Welcome Center: Stakeholders' Accountability Map

Ay, caramba. — Bart Simpson

The Evolution of the Proposed Welcome Center for Refugees

Click to enlarge. A miscellaneous collection of known 

knowns and known unknowns. Arcane? You bet.

July 2011
AFTER A YEAR OF MEETINGS following the huge July 8, 2010 Open Space meeting that raised so many hopes and expectations (Sunday July 11, 2010 News-Record, Ministers: Community responsible for refugees), refugee stakeholders haven't figured out how a better system of refugee resettlement could work.

Missing words?  “Road map.” “Vision.”“Empowerment.”“Imagination.” “Excellence.” 

What else? How about “time frame”?

In the meantime, Greensboro has made national news with its #4 national ranking for food hardship, a measure of families’ abilities to buy enough food to eat. Many Greensboro families affected are refugee families.

So what’s the hold-up to progress?

________________________________________________________________

     Reality Test: Three Simple Questions About Community Building

1. When is resettlement accomplished?
2. Can refugees list three American references on their resume after being here for (say) five years?
3. How much does it cost to resettle a refugee in Guilford County?

___________________________________________________________________

We do not need a RING “Communications Network” as some resettlement authorities have pushed; RING already has a private, gatekeepered Website. And everyone knows how to pick up the phone or write an email.

What we need are answers — an independent Information Task Force to field questions, get answers and distribute them to the wider public — from which we will find new voices, better expertise and allies who will be the deciding force that breaks the refugee logjam and forces accountability and change.

Some people seem to suggest that by simply asking questions, challenging resettlement leaders and insisting on evidence-based rules and guidelines we are hurting their organizations’ abilities to help refugees and by extension, hurting the refugees themselves. The same sort of posturing guided Lutheran Family Services as it fell apart a year and a half ago. On that basis alone, refugee resettlement stakeholders should not expect to be taken at their word. No one accuses them of dishonesty but they should feel obliged to explain their operations and policies since the serious plight refugees is of direct concern to all Greensboro.

These are extraordinarily tough times for refugees. If they really care, resettlement organizations should be open to suggestions for significant change. Circling the wagons is not going to get them that help.

___________________________________________________________________

Anticipating Open Space:
Recommendations to the Open Space meeting
Arguing afterward for Culture:
Why Culture Matters to a Newcomers’ Welcome Center
Other attempts at mapping the impossible:
Montagnard Refugee Concept Map

___________________________________________________________________

What They Said Then: July 22, 2010

Good Afternoon everyone, I hope you're all having a good week. I wanted to follow up on two items today. First are some of the upcoming meetings next week and the following week for the Task Forces that emerged from Open Space. There are a couple of other groups who will be meeting and they will send their dates out later. Hopefully all of the information you need is here, but if not please feel free to contact the team leaders listed for more information (and remember to share this with others in the community!)

Secondly at the bottom of this very long email you'll find instructions to join the Refugee Information Network of Guilford. Several of you have contacted us to be added and instead of inviting you all individually, I thought it'd be easier to give you instructions to add yourselves.

UPCOMING MEETINGS OF OPEN SPACE TASK FORCES
Anyone can join these task forces, even if you were not a part of the original group. It would be especially helpful to share this information with others in the community who you know would like to be involved but who were unable to attend the Open Space meeting.

1. Refugee Health Task Force - Tuesday, July 27th at at 10 am at Church World Service 620 S. Elm St, Conference room on 3rd floor (directly across from the stairs/elevator). There is free parking in the lot in front of the building, if this is full there is a gravel lot across the street, street parking, and parking on the side of the building. This meeting will review the plans made at open space and begin to define the scope of work and potential members of the Refugee Health Council. New ideas and reflections welcome! Contact Person: Sarah Ivory - sivory@churchworldservice.org

2. Immigration Legal Services Task Force - Thursday, July 29th at 11 am at the Triton Building at 1031 Summit Ave., Suite 1E2. Free parking in lot in the back. The purpose of this meeting will be to finalize a statement of need that will ultimately be endorsed by affiliates/ cosponsors/ MAAs, etc regarding the provision of legal immigration services to refugees and immigrants. Contact person: Heather Scavone - heather.scavone@lfscarolinas.org

3. Ethnic Community Empowerment Task Force - Thursday, July 29th at 6pm at Church World Service 620 S. Elm St, Conference Room on 3rd floor (directly across from the stairs/elevator). There is free parking in the lot in front of the building. This group is working on ways to increase the voice of the refugee community in the community at large. Their projects include created a refugee leaders council (a focus group that will share information across ethnic groups and be a voice to the community at large), obtaining technical assistance to support the development of new ethnic mutual assistance organizations, and developing leaders. This meeting is being held in the evening to encourage participation from community members who work during the day and would not otherwise be able to attend. Contact Person - Badal Gurung - bgurung@churchworldservice.org

4. Education/ English as a Second Language Task Force - Tuesday, August 3rd at 10am at a location yet to be determined. This group is tackling issues related to access and content of ESOL and education in the community. Contact people: Leilani Forgay-Roughton -leilani.roughton@lfscarolinas.org and Stephanie Baldwin - thecommunitycollaborative@gmail.com

JOINING THE REFUGEE INFORMATION NETWORK LISTSERV
The Refugee Information Network of Guilford Listserv (RING) is a an online email group that was set up some time ago to facilitate information sharing across our community network around refugee issues. Anyone can join the network and if you join you have the option to choose how you receive information. There are probably about 2 emails a week on average (and zero in many weeks) coming from this listerv so you will not be bogged down. It also gives you the option to go to the listserv home page and access old posts, instructional documents (like the refugee welcome packet that provides information about how to do just about everything in our community), updates on arrival numbers and ethnic breakdowns etc. There is quite a bit of useful information on this page already but so much room for this resource to grow.

