks. They come with a large zip-lock bag-sized white grain rice, freeze dried pinto beans and a dehydrated soy, that is almost granola-like. The local meals also come with freeze-dried vegetables, while international meals come with a vitamin packet.

Its basically Chipotle without the mean and fresh vegetables, Burns said.

Theyre loaded, too. They have a warehouse that is filling up in case their needed within the community.

We make sure we are taking care of our local needs, Burns said.

While they are not a faith-based organization, Numana was founded through faith. Numana refers to the biblical term mana. It is referenced as the food the Israelites were instructed to consume while they wondered the desert during their 40-year exodus.

It was not always their name. They did not have a name originally. However, after the founding owners went to Haiti to help out, they returned home, and Haiti was struck with the devastating earthquake. Numana meals were the first to be airdropped into the country to help feed those affected by the earthquake. Burns said as God provided for the Israelites, Numana tries to provide for others who are in need.

Thats where Numana has stepped up locally.

What made them switch gears is now they have an opportunity to take care of their community. They have provided meals to the area, nearly 100,000 to the south-central Kansas. While they are looking to venture into Sedgwick County more as the pandemic grows, their focus remains on Butler County and El Dorado.

We have been brainstorming the best and most efficient way to be intentional and respecting those who need our help, burns said.

A small staff of five at their office on Boyer Road, just south of 254, haven taken extra precautions with the pandemic. They bleached their kitchen and they are sanitizing daily, observing many of the same health food regulations that your favorite restaurant would adhere to.

Weve always been trying to find that local need and weve never been needed at a high capacity before, Burns said. We are now and were going to provide meals when they are needed.

Numana is trying to show support for our local businesses in El Dorado. They are offering to anyone who donates a $65 box of 216 meals, they will receive a gift card to one of those local businesses.

Numana has made deliveries or made have accommodated the local citizens to provide easy pick up, from a mom picking up on the picnic table just outside of the home office to delivering meals to a couple quarantined.

We want to be considerate and manageable, Burns said. Its about the community and how we can help them.

As of Friday, March 27, Numana has hand delivered a total of 5,328 meal to families in Butler County.

We anticipate that number to grow exponentially next week as we continue to reach out to local partner food pantries who can distribute our meals, Burns said.

See the rest here:

Numana making local impact when needed the most - Pittsburg Morning Sun

One of the things that many people who are addicts experience when theyre in the depths of compulsion is isolation fueled by shame and guilt, he said. Really, one of the most important things people need in recovery are people who are living in the solution, who are thriving in recovery, who they can connect with to find out theyre not alone.

Throughout the state, the places people would normally go for social stimulus restaurants, gyms, libraries, live shows have all temporarily shuttered or limited their services in order to comply with social distance mandates aimed at slowingthe spread of coronavirus.

For people struggling with addiction or other mental health issues, the enforced isolation has been particularly difficult.

Read on: How a tight-knit communitys brush with coronavirus hithome for a Seattle reporter

Many support groups and networks have canceled in-person meetings and pivoted to online communication. Some groups have started conversations through Facebook groups or through video conferencing sites. That's what Shelffo's group did instead of meeting in personat LGBTQ service provider Peer Seattle headquarters, where the groupused to congregate.Peer Seattle recently joined many other organizations in closing for the time being.

Its a lot of stress and anxiety for people, said Joshua Wallace, executive director of Peer Seattle. His organization has moved quickly, encouraging online meetings and continuing services wherever possible.

Human beings are social creatures, and isolation can have a variety of impacts, including increased risk of depression, stress, a weakened immune system and cardiac health issues.

Jonathan Kanter, director of the University of Washingtons Center for the Science of Social Connection, said an ongoing surveythat started March 14 is monitoring how people in King County feel about their isolation under coronavirus. So far, it hasfound that people are adapting, despite general anxieties.

Right now, we collectively have the sense that were in this together, he said. The first week of data showed that while anxieties persist, theirintrusiveness has diminished and people are adapting rather than simply being overwhelmed.

Feeling connected is important, Kanter said. Still, he wonders what people might feel in the weeks to come and is particularly concerned about those who are stressed after losing income, struggling with school closures, living aloneor without access to technology basically, everyone whos most likely to feel lonely and isolated in the long term.

For everyone especially particularly vulnerable peoplewith mental health issues finding ways to stay connected is essential.

Social support tends to be one of the best predictors of recovery and the ability to cope with mental illness, said Adam Kuczynski, a graduate student with UWs Center for the Science of Social Connection and a facilitator of the study.

John D., a member of and volunteer withSeattleAlcoholics Anonymous, saidvideo conferences have been particularly helpful since in-person gatherings were halted. He was unsure about what the experience of an online meeting would be like before joining his first one this week, but he was pleasantly surprised.

Were being forced to adapt as quickly as we can, he said, adding that hes concerned about new members. Ive been sober for a while now, and Im connected to people Ive met in the program but Im worried about the people just coming in that dont have those connections.

For him, staying in community is important so that people dont feel like they have to do this alone. Seattle AA, like other support groups, has continued to update itswebsite, pointing toward online resources.

Kanter said video chatting is one of the best options available to people hoping to break through the isolation that can come with social distancing. Studies show that video chatting, the closest thing to face-to-face conversation, is best for staying connected. Kanteradded that he already used this technology with patients beforethe pandemic and found it enormously useful for people who couldnt meet in person.

But online services arent available to everyone, either because they dont own a computer or capable mobile phone, or cant afford to sign up for a video conferencing program, saidLauren Simonds, executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness Washington. Her organization has provided Zoom onlineconferencing licenses to its Washington affiliates, but that doesnt take care of people without internet access.

Public libraries in Washingtonoften have computers open for public use, but library closures meanopportunities for internet access are further limited. Its an issue Simonds wants government officials thinking about moving forward.

Our cities and our counties might have to consider how to help those in our community who dont have that access, she said.

Its certain that theres still much to configure as communities grapple with isolation, and Kanter said that feeling stress about the situation is OK. Its important to validate those feelings.

Most of us are feeling some stew of stress, anxiety, overwhelm, uncertainty, and feeling this is normal, he said. Its what human bodies do in situations like this. The concern is how we cope with these feelings.

Rather than isolating further, lashing out or depending on substances like alcohol to cope, Kanter and Kuczynski said,staying in community with others through whatever means available is necessary as communities continue to adapt. In some ways, people should follow the example people in support groups have set even before this pandemic and practice intentional openness with one another, Kanter said.

If we are feeling more vulnerable or more in distress, we can reach out to other people and let them know, he said. And if youre feeling OKbut worried about others, really proactively reach out to people right now and check in.

Shelffo saiddoing that requires getting creative. On Tuesday night, he hosted Strength Over Speeds first online meeting. While members said they preferred in-person conversation, Shelffo said it went much smoother than expected communication flowed more easily than hed imagined and some shared that they felt better afterward.

