Since State of the Re:Union is all about topics featuring people and communities turning broken realities into new beginnings, we thought it befitting to highlight this storyline. If it has a familiarity to it, it might be that the talented producer, Mr. Zak Rosen, spent some time with us at SOTRU as a radio producer. Even though his physical presence is elsewhere, his character still permeates the creative air that we breathe.

Source: KCRW

Now working independently, Zak is producing Work in Progress, a story about a Detroit auto worker who found herself crippled after suffering severe nerve damage from a traumatic head injury she received while on the job. The 50-year-old Gloria Lowe had to re-learn everything, from how to speak, to how to brush her teeth. She literally had to start completely over with just learning how to exist in life and how to be in the world. Doctors informed her that she would never maintain a job again. However, as the human spirit often does, she defied their life sentence and got back to work after two and a half years of recovery. This woman of fortitude did not return back to the auto plant, but rather became one of the leaders of a new movement that is taking shape in Detroit, Michigan. Block by block, the city’s residents are taking back communities that have been written off for some time.

Lowe started an organization, We Want Green, Too,  that is dedicated to training Detroiters in how to reclaim their community. Now Through teaching people how to rebuild the homes that will create neighborhoods, Lowe believes that eventually this can revive her beloved city. She has firsthand knowledge of what it is to come back from a devastating blow. Now, without a whole lot of outside help she is at the she is at the leading edge of a movement that’s taking a stand for Detroit, a kind of DIY urban policy.

Source: KCRW

Work in Progress tells the story of how Gloria Lowe and a small army of dry-wallers, community gardeners, bakers, philosophers and other true-believers are working small miracles all over Detroit. This didactic narrative introduces us to some characters who follow Lowe’s lead in accepting the challenge in reinventing who they are. One such person is Edward Collins, a shift manager at Detroit’s On The Rise Bakery, which offers a culinary arts training program for Detroiters
reclaiming lives derailed by unemployment, crime and substance abuse. Another player on the stage is Grace Lee Boggs,  a 96-year-old philosopher and political activist who has taken a part in almost every major social justice movement over the past 70 years. She still lives and works in Detroit and takes no exception when it comes to participating in this movement. It keeps her young.

While this story has a unique beginning, its ending is starting to find its place in a trending world. SOTRU loves to hear the stories that make up a community of doers dedicated to making change happen through taking the first step of faith.  Everyone loves the stories that invoke the spirit of the Phoenix. We’d love to hear about yours. If you or someone you know have shared in a similar story or experience, we would love to learn about it.

You can watch or find out more about Rosen’s Work in Progress or the We Want Green, Too organization by clicking here.

During a time of great turbulence in the Detroit Public School System, one school has been cutting through the urban education stigma. The Catherine Ferguson Academy of Detroit, Michigan has become a beacon in the school system’s bleak future. With a budget deficit of $327 million, a declining enrollment and graduation rate among students, CFA has given pregnant teens and teenage mothers a fighting chance at enjoying a promising future. Through a unique approach to education, the Academy has a graduation rate of more than 90 percent, with the young mothers seeking to achieve higher education. The school’s success is attributed to the caring environment provided by the teachers and a driving commitment that is spearheaded by the Academy’s Principal G. Asenath Andrews. In addition to being educated in core school subjects, supplemental lessons are teaching these young mothers so much more than the basics. CFA students are learning about agriculture firsthand  through keeping bees, raising farm animals and learning to grow a garden. The staff create an even more fertile educational environment through limiting class sizes and providing free childcare. This progressive school has aided in the success of teenage mothers through providing them an opportunity to become responsible citizens, in addition to getting them one step further to breaking a harrowing cycle.