The easiest way to get on this listserv is the follow these instructions below. If you have problems, just let me know and I'll get a personal invitation out to you. You do not need to have a gmail account to join, but it will ask you set to up a google account using your regular email address if you dont.

Let's hope for some incredibly productive task force meetings next week!
Thanks,
Sarah Ivory on behalf of Leadership Team

WHY MONTAGNARDS?

04/12/2011 v1

One-page position paper
PDF printable version

What our treatment of this refugee community says about us

WE HAVE FOCUSED ON THE MONTAGNARD community because it represents one of the oldest refugee groups in Greensboro and most likely, the largest. Montagnards are from the indigenous tribes of Vietnam that fought alongside American forces during the Vietnam War. Although they have been with us a long time, we have not yet envisioned or created a good system for responding to their needs and interests. We recognize that the experiences of refugees are an integral part of our community. As such, their problems are our problems.  

• We need to work harder to serve the Montagnard group well and create a vision and system that are models for other refugee groups coming here.
• Everyone acknowledges the current system is unsustainable. We believe refugees are not the problem but an important part of Greensboro's future. As such, they must be engaged now in the important business of community building.
• We think the time is ripe to consolidate and leverage our collective knowledge, to clearly explain a new vision, and build a sustainable model for the future.

UNTAPPED KNOWLEDGE AND TALENT
• No media, programming, educational information, etc. in native Montagnard languages produced here
• Experienced farmers and agriculturalists rarely find employment that uses their expertise or plant knowledge
• Skilled craftsmen and artists lack basic materials and space to practice their work
• Talented young people are not targeted for college recruitment, counseling or scholarships
• Elderly language experts are not employed to teach native languages or promote culture
• Known health workers such as doctors and nurses have not been enlisted to solve community health problems.

WHY TOMORROW ISN’T GOOD ENOUGH
• Known drug, alcohol, domestic violence, gang and other problems
• Most live in poverty or near poverty decades after being resettled here
• Known chronic health problems associated with lifestyle and diet
• Poor communications with the community
• Most unable to access good healthcare for all family members
• Many suffer from culture and language isolation
• Montagnards have been here since 1986. We should be doing better to assist them and all refugees 

COMMUNITY BUILDING MEANS EQUAL PARTNERSHIP
• Respect Montagnard values and interests
• Replace individual “self-sufficiency” with individual and community “empowerment”
• Involve community on all levels of decision-making as equal partners
• Adequately fund Montagnard Dega Association and Montagnard Human Rights Organization
• Use the wellness of our largest and oldest refugee community as a direct reflection of our collective community building skills, our vision and commitment to improving refugee lives.

STSB: YouTube Demo

SURGICAL TECHNOLOGY SKILLS BUILDER (STSB) was a 2009 serious game created with a team of collaborators from the Piedmont's colleges and universities. I put together the project, which was funded  through the Piedmont Triad Partnership’s Department of Labor WIRED grant, and oversaw its production.

The game is simple but effective, concentrating on key stumbling blocks student learners encounter: identifying instruments, knowing their use, setting up a Mayo Tray, and working under pressure  in a simulated surgery environment.  (more)

All Together Now

(Refugee and Diversity Projects)

IN GUILFORD COUNTY, NC, THERE’S A LOT GOING ON IN THE REFUGEE WORLD. FEW KNOW ABOUT IT. 

LACK OF CONNECTEDNESS IS COSTLY — ESPECIALLY  FOR REFUGEES THEMSELVES, WHO ARE ULTIMATELY MADE TO PAY FOR OUR REGION’S INEFFICIENCIES.

WHO ARE THE long time sponsors in the area? Why do some refugees resist getting citizenship? Who owns the apartment complexes that rent to refugees? What's the latest progress from the much heralded Open Space meeting? What are the limits to services provided by refugee agencies? Which churches are sponsoring refugees? Where's the closest mosque? Do schools have translators on site? How does a refugee get an Orange Card? Who decides how many refugees settle in the area? Are refugees and immigrants disproportionately victimized by crime? Who are the leaders in the area’s refugee and immigrant communities? Where’s the closest ESOL class for an eager learner? How much does it cost to resettle a refugee? Who pays? Who's in charge?

How long would it take you to find answers to these questions?

Why is it so difficult if Greensboro and  Guilford County have been hosting refugees for decades?

Volunteers, sponsors, and charitable donors face an uphill climb trying to understand “how the system works”, who does what, and why. At Refugee Information Network of Guilford (RING) meetings and other large gatherings, a lot of time is spent explaining who does what or how and why a policy came into being.