While current circumstances can be frightening, Shelffo saidhes turned to the history of his community when seeking inspiration for solutions and for strength.

I come from a community of people that made it through the AIDS crisis, he said. We got creative when people got shuttered inside their homes. We found ways to communicate and support each other, and Im sure that well continue to find ways to do that now.

Originally posted here:

Social distancing is hard, especially for people living with addiction and mental illness - Crosscut

Does distance make the heart grow fonder? I have thought about this a lot lately.

I have been physically separated from my mother since the 1st of January, when we celebrated all that 2020 might bring to our lives. Neither of us imagined what was to come, that a pandemic would sweep the world, taking us with it.

Holding hands would soon cease, hugs and kisses no longer allowed.

Our separation hasn't been intentional. It is due to the coronavirus.Mum lives in an aged care complex where several people have been diagnosed and died after contracting the virus.

Just like millions of people around the world, my mum is now trapped in a 'lockdown', with all the best of intentions to protect her.

If Mum gets infected, she is at a very high risk of dying.Seeing her family poses too great a risk to her life.

I am not permitted to visit her. The same applies to my three adult children Lowanna, John and Dylan.

Mum is precious to us. All her siblings have passed away; we are her only family and love her dearly. I tend to think we are more worried about the separation than she is. Over the phone Mum tells me she is fine and sends her love.

At the same time, I have been out in the Redfern community investigating coronavirus or COVID-19, for a special Living Black episode that goes to air tonight.

The strain of juggling personal concerns, with the weight of information I learn on the job has been quite a challenge.On occasions the pressure has bought tears to my eyes.

Karla Grant with her mother Elizabeth and three children, Lowanna, John (left) and Dylan (right). Source: Karla Grant

This virus has halted life as we know it. It has touched all our lives, at home and work.

At my workplace, virtually everyone at NITV is either working on COVID-19 related content, or they are having to adjust 'business as usual' to accommodate COVID-19.

With incredible support from my colleagues, I have carried on working as normally as I can muster under these strained circumstances.The toll has been emotionally and physically draining.

My team and I have all discussed the risks we face of catching COVID-19 while filming and editing this Living Black episode.

We're all mindful, we are putting our lives at risk in order to produce this story. We all have families at home.

Driving us on is the need to report on how the Indigenous community is being impacted by this killer virus. Our people and communities need to know the seriousness of the crisis and what precautions they need to take to keep themselves, their families and their Elders safe.

I am forever grateful to my team for their dedication, for risking their lives to produce this important episode.

I only hope this special episode on COVID-19 sheds light on the dangers of the virus, how it is impacting the world and most importantly, our own backyard.

And while the last week and a half has tested me, I smiled on the final day of shooting.

I was lucky enough to see my Mum and hear her say 'I love you Karla'.

It was from a distance, in line with social distancing of course, but it was the most moving and touching moment to see the smile on my Mums face, to talk to her and to know that she is doing okay.

For me, distance does makes the heart grow fonder.

If you believe you may have contracted the virus, call your doctor, dont visit, or contact the national Coronavirus Health Information Hotline on 1800 020 080.

If you are struggling to breathe or experiencing a medical emergency, call 000.

Coronavirus symptoms can range from mild illness to pneumonia, according to the Federal Government's website, and can include a fever, coughing, sore throat, fatigue and shortness of breath.

Living Black can be viewed on on NITV (Ch.34)Monday 30 March at 8.30pm, Wednesday 1 April at 9:30pmand will be availableOn Demandafter the broadcast.

Link:

'It's upsetting. My Mum is in there' COVID-19 threat to Karla Grant's mother - SBS

I've learned a lot over the last few months about new ways of eating. I'm not a doctor and my intent is not to push a popular diet on others; however, I am excited to share what I've learned about the process of change.

My goal is to inspire and encourage other busy executives and leaders to make changes in their lives. I've found that change (especially when it's controllable) often yields greater happiness. That's what happened to me, and I'd like to pay it forward. It's clear that the more satisfied we are individually and as leaders, the better we can contribute at work and at home.

My journey began on December 23, 2019. While eating dinner with my family, I turned on a Netflix documentary called What the Health. I was so fascinated by the show that I watched The Game Changers right after that. I was intrigued by the stories of those who had switched to a plant-based diet and no longer suffered from stomachaches, which Ive endured since childhood. I had never made such a drastic change before and was willing to begin my own eating experiment. Within a few weeks, I quickly felt positive impacts from my new whole foods lifestyle.

We all face change in our lives, whether its a big change (like working from home during a pandemic) or a small change (like starting a jogging routine). Whatever you are facing in your life, here are my top 10 lessons for personal and professional growth:

Don't hem and haw when faced with change. As Nike says, just do it. Hesitation often leads to doing things the same old way and expecting a different result. Make the decision to start. If you're unhappy, then give yourself permission to modify or stop what you're doing without any guilt. There's no one right or wrong way to do anything. Make your own path and do so with purpose.

Everyone has opinions, and they often don't hold back. That's OK, but surround yourself with like-minded people. It makes the journey more enjoyable.

I didn't realize how many plant-based food options there would be in restaurants, coffee shops, grocery stores, etc. Even fast food and chain restaurants are catering to vegetarians and vegans. Starbucks recently announced that it's adding oat milk to its menu in 1,300 stores.

As I discussed in a recent article, personalizing the customer experience is a smart business strategy to differentiate your brand. In the context of change, this also reinforces my point. When you commit yourself to making a change and keep your eyes open, you'll see many opportunities all around you.

I've found that when we overthink or overcomplicate a task, it leads to accomplishing nothing. So, break down tasks in the pursuit of change. Remember that every action counts. If you only have 30 minutes to exercise instead of your usual hour, for example, commit to it for half an hour rather than pushing it off for another day or never.

There's an inspiring line in the poem "Invictus" by William Ernest Henley: "I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul." I first heard this quote in the movie Invictus, which my friend had recommended to me and I now recommend to others.

You control your destiny. The choices you make today impact tomorrow. Build your self-confidence and believe you can make positive changes. That's when you will do the unimaginable.

Since switching to my new diet, I am more mindful when shopping, cooking and eating. I now read food labels, which I had never done before. I'm tasting so many new foods and trying restaurants I'd never visited. My diet requires me to get more creative, and that makes life more fun. So slow down and enjoy the little things about the change you're making. I've found that being mindful about positive change amplifies happiness.

When making a change, communicate to your friends and family that you need their support. Leverage communities on Facebook, Instagram and other social platforms there is so much knowledge-sharing to go around. Find a partner and hold each other accountable. I would never have continued my plant-based lifestyle had my husband not done it with me.

With any new habit, it's normal to feel doubtful and fearful of the unknown. Recognize that it's OK to feel that way, but move forward without letting it hold you back. You'll be glad you did. If you need inspiration, I recommend reading Feel the Fear...and Do It Anyway by Susan Jeffers, Ph.D.

