Commitment, Community, Cooperation

Archive for the ‘Community’ Category

Participatory Action Research Project with Latino/a Youth in Kentucky

In Community, Culture, Refugees & Immigration, Uncategorized on October 1, 2011 at 1:33 pm

In partnership with the Bluegrass Community and Technical College & the University of Kentucky, Dr. Steve Pavey facilitated a week long participatory action research project at the LLCEC (Latino Leadership College Experience Camp).  The youth called their project,  “Walk a Mile in Our Chanclas:  Nuestra Lucha as Undocumented Students in Kentucky.”  Dr. Pavey hopes this pilot project will be the seed that grows into a regular program he is calling the Artivism Research Collective.

A.R.C. – Artivism Research Collective

Artist + Activist + Researcher = Bending Towards Justice

 “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.”
–  Martin Luther King, Jr.

“The artivist (artist +activist) uses her artistic talents to fight and struggle against injustice and oppression—by any medium necessary.  The artivist merges commitment to freedom and justice with the pen, the lens, the brush, the voice, the body, and the imagination.  The artivist knows that to make an observation is to have an obligation.”
–  M.K. Asante, Jr. (Its Bigger than Hip Hop)

“The silenced are not just incidental to the curiosity of the researcher but are the masters of inquiry into the underlying causes of the events in their world. In this context research becomes a means of moving them beyond silence into a quest to proclaim the world.”
–  Paulo Freire 

EnterChange Sponsors “Side-by-Side”

In Community on September 22, 2010 at 3:05 pm

[Originally posted September 13, 2009]

In the summer of 2009 One Horizon-supported EnterChange Clinical Counseling, launched a training and support initiative for local social-service organizations and programs in Lexington in cooperation with the “Side-By-Side” drug court mentoring program of the Lexington Leadership Foundation. EnterChange helped to design and implement a training and support program for about two-dozen volunteer mentors working with “Side-By-Side.”

In addition to “Side-By-Side,” EnterChange is currently working with Kentucky Refugee Ministries and the Lexington Leadership Foundation’s “Amachi” program to help design, implement and support training programs for their respective volunteers.

The overall vision is to use the “action-reflection” model to assist volunteers who are engaged with the local community and help them think about their engagement, reflect on the practical issues and opportunities related to their involvement and assist in moving them through the experience in a healthy and sustainable manner. In the long run EnterChange hopes that helping facilitate such practices, and training others to do so, will help to foster greater partnership and collaboration between local churches and agencies and empower people at the grassroots level to deepen and expand their volunteer service in the wider community.