The region needs a single information Web site that addresses regional refugee issues and can quickly bring stakeholders, policy makers, and the public up to speed. Individual refugee agencies have Web sites that reflect the scope of their missions, not the entire scope of refugees’ problems and concerns. Everyone working with refugees wants to see more success stories published and circulated. Most stakeholders recognize the need for an educated public and allies but as long as information is dispersed, hard to find, and held by a few, the public’s knowledge about refugees will be sporadic — marked by “feel-good” people stories, dramatic turnarounds like LFS's departure from Greensboro,  reports on run-down housing conditions and crime.

Whenever I've suggested the expanded use of the Internet, online apps, and collaborative media at refugee meetings, the responses split along age and profession. Older folks like email and pointedly state they can't be bothered to learn more. But older folks who are professionals in fields like health and medicine are pro technology, because they use it everyday and know its value. Younger folks use and know the value of social and collaborative media, but at these meetings they don't make the rules. Oldsters believe an email notice announcing a meeting is sufficient to attract community involvement and bring the best talent to the table. When they do come, as they did at the Open Space meeting, they see old attitudes and beliefs ascendant. It's a turn-off, a signal to business, academia and the rising generation of would-be problem solvers, entrepreneurs, community activists that change in our city will be ponderous, controlled, and limited.

When Greensboro was a small town and all the decision-makers knew one another, I'm sure this small-town approach worked. This is no longer the case, yet despite clear signals that the Old Order's way of doing things is not adequate to the difficult tasks at hand — witness the pullout of Lutheran Family Services — we continue to believe email and proven remedies of another era will solve today’s very hard, chronic problems that only promise to worsen with more cutbacks just announced by the State.

Does DATS Have A Future?

I SAY POTATO, YOU SAY TOMORROW: LESSONS LEARNED
The symposium has the potential to contribute to the Triad's recovery, but it can't as long as it's passed from city to city each year without permanent management.  Getting local governments to work together is hard; getting artists, creatives and technologists together should be easy. It's time the principals decide what DATS is for. (MORE --->)

                                                                DATS 2010: FOOD FOR THOUGHT
                                                                CENTER FOR DESIGN INNOVATION / MRCA

• DATS 2010 OFFICIAL SITE

A terrific space with excellent views of downtown Winston-Salem, lousy sound, noisy AC, good parking. This is the space’s third makeover so you have to wonder why basics are still a problem. Too bad the cafe wasn't open. The Milton Rhodes Center for the Arts? Okay, but we bet everyone will just call it what it's always been — the Sawtooth Center.

MY DATS 2010 PROGRAM EVENTS 

• Overview and working premises

Two visions about DATS. The first, about establishing it as a credible venue for important ideas in the Piedmont. The second, about expanding its audience by choosing themes that reflect larger community interests and explain economic value.

• DATS MASHUP Cooking Collaboration

Four teams each consisting of an American chef and refugee cook, working with the locally developed purple sweet potato, created dishes that combined the skills and traditions of two worlds. Through this project we demonstrate that food is a cultural medium that can overcome language and other barriers that have prevented the talents and economic value of refugees from being fully realized.

• MASHUP CONTINUES: Connecting Refugees, Breaking Isolation

The project didn't end on presentation day. It was a jump-off point for refugees to socially connect to mainstream Americans. As artists who've studied the refugee community, we see cultural isolation as a barrier equal to if not bigger than language and employment issues. At our blog, we follow the refugees and participants since the public presentation.

• PECHA KUCHA NIGHT: Where's a Good Montagnard Restaurant? 
We ask a single question and discover the complex relationship this unique refugee group has with food.

• WORLD FOOD in the Triad
Guilford County in North Carolina is the state's number one resettlement county for refugees, but residents don't see local innovations and interests in food, farmers markets, new ethnic restaurants, shops and businesses as a reflection of the region's explosive diversity or a source of economic growth.

TOWARDS DATS 2010
• Why I proposed the food theme 

• Food Geography

PREVIOUS DATS EVENTS
DATS 2009 High Point University

• Our Pecha-Kucha show     
20 slides, 20 seconds each, a new elevator pitch

DATS 2008 UNCG, Greensboro

• Transforming the Triad
The digital divide comes to town
• Are we bleeding talent?

Thank God for youngsters

DATS 2010

 The Milton Rhodes Center for the Arts at the Sawtooth, downtown Winston-Salem

Design, Art + Technology Symposium (DATS) is An Annual Piedmont Event About Important Ideas. Hosts include the Kenan Institute for the Arts at UNCSA, UNCG, High Point University, and the Center for Design Innovation. With the 2010 theme, Food For Thought, we’ll open at the Milton Rhodes Center for the Arts in the newly renovated Sawtooth building in bustling downtown Winston-Salem. Food For Thought will engage timely issues with an influential audience from the region’s businesses, non-profits, educators and government. Meet innovators and trend-setters involved in everything from alternative food to new crops, from agricultural heritage to environmental green, from Southern hospitality to urban sustainability. Inspired by designers Charles and Ray Eames and their film, Powers of 10, they will consider the power of food to transform the daily life of our region. 

It's getting close! DATS 2010 is coming together as a combo local-regional event, with plenty of grassroots energy and organization. (This year will be a breakout event: DATS will move out of academia and into the real world!) Food is about culture. It is one of those rare, big tent themes in which everyone in the Piedmont has an interest. Everyone can bring their experience and know-how.