Conquering anything challenging, whether it's a new diet or exercise plan, or a new job or project, can feel overwhelming when you first get started. Practice does make perfect and becomes rewarding. Be intentional and focused on your purpose by reminding yourself of the "why" behind the change every day.

As human beings, we're all experiencing life in different ways. Take the time to ask questions and share your experience. Read books. Listen to podcasts and TEDx Talks. You may be surprised when something you already know resonates in a whole new way. Epiphanies happen when least expected.

What changes have you made and how has it affected your perspective? Which tip above resonates with you most, and what would you add to the list?

See more here:

Making A Big Or A Small Change In Your Life? 10 Effective Ways To Do It - Forbes

Welcome to State of Basketball, a multi-part series from Inside The Hall taking readers on a tour of historic basketball gyms around the state of Indiana.

Each of the gyms included in the State of Basketball series was featured in this seasons pregame introduction video for the Indiana University mens basketball team.

The goal of the series is simple: To highlight the importance of basketball, at all levels, in the state of Indiana and to explain the importance that being featured in the introduction video for the states flagship team has on the communities these gyms are a part of.

The State of Basketball series: Introduction, Pleasantville Gym, The Harrison Center, Memory Hall, The Anderson Wigwam, Vermillion County Public Library

*****

NEWPORT, Ind. Inside the Vermillion County Public Library, thousands of items are swapped with the thousands of patrons who visit each year.

Most are normal to the environment: Childrens books and DVDs are exchanged and returned, editions of Moby Dick and Don Quixote are in circulation and residents of the four Vermillion County townships served by the library have a vast collection of literature available.

But amongst the hardback and paperback books are basketballs, ready as the rest to be used by visitors.

The library is on the buildings second floor. Classrooms and storage space can be found on the first floor.

The bottom floor is home to the buildings distinguishing element, a basketball court with a red curtain-clad stage along one of its sides.

Newport High School existed inside the building from the early 1920s until 1964, and all the while the Newport Tigers played on that court.

A snarling, red tiger logo still adorns midcourt in between block letters spelling NEWPORT and TIGERS although blue and black tape now criss-crosses the hardwood, marking parameters on the floor for pickleball and volleyball games.

Its been more than 55 years since the gym hosted a high school game, and likely longer since it saw a winning team given Newports substandard history in the sport.

The building and gym remain not only intact but connected, an intentional choice by people like Misty Bishop, the director of the library, to retain the essence of the town.

You get that historic feel in Newport when youre here, Bishop said. The community is so involved with the building and keeping the history.

*****

Although the blueprints have been lost to time, the consensus is that Newport High School spent its final four decades inside the building now housing the library. Newport consolidated into North Vermillion High School in 1964, and for a period after that the old building sat vacant.

It was briefly an elementary school then a community center, but neither occupied the space for very long.

In 2003, the library gained control and moved into the building.

Renovations were done twice in the ensuing 11 years. First there was a million-dollar project to get the building up to code by installing an elevator, a new HVAC system and a new security system, then an additional renovation in 2014 freshened the place up with new carpet and paint.

The structure of the old Newport High School remained the same, a red-brick exterior with plenty of windows, as did the presence of the gym found below ground.

The gym has been a huge focal point for the library in the past couple years, Bishop explained.

With a wooden backboard affixed to one of the walls and modern-day glass backboards held in place by stanchions, one has the tools to compare the gyms past to its present.

But the tape markings on the court act as a constant reminder of the clientele served.

Home plates are outlined in bright yellow tape. A haphazardly drawn 3-point line appears in teal. Random patches of red tape could mean nothing and everything at once.

On a given day the court is a playspace for whoever wants it.

This could mean a chance to shoot hoops, conduct a summer reading seminar, entertain Newport alumni at an annual reunion dinner or host hundreds of people for an indoor easter egg hunt.

The beauty of the gymnasium is in its versatility. Newports is no different.

We try to make it so that when (people) come to the library its more of an experience, Bishop said. It makes coming to the library a place you want to stay once youre there.

*****

Bishops desire in this regard is based on logistics as much as anything else.

Vermillion County, established in 1824, is long and narrow, a sliver of land pressed against the Indiana state border with Illinois.

About 40 miles long and 10 miles wide, some county residents must drive 30 minutes to reach the library (the countys other library is a township library in Clinton).

As such, Bishop uses this as incentive to hype up the best things the library can offer those who must travel to the county seat of Newport.

Since becoming the librarys director in June 2011, Bishop has grown the library turnout tenfold, from roughly 1,000 people annually when she started to the nearly 10,000 people who visited in 2019 (a Vermillion County Soil and Water Conservation District office is also located in the building).

The increase came as Bishop addressed community needs.

Theyre the people who are ultimately paying for the library, so its like, What do you want downstairs?' Bishop said. Oh, you want basketballs so you can go down and practice? Sure, we can do that.

Even prior to her time in charge of one of the few library-gym combinations in existence (gyms in Ancient Greece often had libraries attached), Bishop was a part of the rich basketball tradition in the state.

Shes originally from Hope, Indiana, and played basketball at Hauser High School in Hope from the seventh grade through her senior year.

It kind of brings back all the joys of basketball, she said. Even though I dont do it all the time, its like, Oh yeah, thats part of who I am.'

Attention concerning the old Newport gym came not only with its inclusion in this seasons Indiana basketball introduction video, but also last year when members of The Hoosier Hardwood Photo Project came to town to photograph the gym.

Bishop said some of those photos are now in the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame, helping bring further awareness to an area not usually in the spotlight.

Its exciting for me because a lot of people dont know the library is here, Bishop said. Vermillion County doesnt have a lot of publicitywe always like to say were the best kept secret in Vermillion County because were kind of hidden down here.

*****

Based on basketball pedigree, and athletic success in general, Newports home court should no longer exist.

The Tigers, a member of the Vermillion County Conference (VCC), took part in the state tournament each year from 1915 to 1964, failing to win even a sectional title (Of the VCCs eight members, seven of them left via consolidation. Only Clinton, which won 12 sectionals in its 21 years in the VCC, left as its own school).

There is no record of Newport winning a state championship in any sport, and any trace of the schools athletic involvement has been reduced to old IHSAA handbooks and surviving copies of the school yearbook The Flashlight.

You cant read much about Newports past. But you can stare at it, dribble on it and survive with it into the future.

North Vermillion Elementary School, located in nearby Cayuga, uses the court for practices.

The annual Newport Antique Auto Hill Climb (in which thousands of people gather to drive cars up an 1,800-foot-long, 140-foot-tall hill) in Newport acts as an event naturally funneling people to town, where they visit the library and see the gym and wonder about the stories that took place within its baselines.

Long-term plans for the library dont necessarily involve the gym, because its always been there and will continue to be.