The school’s success was a quiet, but powerful presence in Detroit until the city’s Emergency Financial Manager, Robert Bobb, put CFA on a list of future public school closings. With this decision darkly looming over the school, the community decided that a peaceful protest was the answer for helping keep this public school mecca alive. After assembling pickets signs, teachers, students and the By Any Means Necessary protest group, the city and our nation began to find out just how important and pivotal this program has become in the community. Some students and teachers, both current and former, were prepared to protest for several days, making accommodations for their children and themselves. However, soon after their protest began the Detroit Police Department asked them to leave the building due to closure. When they did not leave, they were led out in handcuffs where they were arrested, processed and later released.

Source: Lamiot

As this story caught the attention of various news media and forums, it also brought out the support of the UAW, a North American human rights union, and Hollywood actor, Danny Glover, who has been a longtime proponent of the vitality of public schools. Before the rally began, word was received that the school would remain open as a charter school. Mr. Glover was scheduled to be the feature speaker during the rally protesting the Academy’s closing and was adamant that education was a right for all, not an entitlement to a few. Although the school staying open is a wonderful thing, it is still not out of the woods. Due to the nature of charter schools being privatized, changes can be made to the curriculum, having a different outcome for future students. Many would like to see the school stay in the public school domain, but for now they see the open state of the school as a small victory.

To date, CFA plans to open the new school year on September 6, 2011, and has a few new tools to utilize in its educational efforts. Under the new charter company, the Academy will have access to new green house construction, solar energy projects, permaculture education, in addition to other educational tools. Principal Andrews remains committed to the future of the girls and the school and believes this is a “win-win” situation. You can read more about the school’s transformation on The Detroit News.

With the budget deficits consistently growing and the murky tides of our national economics having no ebb, schools around the nation continue to face the threat of closure. Funds for public schools are becoming more commonplace throughout our communities. Are supplanting public schools with charter schools the answer to providing our children with a quality education, and if so what are the ramifications that might be foreseen? If you have been impacted in any way by charter schools, we invite you to communicate your comments, thoughts or ideas.

Photo By: David Coates / The Detroit News

You won’t catch Grace Lee Boggs speaking in empty platitudes or trying to recapture a storied past . . . and that would be such an easy place to default to when talking about Detroit. Detroit, once a model of industry, production and success, well, now, is a shell of its former self where residents depart in droves. Boggs is an activist and author. The term activist is an ever-politicized one that often carries a polarizing connotation. But you can be assured, she is not in it for face time or to push a political agenda, she’s doing what needs to be done for her home city, for her neighborhood and the surrounding neighborhoods.

Al spoke to Grace for our Detroit episode, Motor City Rebound, produced during SOTRU’s research and development year. What really caught my ear and sent the sentiment of, wow, she is different, she’s really in it to better things and she understands human nature was when she said:

“It starts with a few people. Human beings are not like fish, they’re not like a school of fish they don’t all move at the same time. People are not just masses, people have to wake up first before they begin acting.

She speaks in specifics, in solutions, and recognizes that Detroit is simply not going to re-industrialize. Instead she believes that the every day people have to do something to create real change. Where most activists call on government for change, Boggs notes that in Detroit, people are taking matters into their own hands.  She cites resident-driven movements to create real self-sufficiency with products and services that derive from within the community like the urban agricultural movement. “If people can feed themselves, people can free themselves,” Grace cites. She has helped start programs like the Detroit Summer Collective, a training ground for the next generation of citizen activists that explore the most crucial components of a community, like education. Boggs also found the Boggs Center to Nurture Community Leadership, a nonprofit community center and think tank.

Grace, who released the book, The Next American Revolution: Sustainable Activism for the 21st Century, was recently honored at an event at the First Unitarian Universalist Church in Detroit in early April. It was scheduled to coincide with the 43rd anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. You can read more about the event here.

We Want to Know:

• Have you seen the type of activism Grace Lee Boggs teaches, that is people taking change in their own hands rather than calling on the government, in your community?
• Do you have solutions on how resident-led efforts can solve a problem in your community? What are they?

You can hear Grace Lee Boggs in our episode Detroit – Motor City Rebound.

*Photos By: David Coates of The Detroit News