     The best gardener I knew was my grandmother. The most flexible cook I knew was my mom. Both were frugal and could do a lot with a little. In my view, those are high standards for designers, artists, and technology innovators, whether in good economic times or bad.

Recreation of a UN shelter, food and water at Festival Park.

The Challenge of DATS
The symposium is an annual event seeking to build a legitimate creative movement in the Piedmont. It answers a severe problem: With Charlotte, RTP and the Triangle all within easy drives, the area has suffered from brain-drain. Both Greensboro and Winston-Salem have seen revivals of their downtowns, nightlife and cultural activities, but the economic downturn has highlighted the unfinished work necessary to permanently change the area's future. Quite simply, the Piedmont has to figure out better ways to attract smart people and businesses and keep its brightest youngsters here.

DATS hosts include High Point University (High Point), UNC School of the Arts and Center for Design Innovation (Winston-Salem) and UNCG (Greensboro). Other colleges are associated with the event. I've been a supporter of higher ed's role in promoting regional growth but a steady critic of the event's smallish concentration on events and programs intended mainly for students.

In 2010 I proposed the food theme, a big-tent approach intended to excite and gather many diverse participants. While dollars are scarce, I have also advocated ground-up, community-based and local organizations' participation. The Piedmont is doing interesting innovation in the area of food, but you have to look hard. As usual, groups are somewhat isolated, duplicative, and unaware of overlapping interests. DATS 2010 is an opportunity to pull groups together.

Above: The Edible Schoolyard at the Children's Museum, with the Greensboro skyline in view, just months after Alice Waters’ visit. Below: Refugee guests at Weatherspoon Art Gallery, UNCG.

Regionalism Still Involves Herding Cats

The following appeared as a Counterpoint in the News-Record, Wednesday, September 1, 2010.

It was refreshing to read accounts of the Piedmont Triad Partnership by Keith Debbage and Rob Bencini (Aug. 4). Both are right about PTP. They ask tough questions about the rhetoric and reality of regionalism that PTP and all leaders should answer.

For readers who don’t understand the point of regional economic development, it’s simple: Greensboro, High Point and Winston-Salem will do far better pooling resources to attract and develop growth than trying it on their own.

In 2008, I was hired by PTP to create a team of educators from the region’s colleges and universities to make an interactive training module for surgical technicians. That is, we were going to make a computer game, an otherwise expensive exercise no single institution could afford.

I knew what I was getting into. One teammate described my job as “herding cats.” A business colleague later confessed PTP would have had to pay her triple to do my job because it looked like “Mission: Impossible” through most of it. By the project’s end we had solid, notable successes and some mixed results — not enough to declare victory and start a game industry here in the Piedmont, a dubious PTP ambition, but more than enough to show what we needed to do if the region was serious about attracting and developing businesses that used high-tech skills like those found in the game industry. And more than enough to show what teachers needed to know to be more effective in the classroom.

If I’m certain we had a positive local impact, I’m less certain PTP came close to big-scale change. Even our small project gave PTP considerable leverage to maximize our results because it paid higher education’s tab for faculty training, no small gift in tough times.

With millions from its Department of Labor grant it could call the shots, bring everyone to the table, and enforce discipline and Kumbaya teamwork. That’s herding cats on a grand scale. Now that the grant’s done, we shouldn’t be surprised to see old ways return.

In baseball, everyone loves the drama of a homer, but there are other ways to score. My team hit the ball and, as we round second, we’re wondering if the new PTP management has the keen eye and experience to spot an inside-the-park home run. We blasted the ball high up, it’s just hit the wall and we’re running, running, waiting for a sign.

DATS: Urban Agriculture

PANEL DISCUSSION
Reynolds Place, MRCA
Monday, October 11, 2010
10:00—11:30 am

Children’s Museum’s Edible Garden against the Greensboro skyline.

DURING WORLD WAR II, Victory Gardens provided an estimated 40% of the nation’s fresh fruits and veggies; today, with issues of food security, both locally and globally, will urban agriculture once again provide us a simple tool for living in a rapidly changing world? Does it have the power to unite people regardless of age, race, ethnicity, religion or creed, in a movement to fight climate change? Join us as we discuss the benefits, challenges and possibilities of urban agriculture in the Piedmont, and learn about ways you can get involved in your community.

Panelists Include

Dawn Leonard was originally from Wisconsin. She found her way to the South after meeting her husband while in the Peace Corps in Jamaica. Upon returning to his home of North Carolina, Justin and Dawn moved to Greensboro in 2005. With a BFA in Graphic Design from Iowa State University, Dawn began a career in Greensboro as a graphic and web designer. But the creative spirit often leaves one searching for new ideas, and being an idealist, Dawn found that getting her hands dirty was spiritually more fulfilling. In the transition from artist and professional designer to urban farmer, Dawn has found the commonality of these kindred vocations. In 2008 she co-founded Urban Harvest, a nonprofit in Greensboro dedicated to urban food production, distribution and education. Starting a nonprofit can be an overwhelming challenge, but Dawn believes that important work is often the most challenging, and it is the challenge and passion for our future that drives her forward. She embodies the creative force, not being afraid to take risks or lead us in a new direction. Experience from the Peace Corps, to a summer-long internship at an urban farm, to teaching yoga at Guilford College has led Dawn to a new path of healing the body, the Earth, and our communities.