Bishop wants to make the library more mobile and find a way to take its programming on the road. The library has also gone fines free, eliminating fines and late fees (except those for damaged or lost books) for patrons to encourage people to continue to make use of the resource.

Bishop has also dealt with people stealing basketballs from the library after checking them out, something that can only be described as a stereotypically Indiana problem.

Its one she will have to continue to monitor as well.

As a concept, the library is one of the last great community cornerstones in this country. It delivers what those who use it request.

In Indiana, that is a basketball and a gym to play in.

Its here, we might as well use it, Bishop said of the gym. We might as well give it back to the community and keep it preserved.

*****

The Vermillion County Public Library is featured once in the 2019-20 Indiana mens basketball introduction video at the 0:40 mark. The video can be seen here.

Filed to: State of Basketball,Vermillion County Public Library

View post:

State of Basketball: Part 6 - Vermillion County Public Library - Inside the Hall

The sound of Christian hymns echoes through an empty sanctuary during a Facebook Live service at Immanuel Lutheran Church in DeKalb.

Like nonessential businesses, the churches doors have been locked to their congregations in the interest of public health.

You can imagine parishioners are singing along, sheltered-in-place at their homes. Marty Marks is the pastor at Immanuel. One of his members wanted to sing but didnt have a hymnal.

So I did kind of a drive-by ding-dong ditch thing where I went to the house, I rang the doorbell, you know, Im leaving the hymnal here! said Marks.

Every faith group is trying new ways to keep their communities connected, even if they cant do it face-to-face. For many, Facebook has been the tool of choice to reach them.

Facebook Live sermon broadcasts and Zoom meeting prayers are the new norm.

Theyre also keeping up with each other through phone calls, emails and WhatsApp.

For the Muslim Association of Greater Rockford, its been a big adjustment. Just consider their mosques normal Friday prayer gatherings.

We usually have approximately 700 people -- now there is none, said Imam Mohamed Ahmed Elgobashy of the Muslim Association of Greater Rockford.

The Association posted daily prayer from home instructions on its website.

You can pray anywhere, he said. And if you have some emergency like this, you will get the same reward from God if you pray at home if you didn't come to the mosque.

Denzil Luckritz is the pastor at Trinity Episcopal Church in Aurora. Hes been having morning and evening prayer groups on Zoom. Hes also doing Facebook streams for the first time.

Everybody's been talking about a learning curve, said Luckritz. It has not been a learning curve at all. It has been like a rocket launch. It has been straight up.

Many peoples daily schedules have all but exploded during the COVID-19 crisis. The Rev. Eric Doolittle says having a prayer schedule, like in Islam, can be beneficial to anyone in any faith tradition.

So planning that time, 10 minutes, five minutes, 20 if you can do it, to be intentional about the different parts of your self-care is essential, said Rev. Doolittle, the chaplain at North Central Colleges Office of Faith and Action.

He says hes eager to see how people of faith take the opportunity for action in their communities.

How will people use the extra time? And as they feel that they are able to engage, to give back to embody the love of neighbor in a proactive way, said Rev. Doolittle.

Members of the Muslim Association of Greater Rockford are helping deliver meals to students.

Other religious groups at Northern Illinois University are working with food insecurity missions for college students and trying to connect them to other campus resources.

Marty Marks is also the president of ACRO -- the association of campus religious organizations at NIU.

He says those student faith groups are also staying plugged in with each other.

I don't see me doing a Snapchat or TikTok Bible study but, you never know, you get creative in times of need, he said.

Rev. Doolittle at North Central College is hoping church leaders learn to rely on the young adults they have.

Theyre already experts, so lean into them, he said.

One of the religious organizations at North Central, the Christian fellowship FOCUS, is breaking services into chunks through the week and curating Spotify playlists for worship.

Despite the innovation, many churches are also feeling a financial burden.

Its all unknown, said Marty Marks of Immanuel Lutheran. Weve got no idea what our offerings over the next few weeks of them look like, we're in the process of budgeting for our next fiscal year. So we have no clue what our income is going to look like.

Some churches, like Immanuel, also run schools that have teachers and staff who need to be paid.

Most churches set up online giving options in the meantime.

For now, Denzil Luckritz at Trinity Episcopal says, hes seeing his community step up spiritually for each other.

All of that has been challenging at the same time there's been a silver lining because we're coming together in ways that are simply remarkable, said Luckritz.

And with coronavirus stress and anxiety taking a toll on many, faith groups pray they can continue to nurture spiritual care for themselves, and others. in a uniquely uncertain time.

Read this article:

'Embody The Love Of Neighbor': Practicing Faith In A Pandemic - WNIJ and WNIU

Ben Higgins is engaged!

The Bachelor star, 31, proposed to girlfriend Jessica Clarke over the weekend in Franklin, Tennessee.

I was super nervous. Shes my best friend, my partner and I love her. I was nervous to kind of do this whole thing in front of her. I wasnt anxious, its just a big moment! he told Entertainment Tonight.

So who is Higgins future wife?

Clarke, 24, is an avid runner and competed on the University of Mississippis (Ole Miss) womens track and field and cross-country team. According to her athlete bio, Clarke is also dedicated to helping others and stayed in a special needs orphanage in China for 10 days.

Ben Higgens/Instagram

She graduated from Ole Miss in 2018 with a bachelors degree in integrated marketing and communications, according to her LinkedIn, and began working at Valet Energy in Nashville in November 2018. Shes also the co-owner of SweatNET Nashville and SweatNET Denver, online communities that offer coupons for workouts and more.

The couple met in 2018 when Higgins successfully slid into Clarkes direct messages on social media. The two dated in private for several months before making their relationship public in February 2019.

RELATED: The Bachelors Ben Higgins Claps Back at Troll Who Says His GF Looks Like Shes in High School

Ive been selfishly keeping this girl to myself for too long! Hey friends meet @jessclarke_! I successfully slid into her Dms a few months ago. I took a risk and I am glad I did, Higgins captioned a photo of himself and Clarke in Honduras.

She is someone special, and I look forward to where life is going to take us, the Generous Coffee co-founder continued. Stay tuned for the journey. In addition, this picture was taken this week in Honduras. I got to spend some time with an incredible group of people from all over the USA on a @generous_coffee_ adventure. Life is good!

Though Clarke was aware of who Higgins was when he slid into her DMs, she hadnt watched his season of The Bachelor.

Her mom loves the show so much, so she called her mom right away and was like, What is happening here? and her mom was like, I dont really know, but you should at least message him back. So she didnt watch my season, which is actually good, Higgins previously told PeopleTVs Reality Check.

Ben Higgens/Instagram

RELATED: The Bachelors Ben Higgins and His Girlfriend Jessica Clarke Dish on Their Romantic First Kiss

And according to Higgins, the likelihood of them ever sitting down together and revisiting his Bachelor days is slim to none.

