宽容

The Federal Reserve claims the average lifespan of a new dollar bill is 4.8 years = 1,752 days. There is unfortunately, no data available on how frequently an individual bill changes hands in its usable lifetime. Once a day sounds about right to me, but wouldn’t you agree that with a single wallet full of Dandelion Dollars, you could realistically expect to reach 10,000 people in the lifespan of those bills?

According to government statistics, out of 10,000 adult Americans:
1,810 suffer from an anxiety disorder
1,500 are living in poverty
930 needed treatment for a drug or alcohol abuse problem in the last year
670 suffer from a major depressive disorder
400 will divorce in the next year
38 will commit a violent crime in the next year
11 will attempt suicide in the next year
1 will die from suicide in the next year

If you could reach out to these 5,360 struggling people with a message of LOVE, JOY, HOPE don’t you think that it would make a real difference to one, or two, or five, or 100 of them to receive it at just the right time when they desperately needed a sign that things can get better. That there are forces out there in the universe pulling for them?. What if my math is wrong? What if it wouldn’t reach 5,360 people like this? What if it only reached 536? Or 53? Or 5? Wouldn’t that still be reason enough to reach out to them? But what if one Dandelion Dollar recipient picked up a dollar and a pen and made a Dandelion Dollar of their own? What if 5 did? What if 53 did? What if 536 did? What if 5,360 did? What if everyone did? :-)

Hullabaloo is the culmination of a yearlong series of workshops where youth learn writing and public speaking skills.

Next year will be Year 3 for Hullabaloo. In this year, Hullabaloo envisions a bold expansion of the program. We will conduct 30 half-day workshops in financially disadvantaged institutions to connect with at-risk youth and help them become engaged in civic issues through spoken word, an increase of 50% over the previous year. We will expand Hullabaloo from 12 to 16 teams.

In practice, a typical example of the impact of Hullabaloo works in the following way. We will arrange a large performance featuring professional Spoken Word performers at a school's general assembly. The youth will see the show and be inspired. Afterwards, there will be a few workshops to give them the basic tools to write their own Spoken Word Poetry and information on how to start a Slam Club. Then, we'll work with the students and their sponsor teacher to continue the momentum with the Slam Club. These students will start putting on shows after school or at lunch for other youth, exposing them to poems about race, class, and other social issues that are common in Spoken Word. The club then forms a team, registers in Hullabaloo, comes to the festival, meets other poets their age, and presents their poems for hundreds of people. Then, they return back to their communities, empowered and inspired to continue to write more poems and stage more performances. It's a positively reinforcing cycle. Each year, more youth get involved, mentor each other, and engage with more through poetry.

In 2010, PeaceTones ran "Haiti Sings," a project in Port-au-Prince. We publicized open auditions on Haitian National TV six months after the earthquake and had an overwhelming response. We selected twenty talented musicians singing about social change and justice, held legal and marketing workshops, and ran a contest on Facebook to select the winner. A global voting population chose a 22-year-old artist named Wanito. He has, in little over a year, become one of Haiti's top stars following our contest and our production of his first album. He agreed to put a percentage of the album sales back into his community through literacy programs.
Wanito is a shining example of an artist who has taken the legal, marketing and justice tools we have taught him, and created a successful career based on a positive and empowering musical message. Wanito was named one of the most influential people in Haiti in 2011, alongside Hilary Clinton, and has also been invited by the Haitian parliament to be Youth Ambassador for 2012. Wanito’s most popular song, listened to by hundreds of thousands of Haitians throughout the cities and provinces of Haiti and the Haitian diaspora, addresses the risk of unwanted pregnancy to teenage couples and encourages the use of protection and forethought. The impact of this song’s public health message throughout the greater community of Haitians is just one example of the potential of an unknown artist’s unknown song to grow into a national campaign for peace, justice and development.

A teacher in a BC grade 4 class may use this forum to engage her students for the entire Social Studies curriculum, children will come away with empathy for others and deep knowledge of their bioeregion and province. An ESL adult class may use the forum further understand the geography of their new home, it can provide a talking point for their own feeling of culture shock and loss. They will come away with a connection to their new home, each other, and understanding of Aboriginal people. The community mapping section will have activities for early chilhood educators through senior citizen coordinators to assist groups in mapping their home. Maps and experiences can be shared online. The model is a website with much to offer from interactive mapping to, experiential activities, and connection. Building social capital through knowledge, empathy, and connection will be integral values in the model.