Justin Leonard is an experienced urban farmer who also is Garden Manager at Edible Schoolyard, part of the Children's Museum on downtown Greensboro. The Edible Schoolyard received national news coverage when Alice Waters, renowned chef, author, and Slow Food advocate came to its groundbreaking ceremony. Justin also a founding member of Urban Harvest and responsible for residential edible landscaping projects.

Kat Siladi works with the Edible Schoolyard at the Greensboro Children's Museum as the Garden Educator and Intern and Volunteer Coordinator. She has a degree in Peace and Conflict Studies and Ceramic Arts from Guilford College and she has recently finished a part-time Americorps term working to make the museum more accessible to immigrants and refugees from the area. Her interest in food education lies in teaching children and families lost knowledge of food production and connecting food production, from seed to table, with multiculturalism and other social issues.

Roland McReynolds (moderator), is executive director of the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association (CFSA). Roland grew up on a farm in central Missouri. After graduating from the University of Missouri-Columbia with BA and BS degrees in History and Political Science, he earned his law degree at the University of North Carolina School Of Law and is licensed to practice in the state. He spent almost 10 years in the legal publishing industry, and spent one year exploring local and sustainable food systems in Europe, before coming to work for CFSA. Roland serves on the North Carolina Certified Crop Advisors Board and the Advisory Committees for the North and South Carolina Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education programs.

Dunleith Gardens, Greensboro, NC

More About CFSA

The Carolina Farm Stewardship Association is a Pittsboro-based organization of 1,000 farmers, gardeners, consumers and businesses in North and South Carolina committed to sustainable agriculture and the development of locally based organic food systems. Founded in 1979 by farmers, gardeners and consumers to support one another and foster the growth of organic food, the Carolinas Farm Stewardship Association (CFSA) has grown into a non-profit with more than 1,000 members and seven regional chapters: six in North Carolina and one in Upstate South Carolina.

In December, the CFSA’s 25th annual Sustainable Agriculture Conference will be held in Winston-Salem. This year’s theme this year is, “Local & Organic Arrives: Our Opportunity is Now.” Local and organic food is at a popularity level that proponents would have only dreamed of a few years ago, and the conference will explore how the movement will seize the opportunity and take it to the next level. The keynote this year, author, attorney, economist and entrepreneur Michael Shuman, one of the nation's leading voices on "buy local" and serves as research and economic development director for the much-heralded Business Alliance for Local Living Economies (BALLE). He will offer compelling and provocative ideas about this important topic.

(photos: Children's Museum: Andrew Young; Betsy Renfrew: Dunleith Gardens)

DATS: World Food in the Triad

PANEL DISCUSSION
Reynolds Place, MRCA
Sunday, Oct.10, 2010
3:00 — 4:30 pm

YouTube: All roads lead to food (How one refugee group thinks about food)

YouTube: H Bec talking about her garden (What's growing in a refugee's backyard?)

Guilford County is the largest refugee resettlement county in the state. About 50-60,000 of the area’s 430,000 residents are immigrants or refugees. How have new populations from all over the world changed the food landscape of the Piedmont? What can we learn from our neighbors? How have their food traditions contributed to the explosion of food diversity we now see in ethnic food stores, restaurants and farmers’ markets? What is their economic and social impact?

In this panel discussion we will explore how our ideas about food reflect our ideas about culture — ours and those of immigrants and refugees. Most discussions about immigrants and refugees are about problems. North Carolina's obese population now tops 25+%. What solutions might we find amongst immigrant and refugee diets, foods, traditions and lifestyles as we struggle with staggering health issues and their consequences?

PARTICIPANTS

Jigna Dharod, PhD is Assistant Professor, Department of Nutrition at University of North Carolina Greensboro. Her research interests include understanding the different coping mechanisms low-income families use to reduce the severity and incidence of food insecurity; determination of the relationship between food insecurity and social capital and its influence on health outcomes, such as body weight among different immigrants and refugee groups in the US; the use microbiological and other indicators, such as attitude towards food safety, to understand food safety risks in preparation and storage of weaning foods among immigrants and refugee populations settled in the US.

Sharon Morrison, PhD, is Associate Professor at UNCG Department of Health Education and currently, the Director of the Undergraduate Program. Dr. Morrison’s research interests include social aspects of HIV disparities among subcultures of women, particularly women in the African Diaspora. She is examining the role of social capital in HIV risk, transmission awareness and prevention among US African and Latina immigrant women, and young women and girls in the rural Caribbean. She is also interested in the use of media and performing arts for HIV outreach and prevention intervention in South Africa. Dr. Morrison also conducts research related to immigrant and refugee health and welfare. She is conducting research related to cultural adaptation and health outcomes of new and recent immigrants in the US. She is involved in designing and implementing culturally appropriate interventions for limited English proficient (LEP) immigrant individuals and families.

Chram Rode is Assistant Manager at Goat Lady Dairy and was a farmer in Vietnam’s Central Highlands before he came to the US in 2006. He is a Montagnard from the Bahnar tribe.