The very first time she ever saw any piece of my season was watching the Bachelorette reunion show that came out last year. And it was when JoJo [Fletcher] and Lauren [Bushnell] were both there with me at the end, Higgins explained, noting his exes. And it crushed Jessica. Shes like, I dont want to ever see this again. So I have no doubt we will never watch my season.

While the couple started their relationship long-distance (with Higgins based in Denver and Clarke living in Nashville), they made a point not to go more than two weeks without seeing each other and frequently traveled together. She even joined him on the road for The Bachelor Live on Stage Official Tour, until the coronavirus pandemic forced its cancellation.

Like Higgins, Clarke is Christian; she lists the Bible passage 1 Thessalonians 5:16 (Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is Gods will for you in Christ Jesus) in her Instagram bio.

Faith is foundational. Our relationship wouldnt work or make sense without our faith being front and center, they told the blog Live Original in November 2019. Its a grounding force for us and something that has led to the most challenging, but also the most fruitful conversations. Starting to get to know someone by dating long distance means that everything must be intentional. We never have been afraid to dig deeper into our beliefs from the get-go and its led to a strong foundation that now weve been able to build on and really have fun with. Bens leadership in faith is one of the things Jess is most attracted to about Ben.

Clarke announced their engagement on Sunday, sharing a sweet photo of the proposal.

I dont remember everything you said, but I know that I said yes. I woke up in a dream today and I get to live in this dream every day from now on (eeeep), the bride-to-be announced on Instagram, along with photos of the moment her fianc proposed.

Link:

Everything to Know About The Bachelor Star Ben Higgins' Fiance Jessica Clarke - Yahoo Entertainment

Jeremy Cohen of Playwrights Center, Rachel Spencer Hewitt of Parent Artist Advocacy League, and Godfrey L. Simmons Jr. of Civic Ensemble. (Photo by Ryan Bourque for Theatre Communications Group)

At this time last year, I was preparing to attend TCGs annual conference to facilitate a lab on creating supportive work structure and environments for caregivers in our field. None of us could anticipate that in just 12 short months, our world would be on lockdown and our livelihoods in crisis.

The irony in this anniversary is that while our planet experiences a seismic shift, the work and strategies generated in that lab have become more relevant than ever. Ive received messages thanking the Parent-Artists Advocacy League (PAAL) for acting so quickly to provide solutions to current conditions. But the reality is that gathering these solutions has been in the works for years because, for better or worse, caregivers have extensive experience with necessary work accommodations, conditional employment loss, and experiences of isolation.

A year ago these were thought of as challenges chiefly for the vulnerablefor workers who might be allowed to form their own affinity groups during the lunch hour only to wait months, if not years, for their organizations to listen to their advice. In short, accommodations for caregivers were once a niche issue. Now, tragically, these accommodations have become necessities for everyone.

When I began collecting information for this piece, I contacted caregivers who have endured their own versions of quarantine, remade their creative spaces, and created solutions for working at homeall before the field at large was ready to hear them. It is an extraordinary privilege to share these solutions on a universal scale to honor the stories of caregivers who have proven to be accidental Cassandras for our current state.

What were once essential needs for seemingly few have, in a matter of months, become the essential needs for all. We now have the opportunity to use the lessons from caregiver solutions to make this time of crisis a time of organizational reinvention. In order to achieve resilient reinvention, however, we must take intentional steps to reshape our way of thinking, our way of working, and our way of making. Before the crisis, the solutions were effective for caregivers. After the crisis, the solutions are universally necessary. What an opportunity to take these lessons and implement them to make our collaborations healthier, more effective, and designed for humanity. This began as a piece on solutions for caregiver support, and it now can serve as a blueprint of intentional steps toward the reinvention we need to shape a sustainable future.

When I presented for the first time at the Statera Conference in Milwaukee in 2018, I conducted a workshop on Motherhood and Leadership. I invited mothers to share their experiences, non-parents to ask their questions, and leaders to challenge themselves to walk away with one actionable item they each could implement to support their caregivers. While that workshop could be an article in itself, the most striking moment happened after we dismissed. I was approached by a non-parent who had attended as an ally. She shared with me in confidence that in her organization, there was a time when she was diagnosed with a serious illness at the same time her co-worker became pregnant. Almost simultaneously, she shared, her illness and her co-workers pregnancy created a shift in how they were treated. Conversation on solutions was nearly non-existent, the organization had no plan in place, and both were left to endure their major life events alone: in isolation, without structural support or cultural awareness.

These two colleagues had parallel experiences of abandonment by their leadership because their organization had shaped its policy outside of the realm of events that make us dynamically human. I often share that there will be a point in every individuals life where they will experience a major life event: illness, birth, loss. We are all vulnerable at some point. In a conversation with Ann Marie Lonsdale from the HowlRound webinar Artists in a Time of Global Pandemic, she offered a phrase that has circulated throughout the disability community: Were all temporarily able. We have long failed those in our field who have had to face their major life events alone. Now that we have a universal life event, we must cling to this experience to define the priorities of our organizations as theyre remade.

At PAAL we talk about interconnected access. This refers to the belief that by centering our policies on need versus convention, we find solutions that elevate benefits of the work environment for everyone. For those terrified of the financial implications of this concept, not to worry: It is actually economically beneficial. As all our financial plans feel shattered in this moment, as we reconstruct the pieces to shape a new financial future, our fragile structures will survive if they are centered on the realities of what it means to be human.

As many states shelter in place, both administrative and creative work has moved to virtual connections. In interviews with parents, they say that work from home has helped increase their time to bond with children, reduced financial strain by cutting back hours needed for childcare or unnecessary travel for occasional production meetings that could be conducted virtually, and provided contingency plans when schools were closed, and prevented tapping into much-needed sick days when it has been their child that needs care.

Historically, remote work has also been a key factor in increasing accessibility. Says Talleri McRae from National Disability Theatre, I always appreciatewhether its related to parenting, disability, or neitherflexibility and understanding. Flexibility on tight deadlines whenever possible. (My turnaround time has tripled since becoming a parent.) Flexibility in how I can participate, in person, by video, or even by email before a meeting happens because the meeting is during toddler bedtime. Understanding that meeting times might shift, rehearsal plans might get rearranged, but also trust that things will move forward. Questions will be answered. Discussions will be had. And just because Im disabled and just because Im a parent doesnt make me less capable to do these work things. It just means shifting how Iand we, the teamget things done.