My aim is to introduce the initiative (material and specifications for the project) to the State or Self-Governing Community Observatory of School Coexistence so that it may be studied in a commission formed by representatives of the school community. Once the project has been discussed, the program would be carried out in a 25 public schools sample, creating work teams with participating teachers in order to draw and present its conclusions.
The program has 15 workshops divided into 6 modules. Each workshop includes:
- Reading part of the text of the Constitution explained to children or one of the fables explaining the origin of Democracy and how it works. Teachers should read these texts to the students.
- Debating among students and their teacher on the concepts dealt with in the text and applicable to real situations and conflicts that may have taken place among them.
- Arts and crafts, plays and musical activities in which teachers for different school subjects may participate, aimed at reinforcing assimilation and application of the concepts learned.
- Home activities aimed at establishing a dialogue with the families on the concepts learned in class linking what is learned at school and at home.
- Creating a web page to coordinate the work, connect the schools involved in the study and provide complementary material.

Jared, a 15 year old African-American boy sits down to play the game. His character's name is Kronk and is a member of the Bovil group. He lives in a Bovil neighborhood, has had mostly bovil friends and colleagues. Kronk is a cop. Kronk wakes up and has the option to read the paper at breakfast. He chooses yes, and reads stories about break-ins committed by some Zoinks in a nearby town. He puts the paper down and gets in his car. He decides to turn on the radio and changes it to the news station. There is another report of a Zoinks committing a wave of robberies in the next state. He changes to a popular music station and hear's some famous Zoink rappers. He changes back to news. He is at work. He has been assigned neighborhood patrol. He and his partner drive through the neighborhood. He can choose to stop to talk to a Bovil neighbor. He does. He continues through the neighborhood. His partner calls to his attention a group of Zoinks walking together. He turns to Kronk and gives him the option of questioning them or just driving past. Kronk decides to stop them.

After playing that round, Jared can be probed either discussion style in class or in the game, if Jared's decision to stop the Kronks was racist. Was it profiling? Was it stereotyping? Or was it responsible action.

Each module allows for the character to make the small decisions we make daily. At crucial ones, (such as the moment the player must decide whether to stop the Zoinks) they are forced to reflect on the motivation that lead to the action in the game and in real life.

A curriculum designed by Poet William Irwin Thompson and Chaos Theorist Ralph Abraham which examines the evolution of consciousness operating within a complex dynamical model is in place at a lab school on the eastern end of Long Island, New York.

Using an integrated curriculum and a team teaching approach, we study the medieval period.

We never actually use the word “Empathy.” Instead, every unit and every stage of every project asks students to know themselves more deeply and to use this knowledge to connect with others.

Six Units:
VOICE--Students study the life of the prophet Mohammed, the Umayyad and Abbasid Caliphates and life in Medieval Spain to prepare for the in-depth study of one of the luminary figures of this era. Students write a memoir in the voice of one of these doctors or engineers or poets and portray them for their peers.

TEAM—Students spend three days and two nights away at a high ropes facility.

ACTION—Students and teachers help set up a homeless shelter run out of a local house of worship and raise money by jumping into the Peconic Bay in February.

DIALOUGE –Students work with Young American Writers Project to draft a one-act play for two actors of their age, the best of which are produced in a professional theater setting.

SELF--In the style of artist Sharin Neshat students do photographic portraits with their maxim written somewhere on or near them.

DIVINATION—In the tradition of the Vikings, we read runes. We also do some conflict resolution work with Beowolf and the Wendel.

The three primary program inputs are youth participating in local PeaceJam group activities, studying the lives of the Nobel Peace laureates and interacting with the PeaceJam curriculum, and engaging in social action and community service. Groups organize through classes and clubs in public and private schools, in after-school and community based organizations, and through church youth groups and faith-based organizations.

As an example, a local school-based PeaceJam group decided to act on issues of early literacy for one of their service projects this year. They organized a peer reading program with a group of elementary students and had reading-buddy sessions every Friday afternoon over the spring. They collected over a thousand books and gave these out at a culminating book fair that celebrated the experience.

We create a task force of mentors from senior classes in schools by training them on anti bully. We use cartoons, vignettes and powerful discussions & dialogue to reach out to them. A feed- back mechanism is built in so that the power is not misused & to ensure proper functioning. We also uses various innovative tools to keep a check on motivation and sustainability by giving them incentives of special batches, tee shirts & recommendation letter by school.

Each mentor undertakes 10 to 15 students from junior classes under its wing and trains them in anti- bully. They conduct regular group sessions with their groups & come out with an anti -bully product like art work, message to the bully or anti bully slogans. The whole campaign goes through a series of planned sessions ranging from conceptualising an “anti-bully law enforcement book” to its actual implementation by involving them in “grass root comic making”. In this way the whole school is involved & sensitized on the anti -bully campaign, since the message comes from the peer, it has a larger impact & and also acts as a check on ones behaviour, making each one responsible for ones action.

Workshops are held with teachers & management to sensitize them on the children issues of being a victim or how to deal with a bully. Also efforts are made to improve vigilance by school faculty and student leaders/ mentors.

We also conduct parent awareness programs that link to school policies and practices regarding reporting bullying and resolving conflicts in ways that minimize stigma to the children involved.