Lee Walton is an artist whose work takes many forms from drawing, performance, net art, video, public performances, social architectures and more. Walton has exhibited and created projects for museums, institutions and cities both nationally and internationally. His public art is often situational and involves collaboration with numerous participants. Walton is an Assistant Professor of Art at the University of North Carolina Greensboro. His work can be viewed at leewalton.com. With Donovan McKnight (co-director of Face to Face Greensboro and Spare Room) he orchestrated the Super G Experiential Residency Program held at Super G Mart International Food, a popular shopping destination for multicultural Greensboro.

Daniel Woodham is the CSA (community sponsored agriculture) Manager at Goat Lady Dairy in Randolph County and the former ESOL director at Montagnard Dega Association, an ethnic-based community organization based in Greensboro. After operating his own successful CSA (NIMBY Gardens), he has helped Goat Lady launch their highly successful CSA this year. Daniel is a regular vendor at the Greensboro Farmers Curb Market.

Andrew J. Young (moderator) is an artist, educator, game designer and advocate. For two years he volunteered and then worked at Montagnard Dega Association as an ESOL teacher and employment specialist in order to study and understand the community. He worked with leaders to translate the US census form, health information and US citizenship questions, established translation guidelines, and produced Web-based videos to address the lack of basic information available to this mostly preliterate population. He is currently working with his wife, Betsy Renfrew, and backstrap weavers from Southeast Asia to together preserve and promote traditional weaving through a sustainable model.

WIRED Capstone Event: Lessons Learned

June 3, 2010

Koury Center, Greensboro NC

The following are my notes for the lunchtime panel discussion featured during the Piedmont Triad Partnership's Capstone event concluding its 3-year federal WIRED grant.

 








Lessons Learned: Serious Game Group and the Surgical Technology Skills Builder
     • My story
     • Successes
     • Failures
     • Lessons learned
     • Focus on the real problem

I STUDIED STUDIO ART at the Rhode Island School of Design and Yale and taught in California and North Carolina colleges. I had a good career with many students who are now accomplished professionals.

Things changed when I took on the job of modernizing a community college graphics program just as desktop publishing arrived — the first wave of what we today call “disruptive technology”. My faculty and I responded with new teaching methods. We partnered with progressive area businesses. My 20-year old grads moved into management positions because they were ready, with the sharpest going to RTP.

Meanwhile in the county, big printers and textile companies failed to computerize, innovate or compete. People lost jobs. I fought my administration over this new thing called the Web. Then video and multimedia went digital, and my department still couldn’t get online.

By then, I had been creating games with Adveractive in Chapel Hill. Games have the powerful ability to change the way people behave. The central idea of games is that we humans often learn most effectively in game-like situations. I left teaching in 2000 and since then I've made over 100 games for major clients like Coca-Cola, Shockwave, ESPN, and Yahoo.

Since 2004 I have been in business for myself. Most of my clients are on the West Coast. I work with area nonprofits like Reading Connections, Green Hill Center, and refugee organizations, using technology in smart ways to drive down costs and improve efficiency. I proposed the 2010 food theme for the technology and art conference sponsored by CDI, a big-tent event designed to get the most energetic Piedmont talent to connect and create.

Last year, Margaret said PTP wanted to test the region's ability to do a Really Hard Task. I was impressed that she was willing to put serious money down on the things I believed in, especially keeping smart young people here. From May 2009 until January 2010 I oversaw the team that created “Surgical Technology Skills Builder”, a serious game for Guilford Tech's surgical department.

As I see it, these are our successes:
• We built a team of game, art, and design educators who'd never worked together and made a solid product.
• Our game was good enough to turn the heads of Triangle game leaders.
• We exceeded the expectations of the game's client and subject expert, GTCC department head Tony Makin.
• We proved the collaborative model can work in the Triad, even one involving many partners — in our case, seven institutions each with its own mission statement and values.
• We showed our costs can come close to industry costs.
• Most importantly, we showed the talent’s here.

Here are our failures:
• We didn’t obligate matching or other support from academic institutions.
• We missed deadlines and failed to get student-tested feedback.
• We had uneven contributions from team members because we didn't consistently hold them accountable.
• Was our focus on creating a commercial product or teaching teachers? We failed to have a single project focus.
• And, we failed to put another project in the pipeline, dissipating momentum and dispersing the team.

What can we learn from this?
About academia...
• Let’s expect higher ed. to put some skin in the game. Two did. The rest could do more. After all, PTP paid for their faculty training.
• Let’s make sure academics can work with professionals. They must learn how to track their time or they’ll be suffocated by their other duties.

About artists...
• PTP wants to give fine artists a role in economic growth. The Piedmont has long had a “creative class” before it was called that. But to earn its place at the table, it has know how to price its time and services.

About teamwork...
• Let’s teach people how to improve their online and collaborative skills. This weakness plagues every Piedmont organization I've worked with.

About breaking silos...
• Let’s see more “Mission Impossible” projects like ours. The best way to test this region's collective abilities is to give a team of creatives and techies really difficult problems to solve. The best way to test someone’s talent is to see him work a problem.

About Piedmont leadership...
• We already have a game industry in the Triangle, so why are we talking about a game industry here? Instead, let's consider how disruptive technology could lead to the next great thing right here in the Triad. The mental attitude and skills required in the game industry represent the same savvy skills and street smarts we want to see in our classrooms, workforce and boardrooms. But I don’t hear anyone explicitly saying this. (PS. We need these skills in healthcare, logistics, and manufacturing.)
• We need articulate voices at the top who have a sophisticated understanding of how creativity and technology work on the ground level.
