In PAALs new HR Health program, weve launched the online workshop The Readiness Series on how to seek employment and effectively work from home. In this series, we are releasing the resources once meant for caregivers that could now help our field at large. The recommendations for successful execution in the work from home environment include

a) Start each call with a personal check-in to generate healthy relationship over digital space

b) Create a physical space in the home dedicated to the work to create a physical and psychological boundary

c) Articulate as a team or organization specific times off-line where emails and calls will not be answered to create healthy work expectation

d) Commit as leadership or with leadership to write these time boundaries out as company-wide commitments and articulate any project exceptions and how to compensate exceptions with additional off-line time frames

e) Engage with caregivers on supportive streamlining for calls and deadlines (occasional work calls post-bedtime while the next morning is designated as off-line or scheduling all work calls in the afternoon to leave the morning off-line so they can establish schooling, home routine, outdoor time, etc.

f) Understand that the more humans involved, the more compassion is required. If your colleague has to negotiate a sibling war or is changing a diaper or has to pause the call to bandage a wound, remember our humanity is the priority here, and the project a far second. Take a breath and the opportunity to be generous and even take a moment of meditation for yourselfthen offer one to your colleague who may reenter the call breathless and likely amped

g) Engage leadership to make work from home a provision for major life events and work/life balance moving forward.

Our theatre culture clings to tight production schedules and extensive office hours as indications of commitment or passion. For caregivers whose human responsibilities require more supportive scheduling, this mindset cuts into their reputations, employment opportunities, or financial and physical health. But many caregivers in leadershipoften women, such as the case of the leadership at Detroit Public Theatre, and primarily women of color, to be more specific, including Roberta Pereira and Patricia McGregorhave broken ground in restructuring more humane schedules to more relevantly support our time, and to define commitment and passion by the work contributed, not hours logged.

Supportive scheduling includes the five-day rehearsal week, restructuring tech days, and creating administrative off-line boundaries with project exceptions and off-line compensation times (as listed above). With the five-day rehearsal week, it has been proven time and again that financial and logistical burdens are reduced for everyone and the quality of the contribution rises. Award-winning director Patricia McGregor is a powerful advocate for the five-day work week and restructured tech schedules. Also a caregiver, McGregor told me that her belief in a more humane work schedule preceded her becoming a mother. Her own mother was a union worker who marched for teachers rights decades ago. Both witnessing and participating, young Patricia learned of the inextricable nature between labor and equity. Here and now, she says, the theatre has an opportunity to be a leader not in what has always been but in what should be in redefining how collectives should work.

Supportive scheduling will make it more possible for more artists and administrators to contribute as we rebuild what it means to commit in our field. The five-day rehearsal week is available for every equity contract, and PAAL has outlined how to engage with it.

In the play Goodnight Nobody by Rachel Bonds at the McCarter Theatre Center this past fall, the lead character Kay pumps her breast milk in a farmhouse. The audience hears the breast pump runninga mechanical and jarring gear-plus-suction soundfor 25 percent of the show, then witnesses Kay washing her pump parts in the sink. While the character has a three-hour timer for pumping going off in her head, she also wrestles with identity, a full-time job, caring for a seven-month-old baby, and loneliness.

The McCarters production featured a radical element offstage. Kay was played by actor Arielle Woodweiss, who, at the very moment of production, was a new mom to a seven-month-old little boy. Throughout rehearsals and tech, Bonds, director Tyne Rafaeli, and the theatre engaged in constant dialogue with Woodweiss about her needs, specifically in terms of space. Finding powerful advocates in Bonds, a mother herself, Rafaeli, a committed ally, and the McCarter, an organization with a reputation of this kind of support, Woodweiss said she learned language in real time to articulate what she needed to live in housing with a child and pump on-site while bringing the story of a breastfeeding mother onto the stage.

Talleri McRae seconded the importance of space access. As a disabled parent, one of the things I appreciate the most is a no-judgement attitude, if my toddler attends a meeting or a through, and actswell, like a toddler.

As we reimagine what a professional space means, many of us need not look much farther than the dining room table or the couch we now call the office. Children entering the rehearsal space may happen time and again due to financial and logistical failings. These examples are critical to include in our conversations with parents now as we all navigate how to communicate with children in the space, and ask what artists access need may be in order to best contribute. Because, at the end of the day, shaping the space for access needs rather than adhering to convention affects the stories we can tell. It is impossible to bring diverse content to our stages and create accessible opportunities for our audiences without first learning how to do it for our artists and administrators behind the scenes.

Even before the crisis, budgets for nonprofit theatres often strained financially. At our national summit on caregiver support last December, we engaged with many leaders who provided real numbers for funds they created to support childcare, including Elevator Repair Service, the TEAM, the Playwrights Realm, and more. PAAL has outlined the steps to creating a fund for caregiver provisions. While budgets look slashed and hopeless now for so many institutions, freelance caregivers are in the same boatand they dont have access to boards or a platform for their voice. If they are to return to our field, we need to hold space for their support. What weve found is that when a fund is dedicated to caregiver support, donors find it a relatable cause, as caregiving affects all of us in some way, especially in times of crisis.

This a wonderful opportunity for individuals to be specific with how they can help rebuild our institutions. At the PAAL summit, the Realm also explained how they were able to provide paid maternity leave for producing director Roberta Pereira: The Realm created a fund with a surplus for artistic risk and expanded its use to support a leave policy shaped with the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) standards. While not every organization has a surplus or qualifies to fulfill FMLA obligations, every institution has the opportunity to demonstrate the commitment of their budgets narrative to gender parity, diversity, and improving the retention rate of upward mobility in our field. That applies even when rebuilding. And the national statistics prove that gender parity, diversity, and retention rates are directly impacted by caregiver funds and leave policies. Every institution must include a childcare fund as they rebuild. Structuring the budgets of our rebuilding field around these provisions will improve our efforts in rebuilding communities as well.

As quickly as the world can fall into crisis, even more quickly it can forget what it means to be vulnerable. We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to convert the energy generated by our fear of the future into energy to fight for it. There is no future worth that fight where we gather again, healthy and working, while a few are left to quarantine in their own crises because weve neglected to take this time to make need the priority of structural change. In a social media post this past week, Johanna Maynard Edward, executive director of Womens Theatre Festival of Raleigh, N.C., and PAAL chief rep, documented her family life during social distancing. In a video, she shares her experience running a theatre company and caring for her family while in isolation during the time she was also being diagnosed with an autoimmune condition of the cardiovascular system. Her experience helped equip her for the current isolation with a child on the spectrum. The takeaways Edwards offers include, We are parent artists. We are the most creative problem solvers on the planet. We were made for this moment.

While layoffs, budget devastations, and shuttered productions threaten our institutional sustainabilityor, in some cases, very existencewe must find our light. Whether its conscious of it or not, our field is more flexible than ever in its understanding of necessity and luxury, and this flexibility can foster growth if we invest in the right ways. Remote work, flexible scheduling, childcare, and leave provisions in the past were often categorized as luxury because they only impacted a few. Now that these provisions are everyones necessity, our time now opens wide the door for the theatre to lead the way through it. Thanks to caregivers who persevered, we have the next steps for how to learn from a crisis we couldnt anticipate to create the future our field deserves.

