The meeting began with each person introducing
themselves. There were about 25 people present. Justin
LaBarge, a
student, stopped in to say ‘hi’, but he had to leave to finish his
homework. Bob gave a brief summary of how the meetings have
progressed and why
they started. There were several new faces at the meeting, so we
took some
time to answer their questions. The question was asked if people
wanted to
break into smaller groups or to focus on one issue with the whole
group. After
some good questions and discussions, it was decided to focus on one
issue and
to see how we work together as a group. The thought was that we
needed to
“get our feet wet” with one specific project that we could then
apply the process to other issues that we want to address and advocate.
There was an excellent discussion about taking action
tonight. For the first time, it seemed that the group was acting
together
with the best interest of the community, families and children on our
minds. We
still may not all agree on every issue, but we are learning how to
disagree
respectfully and then take it even another step, which is to search for
consensus with our differences guiding the process. This is really one
of the
outcomes we had hoped to achieve when we started these meetings as it
was not
happening in our community. That will continue to be the guiding
foundation for
this group. We also talked about being very informed about the issues
we wanted
to advocate for and help others with. We spoke very candidly about
barriers to
this approach in our community but the general feeling was that as a
group we
could accomplish things that we would not be able to do
individually.
One person shared a story about a student who was having
problems in a school and was being recommended by school officials for
medication and special needs status. Some adults helped the parents
work with
the school and as a group they realized that the problem was the
student was
extremely bright and very bored. This student is now excelling and is
not on
any medication. It was a great example of how a concerned group of
people in
the community can help both families and schools work on behalf of
students.
Our group then discussed ways that we could become more
involved. We talked about a number of opportunities for community
members:
Rapid response / student advocate community volunteers
Teach the student bill of rights
Create a culture of success
Intervention / prevention
Develop coordinated efforts and working relationships with
other committees – like parent network committee
We learned
about Ernie’s description of the options we have to deal with conflict
and issues in our communities.
LAW WAY
|
PEACE
WAY |
Authority
|
Relations |
|
Rules of Law |
Communication |
|
Decisions |
Consensus |
|
Penalty |
Healing |
The group talked about endorsing the “Peace Way”
as a guiding principle for this group. Lynn Bartling shared how LUHS
and
Restorative Justice are now working together as an example of the Peace
Way and
we have talked in previous meetings about the LdF Women’s Circle that
is
another really cool part of that same process going on right now.
We discussed
how the four issues we have identified the past 14 months are
intricately
connected: Racism, Substance Abuse, Parenting Issues and Youth Issues.
As we
spoke about this, we wanted to connect these to an issue that we could
take
action on as our first effort to make our presence felt in the
community. There
was an article in the Lakeland Times a few weeks ago stating that the
community
would be invited to join LUHS in some part of the hiring process for
the new
LUHS Superintendent. We decided that we should formally offer our group
as a
resource to tap into. , and so the group wanted to let the board know
they are
available. We
decided that we would ask to be on the next school board agenda and
spent most
of the meeting working on creating a letter to send to the board that
we would
read at that meeting. This would give us the opportunity to introduce
our group
to both the school board and the community, explaining our history and
the
issues we have identified through our meetings of the past 14 months.
By being
a collective voice for positive change, our hope is to attract others
in the
community to join us and become engaged in our community (schools and
families). Helping LUHS in the process would be a really positive first
step.
The letter will be signed by as many members of the community as
possible-committing
all of us to working together on behalf of youth and families in our
area. The
high school remains the center of our community and partaking in the
process to
hire the new superintendent seemed like a healthy place to start.
- Bob will call to find out
if we can be added to the agenda for the next school board
meeting. He has asked for input and will draft a letter by next
week that we could all sign and read to the Board.
We’re working on the date
for the next
meeting-early January! Thanks everyone!