Focus on the real problem
The Piedmont's problems are cultural, not technological. Valuing time, working online, working outside of one’s “comfort zone”, and a tendency to resist change reflect cultural attitudes.

In planning sessions and boardrooms, everyone loves the word “transformational” to describe the scale of change needed here in the Triad. Recall this was before the housing market crashed. Our difficulties — or opportunities — already big then, are now immense.

We need to change the prevailing culture, change human behavior.

People make culture. People can change it.

DATS 2010: Food Geography

SOURCES OF INSPIRATION

• Go to Center for Design Innovation’s site to learn about this year’s host for the Design, Arts, and Technology Symposium.
• For Food Geography panel and participation topics, click here.


“Food has no ethnicity, only geography.” —Musa Dagdiviren

DATS 2010 (Design, Art, and Technology Symposium) has made food its theme. The event is scheduled to be hosted by the Center for Design Innovation to take place at the Sawtooth Center in Winston-Salem in October 10, 2010, possibly with some additional activities in Greensboro. Past DATS hosts include High Point University, UNCG, and UNC School of the Arts. This year will be a breakout event: DATS will move out of academia and into the real world!

To introduce the idea of food and its relation to culture, I’ve assembled several sources to get you and potential participants thinking about possible symposium events, discussions, and activities. We want to find a way of talking about food that connects the ideas of organic, ethnic, industrial, fast, slow, snack, dessert, vegan, vegetarian, health, recipes, nutrition, local — the list goes on.

What I rarely hear is discussion about food in its most inclusive form, as it relates to culture. Maybe it’s because we’re not too sure about what our Piedmont culture is or what it means. While I believe food is deeply connected to memories, especially childhood, it is inseparable from place. Thus my interest perked up when I came across the above quote by a Turkish chef. Food and culture. Food and history. Food and geography.

Points of Departure
• Musa Dagdiviren’s remarkable quote is from “The Memory Kitchen” by Elif Batuman in the New Yorker, April 19, 2010. The full article isn’t available yet, so buy the magazine or check out the audio link.

• What does the world eat? See the photo essay excerpts . Notice the preponderance of packaging and processed foods in the families of industrialized, "advanced" countries.

• If you were a pig, would you choose to live in an industrial farm? Watch Dan Barber in chapter 6 of “What’s for Dinner: Food and Politics in the 21st Century” on Fora TV and listen how he explains foei gras.

• Read about Will Allen, MacArthur grant winner, in the Sunday NY Times’ “Street Farmer”. Notable quote, If there’s no place in the food movement for low- and middle-income people of all races, says Tom Philpott, food editor of Grist.org and co-founder of the North Carolina-based Maverick Farms, “we’ve got big problems, because the critics will be proven right — that this is a consumption club for people who’ve traveled to Europe and tasted fine food.

• Does the Piedmont’s refugee population have a place at our table? Read about local farmer Daniel Woodham’s work to incorporate the agriculture experience of Montagnard refugees into the local economy as reported in the Greensboro News-Record. And check out great photos by Max Holder of his ESOL class at work in Luke and Tobi's garden. And a few more pictures of Montagnard participation at the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association’s Black Mountain conference. On a related note, read about the opening of the area’s largest Montagnard-owned food store.

• Alice Waters’ school food projects work on a $5 per pupil model. From American Public Media’s Splendid Table, a talk with Jean Ronnei of the St. Paul, MN public schools reviews the hard problem of feeding kids school lunches for less than $3 per pupil.

• On dumpster diving and urban farming, watch “Education of an Urban Farmer: Novella Carpenter”.

• Arnold Pacey’s “Technology in World Civilization”, 1991, MIT, credits ancient native American farmers for their important work in the development of corn, potatoes, and other agricultural products, their gift to the world that allowed populations to grow and modern societies to emerge.

• See as much as you can of Wade Davis’ “Why Ancient Wisdom Matters in the Modern World” on Fora TV and check out “Sky in Motion” that precedes it, also on viewable on YouTube.

Do you have an inspiring source to share? Please notify me and I’ll put it up.

DATS 2010: Food Geography Events

General Info        CDI Official Site Link

Join a venue. Food Geography forms an important part of the DATS theme. We can work together and promote your interests. Below is a list of venues I'm working on now.

1. World Food in the Triad 

Description      First-time ever (!) Piedmont get-together about the experiences and impact of world food in the Triad. We'll talk about urban gardens, alternate food sources, new ethnic foods, health literacy, food as culture and other amazing, innovative stuff designed to bring different and unique perspectives to the table. Leave your ideas about haute cusine at home! 

How you can participate
• Got a great organization, project, research, idea you want to promote and share? Contact me.
• Is this venue something your organization would like to support? Underwriting us is a great way to let everyone know about your values and commitment to the development, sharing, and promotion of great ideas in the Triad.

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2. DATS MashUp

Description      Collaborative cooking teams professional chefs and refugee-immigrants leading up to a big-bash presentation at DATS 2010. They'll create unique dishes using the Piedmont's own locally developed product, the Stokes Purple sweet potato. (more)

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3. Pecha Kucha Night at DATS

Description      Follows the established Pecha Kucha format (20 slides, 20 seconds each, total program per participant is 6 minutes and 40 seconds) designed to keep presentations exciting, informative, and entertaining. Now a DATS tradition, come out and be a part of the inauguration of PKN Triad, a new organization promoting this lively event throughout the year.