New York-based actor Rachel Spencer Hewitt is the founder of Parent Artist Advocacy League for Performing Arts + Media.

Creative credits for photo:Goodnight Nobodyat McCarter Theatre Center, written by Rachel Bonds, directed by Tyne Rafaeli, withsets by Kimie Nishikawa,costumes by sta Bennie Hostetter, lighting by Jen Schriever, and sound by Daniel Kluger.

Related

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Work/Life Balance Is Everyone's Urgent Business Now - American Theatre

Tecumsehs East Wind Community was one of several income-sharing communities across the country recently featured in a New York Times Style Magazine article titled The New Generation of Self-Created Utopias.

The East Wind section of the article features a series of photos of the communitys land and its 70 residents, who cooperatively live on the property off County Road 547 between Gainesville and Tecumseh.

Boone Wheeler, a four-year resident of East Wind, told the Ozark County Times that the articles author, Mike Mariani, and photographer, George Etheredge, were perfectly nice guys.

We invited them out here, and no one had an issue with it, Wheeler said. I think most people think its cool to have their picture in the New York Times.

Wheeler operates the communitys Instagram account and said the number of followers on the social media platform tripled within a week of the article being published.

It led to a spike of awareness and interest in what were doing here said Wheeler.

The community also received 30 new inquiries about membership after the article was published, he said.

Just trying to live a good life, same as anyone else

Many Ozark County residents have likely encountered East Wind members running errands around Gainesville or volunteering at the Ozark County Food Pantryas part of their civic support initiative, Wheeler says, but the community remains somewhat of a mystery to the general population.

What I personally would like other Ozark Countians to know about East Wind is that were just trying to live a good life, same as anyone else. Living cooperatively affords us a high quality of life without having to work crazy hard, Wheeler said. East Winders are really diverse, coming from all over and from all walks of life. We grow a good amount of our own food and do a lot of our own work.

According to East Winds website, more than a thousand people have lived at what is called an intentional community since its founding in 1974, and the communitys culture has evolved as residents have come and gone.

Its very different than it was back in the 70s. We dont have a taboo around nudity, but we arent all naked all the time, said Wheeler.

The New York Times article says that around half of the population is part of a new wave, people in their late 20s and early 30s who joined in the last four years. These newer residents moved to East Wind to wean themselves off fossil fuels, grow their own food, have a greater say in how their society is run and live in less precarious financial circumstances.

Community structure

East Wind members work 35 hours a week in exchange for their basic needs, including food, water, electricity, shelter, medical coverage and a $150 monthly allowance.

Community members share laundry and kitchen facilities as well as an auto repair shop, social spaces, workshops and even a music studio.

The communitys main source of income is East Wind Nut Butters, a multi-million-dollar business that produces peanut, almond and cashew butter as well as tahini, a butter made of sesame seeds.

In addition to working in the nut butter factory, members also share the workload of caring for livestock, tending gardens, maintaining buildings and grounds, and cooking meals.

Work doesnt feel like work here, said Wheeler, who meets his hours by working the front desk, building maintenance and construction, making cheese and working on the nut butter production line. And everyone does the dishes, he said. So I do the dishes too.

The community practices direct democracy, meaning that each member has an equal vote on all matters, including whether or not prospective members are allowed to stay.

Everyone is entitled to his or her own room, and contrary to some popular conceptions, East Winders are free to own personal property such as electronics, media and clothing.

However, they do have a shared clothing supply, affectionately named Commie Clothes, where anyone can take or borrow items.

According to Wheeler, The only thing people cant have is their own car, at least not on the East Wind property.

East Wind itself owns several vehicles, and regular group trips are made to Gainesville, West Plains and Springfield, as well as Mountain Home, Arkansas. Members can also check out cars for personal use and even for long distance travel.

We have a really high quality of life here. If you divide our income by the number of people, its way below the poverty line, but our lifestyle is way higher than that, said Wheeler, who believes that cooperating and sharing is what our world needs, and says, East Wind proves that it works.

No stranger to the media

East Wind, no stranger to the media, has appeared in National Geographic magazine (65760: Not quite Utopia, published August 2005) and the Washington Times (East Wind community in Missouri continues to grow, published Sept. 1, 2017). More recently, an article in the Kansas City Star (Dark rituals, Orgies, See the reality of a hippie commune deep in Missouris Bible Belt, published Aug. 27, 2017) elicited criticism from East Wind members as well as other Ozark County residents for its sensational (and, many said, inaccurate) portrayal of the community.

To read the New York Times Style Magazine article, visit https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/16/t-magazine/intentional-communities.ht...

Visit East Wind

While East Wind does not welcome drop-in visitors, the community is happy to accommodate anyone who would like to schedule a visit. Write to ew.membership@gmail.com for more information or visit the website EastWind.org. Social media users can also follow eastwindcommunity on Instagram.

Read the rest here:

East Wind Community featured in New York Times Style Magazine - Ozark County Times

The business world, and in fact the country, lost a great man recently with the passing of Clayton Christensen. This Harvard School of Business professor authored some of the finest business books hundreds of thousands have benefited from. He was a genuine gentleman and he will be missed by many. One of his greatest pieces of business advice was very simple, yet so profound. Paraphrased, he said, Success is measured by the lives you touch and impact.It was no secret that this was his guiding philosophy regardless whether it was in his business or his personal life.

One might ask, while that might be great advice, what does that have to do with my community or with me? When I look at our community, I believe that how we positively impact the lives of those in our community is the ultimate measurement of success. Every supportive action that we take in our community makes an impact. Every dime we spend at a local establishment makes an impact. Casting a vote in a local election makes an impact. Every volunteer hour we spend helping or lifting people up in our community makes and impact. Every time we say a kind word to others impacts our community. When you view it through that lens, we can all have a great impact in our community and on the lives of those in our community.

We have all heard the term unintended consequences used, usually in a negative light. But let me share a positive economic intended consequence of our actions that we can have control over.

While the community size only impacts the final numbers, the following example remains the same. Lets say you live in a community of 20,000 residents. For this example, lets also assume that residents will travel to other nearby communities or cities to do much of their shopping, dining and entertainment. Lets also assume that like most, many in your community are starting to shop online more and more each year. What would be the impact if each resident were to make a conscious effort to spend $25 each month at a locally owned and operated business that they might have otherwise spent out-of-town or online? That small commitment to your local community would be enormous. That would equate to $500,000 each month or $6 million each year circulating throughout your small community. This intended consequence becomes a game changer in many communities.

How would an additional $6 million impact the locally owned and operated business community? How many local jobs might that help create? How many more tax dollars would be available to assist with the local roads, fire, schools, infrastructure and so forth? How would it feel to intentionally assist with the paving of your own roads in lieu of paving the roads in Bentonville, Arkansas, or some far-off corporate headquarters?

Yes, we can surely impact so many lives in our community by our small and intentional actions. Not only how we treat people, but how we choose to spend our money can make a significant positive impact. When we look at our friends, co-workers and neighbors, we can have a greater impact on their lives right here and right now more than we know. We are all in this economic battle together. Local communities need to not only think truly local, but act that way as well.

Ill close with the quote I shared at the beginning by Clayton Christensen with a slight modification, Our local communitys success is measured by the lives we touch and impact. Are we measuring up to that challenge or do we need to evaluate our lives and rededicate and commit to our local community? You cant go wrong in thinking local, in fact, when it comes to measuring impact it may very well be the only right thing to do.

John A. Newby, author of the "Building Main Street, Not Wall Street " column dedicated to helping communities combine synergies with local media companies allowing them to not just survive, but thrive in a world where Truly Local is lost to Amazon, Wall Street chains and others. His email is: john@360MediaAlliance.net.

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Building Main Street, not Wall Street: Success is measured by the lives we impact - Muskogee Daily Phoenix

Elroy Gay and Lillie Gay, 1987. Photo: Joseph Borukhov

Once upon a time in the 1980s long before the days of Ludlow House, $7 lattes, and recently relocated frat boys the Lower East Side was one of the most ethnically diverse (and affordable) neighborhoods in Manhattan. Today, only traces of those previous tenants and their businesses remain in the wake of gentrification, making the remaining stalwarts feel all the more precious. Rainbow Shoe Repair, an unassuming cobbler business, is one of these anomalies theyve been in business 40 years now. Those who frequented the Delancey Street storefront in the 80s, 90s and early 00s remember it as more than just a place to mend soles. Rainbow Shoe Repair was a place to make memories.

Shawntel Dunbar, 1996. Photo: Ilya Shoulov

Rainbow has amassed its fair share of detailed Yelp reviews throughout the years, but even the most loquacious fail to mention that the store used to operate a photo studio. The original owner, Josef Borukhov, began offering passport photos to his clientele in the 80s, and soon after expanded his offerings. Rainbow became a destination for affordable graduation photos, family photos, engagement photos, or just plain fit pics (read: outfit pics) with friends. It became a cherished space in an era that predated phone photography, back when getting your picture taken was an intentional, formal event. Lower East Siders went to Rainbow for more than casual snapshots; they were engaging in documentation rituals that allowed them to freeze a moment, feeling, or relationship in time and keep it forever.

Elroy and Sammi Gay, 1996. Photo: Ilya Shoulov

In the summer of 2018, curator Ali Rosa-Salas discovered images from Rainbow when flipping through Lower East Side native Sammi Gays family album. She was struck by the composition of the shots and the intimacy between photographer and subject, not to mention how relevant the fashion remains 30 years later. I thought about the power of nostalgia and the pride LES residents have for where they are from, Rosa-Salas explained. I thought about the importance of this neighborhood in setting fashion trends on a global scale how much this community has endured and the current complications its facing.

Soon after, she visited the Delancey Street storefront with fellow curator Brooke Nicholas. The owner disappeared into a backroom and emerged with crumbling manila folders, spilling out with unclaimed photographs from the 80s, 90s and 2000s, says Nicholas. These were far more artistic than your typical in-and-out passport-photo setup. These shoots put couples, graduates, and families in dozens of unique poses, and often involved background and outfit changes. Each captured the unique style and personality of the sitter, says Nicholas.

Nelson Hernandez, 1988. Photo: Joseph Borukhov

This forgotten archive formed the basis of a show now on view at Abrons Arts Center: Rainbow Shoe Repair: An Unexpected Theater of Flyness. Rosa-Salas and Nicholas joined forces with fashion scholar Kimberly Jenkins to put out an open call for photographs taken at Rainbow. Clientele came forward to share their snapshots and the stories behind them. Rosa-Salas notes: Many of these images are old, fragile, and the only one of its kind that exists. We are extremely grateful that residents have entrusted us with pieces of their personal archive.

Wayne Casimir and Debbie Cox, 1986. Photo: Joseph Borukhov

Attending the show at Abrons Arts Center (just a five-minute walk from Rainbow) feels like a family reunion. Theres a warm familiarity that washes over you when looking at the Rainbow display. Even if you dont know anyone in the photos, youll feel like you do, because each moment captured is intimate, proud, and loving. Visitors will see groups of friends dressed to the nines in hip hop apparel, young parents with babies, and siblings embracing each other above the caption Memories of 1987. For photographer Ilya Shaulov, who worked at Rainbow for 13 years, the opening was an actual series of reunions. Shaulov, who also photographed the opening, found himself face to face with many of his past subjects. It feels good that many people in the neighborhood remember me and my work, he says.

Yesenia, circa 1998. Photo: Ilya Shoulov

Individuals featured in the exhibition pointed and said things like thats my son, providing context to peers and strangers, unbidden. Shawntel Dunbar reflected on her own portrait in front of the rainbow backdrop: It was taken just after I started a new job. I really wanted to dress the part, because I was working down on Wall Street. I wanted to fit in, but I didnt want to take away from who I was.

Ellison and Alyssa Champagne, 2003. Photo: Ilya Shaulov

Jessica LeBron described her teenage sitting: I was feeling very Mary J. Blige at the time, with the baggy clothes and a backwards hat. When I look at this picture, I see that I was standing in my power; I can see my inner light. I was smiling and looked sweet, but growing up in the LES meant I also knew how to protect myself.

Jessica LeBron, 1993. Photo: JosephBorukhov

Many of the photographs depict fashion designer Elroy Gay (father of Sammi Gay, whose family album sparked the project). One of the clear standouts is an image of Gay and his daughter on Halloween. She says of the image, I was dressed as a black Barbie and my Dad picked the outfit out. This picture makes me proud of him, his work ethic, and our evolving father-daughter relationship. Elroy Gay explained how this kind of portraiture empowered the community: If you got your pictures taken at Rainbow, you were somebody for some reason. If you looked jiggy that day, you would take a photo. If you had enough money, you would get two. Still to this day, the Lower East Side is one of the fashion boroughs. We wont judge what you do, but we will judge how you dress!

Jasmine Lopez, 1992. Photo: Joseph Borukhov

As charming as the exhibition is on the surface, its about so much more than style and tenderness. It celebrates the communities of color that have made the Lower East Side what it is. While outside forces actively seek to erase these communities, these images that honor their ingenuity, achievements, and familial bonds are not just powerful theyre vital. The subjects captured are undeniably diverse, but each has something in common: They decided that the day they documented was one worth remembering. Now, thanks to Abrons, these preserved moments of flyness are a part of New Yorks shared history.

Martha Lulu Ayala and Valerie Hernandez, 1989. Photo: Joseph Borukhov

Rainbow Shoe Repair is on view at Abrons Arts Center until March 29.

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See a New Exhibition That Captures the Flyest NYC Community - The Cut