Don’t know how cool Pech Kucha is? Visit Raleigh's site.

How you can participate!
• Present a great topic that connects food with an aspect of tech, design or the arts. Talk about your organization's mission, your project, your research, your dream. (Betsy and I presented together at DATS 2009 and talked about our projects.) Check back at this Website or the official DATS site for more info about how to submit your entry.
• Give technical, writing or language help      You can also participate by helping someone technically prepare their digital slides, language translation or their writing, especially if English is their second language. The digital divide is a significant obstacle to refugee populations and other groups in the Triad. To make sure their views are represented, you can help guide a participant through the process.
• Sponsor a minority, refugee or immigrant presentation      A significant barrier to refugee, immigrant and minority populations is cultural isolation. For newcomers, learning English prevents many from fully sharing their talents, skills and knowledge to the Piedmont economy. Sponsorship money can help underwrite costs for transportation, technical help, and language translation.

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4. Big Tent Food Vendors
Description     This is a special venue opportunity for a limited number of refugee, immigrant and minority population vendors to sell food during DATS 2010, October 9-11. We want to make sure vendors will reflect the great diversity of food traditions and cultures that have come to the Piedmont. More details will be coming.

How you can participate!
• Do you, your organization, church or business have experience selling quality multicultural food at events? Would you like more information? Contact me.
• Sponsor a vendor. In many instances, minority, refugee, and immigrants lack capital and cultural advice. A small amount of money and time can go a long way to launching an entrepreneur.

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Make the Connection
Suggestions about activities and event organization

1. Make the local connection. Frame trends in local terms with local illustrations. Use the opportunity to dig deep, discover local talent and pull in area experts.

2. Get out of the circle. Say design, art, and technology and most Piedmonters are stuck in narrow definitions and a short list of specialized professionals practicing in silos.

3. Leverage the event. Use DATS 2010 to pull doubters, fence-sitters, future partners, collaborators and possible champions into listening range.

4. Everything you can do to move away from a lecture format will be appreciated by participants. Lecture with pictures is slightly better, panel discussion better, hands-on workshop or interactive, kinesthetic learning experience best.

5. Think messy and after effects. So the event didn’t work the way you wanted, but it generated dozens of conversations amongst attendees who never knew one another weeks after the event, three collaborative projects, and a job or two. Was your event successful or not? (PS: Document the event so it can live on. Make sure the info is online.)

6. Dollars and support. Consider financial supporters as part of the enlarged circle you’re trying to reach. Talk to the usual funders and do-gooder organizations that are called upon again and again to be generous, but invite those to help who’ve never participated. Many have not participated because they have never been invited.

Project Overview: STSB

(Surgical Technology Skills Builder)
(Game Development Slide Show)
(PTP Game Technology Initiative)
(Project Overview:STSB)
(Talking to Students: Learning Collaboration)
(Reluctant Post Mortem)
(Lessons Learned)

We presented this game at the Center for Design Innovation (CDI) and the next day at a panel discussion of the Triangle Game Conference in Raleigh NC on April, 2010.

From May 2009 until February 2010, I oversaw a team of educators, consultants, and students in the creation of a serious game funded by the Piedmont Triad Partnership through a Department of Labor WIRED grant. I developed the project’s purpose, which was to gauge the likely success of an area educators and game professionals collaboration starting with a core team of educators from one public high school and eight colleges and universities from the region. About 35 people eventually worked on the project.
The core team was augmented by specialists and professionals as needed. The core team worked and communicated online using Skype, Facebook and Google apps which were novel work methods for most of the team. Many educators came from new programs and departments formed to reflect trends in animation, entertainment, game, and related media. Most had not worked with one another or on a commercial game project from beginning to end. One of the big challenges and successes was the team’s transition from a work style and culture characterized by close supervision, regulated activities and regular face-to-face meetings to a nimbler sharing, discussion, and decision-making process mediated by the Web.

The Surgical Technology Skills Builder (STSB) is a Flash-based online serious game created to solve key memory, identification, spatial arrangement, and limited access problems experienced by surgical technology students studying at Guilford Technical Community College (GTCC). It was chosen by the core education team from 19 proposals solicited from the region...


The final product was as much bounded by the team’s technical and design abilities and experience as it was by members’ primary commitments to teaching, limited time frame, and budget (which in the end came close to commercial rates). While we deliberately chose conservative, proven solutions to design and production rather than tax the team’s abilities, the game’s components and production values were consistent with the objectives of the instructor, who also headed the surgical technology department.

He described some of the key obstacles students encountered in their training included rote memorization of hundreds of surgical instruments, their correct placement on the surgery room back table and Mayo tray, and prompt response to a surgeon’s request for instruments during surgery. These problems were analyzed and addressed through the game’s three distinct training modules: Identification game, Set Up game, and OR game (see above screen shots). Isolating and addressing learning barriers through a serious game employing limited capabilities (we opted for “2 1/2 D” and “limited immersion”) is not only effective but it keeps costs down. We followed the belief that not every serious game requires full 3D programming.