Defining New Models for Building Community
At I-Think, we explore mental models. We were planning for our first large-scale Challenge Kit series on the theme of well-being and building community. When we turned to experts, they all had different models of “Building Community”, as did members of our team. Over the summer of 2020, we read, dialogued, and had experiences with community building. We thank educator and leader Jaye-Alexiis Stephen for being our leading thought partner in this work.
We examined the assumption that doing activities together automatically leads to community building, realizing instead that sometimes we are simply alone together: participating individually in a shared activity. We grappled with the role of love in education and if should we name it in the document. (One draft had “care” instead of “love”.) We worked to articulate why building community even matters: because we believe in our collective future.
This document has been used by school boards, especially the Equity and Human Rights teams within them, Principals, Principals and teachers to prompt reflection. Reflections include:
Open Ended: Annotate this document with your thoughts, reflections, and questions.
Structured: Reflect on what in this statement affirms, expands and challenges your thinking.
Towards Next Steps: Identify how these show up in your practice and what of this is missing in your practice. How might you bring these into your practice? What will you try starting tomorrow?
“When I first read this, I didn’t think about loving students. I care deeply about them, but I would not use the word love. Later that school year, I had a student struggling to read. I was teaching Kindergarten for the first time in my career. I dove into the research to learn more about teaching literacy. I tried new techniques and adapted my teaching to this student’s needs. Coming back to this statement at the end of the school year, I realized my actions for this student was how I lived my love for them.” - Kindergarten Teacher
Building community¹ is to create beyond what we’ve been socialized to know².
Building community are acts of love, action and joy. We build community because we believe in our collective future.
Building community is essential for transformational learning. It is how we develop a critical consciousness that will frame how we understand problems, influence the insights we come to and ensure that innovation is rooted in human rights and dignity for all.
Building community is an act of love³. Love is what gives building community texture. Love is a kind of complexity that honours and affirms the voices, stories and experiences of the people in the community. The texture of the community is what implicates us⁴; implication that fuels what we create together.
Building community takes action to prove that another world is possible. We are relentless. We move towards the discomfort and work our way through its complexity. It is how we transform our current models. It is how we build classroom and school communities that affirm and honour the brilliance of all learners - young and old.
Building community is joy⁵. It is how we go into the future: by liberating our imaginations to co-create a vision of what is possible and acting accordingly.
We engage in anti-racist, anti-oppressive community building with:
Love.
Because we love:
We bring our critical consciousness to de-center ourselves and our positionality
We center and affirm the lived experiences of identities that have been negatively impacted by existing systems of oppression
When we do the work to de-center, we will center the voice of groups who have otherwise been silenced. Continuously developing our critical consciousness, allows us to be mindful of the work that must always be done. What we, as a community, center matters. What we center needs to affirm the beautiful, intersecting identities of its community members.
We bring our critical consciousness to our learning
Our critical consciousness asks us to consider and act on the ways in which our conventional norms do not meet the needs of the community we are in. When we love, it is active, questioning, ever-evolving our models and unafraid of the change.
We focus on problem solving that improves the community
Solving problems is an act of building community driven by love because we are not satisfied with the status quo. “When we are filled with love… injustice becomes intolerable.⁶” Because we love, we are implicated to come together to better our community.
Action.
Because we take action:
We are showing that another world is possible
We, as those with power, can take action. When we take action, we are modeling, demonstrating and creating another world where every person can belong.
We wrestle with complexity
Change is complex and we must be willing to dive into that complexity. We need complexity to question individual bias, interpersonal struggles and institutional oppression. Without complexity, we will not be able to appreciate, acknowledge and affirm the identities and gifts that every individual brings.
We hold ourselves to the highest standards of impact
Building community is not easy. We will have conversations and do activities that feel uncomfortable. We co-create the space for feedback where community can hold us accountable for the impact we are creating.
We change
When we know better, we do better. We celebrate the joy and process of change.
Joy.
Because we are joyful:
We take action
Community building happens through process and in the journey we find joy. You can’t just learn and reflect. It is not enough. Building community is an intentional, continuous act. As we act to de-center, in order to center affirmation of every identity and lived experience, we are going to make mistakes, it is going to hurt. Working through the hurt and uncertainty is how we transform and build anew.
We stay accountable by seeking feedback
Being held accountable strengthens relationships, and through relationships We hold one another accountable. Building community is not a formula that can be applied, year over year. Actively seeking feedback from the community that we are working to build and from those with other perspectives ensures that the work of community building is ongoing and never ending.
We reflect
Taking meaningful action means that we take the time to reflect and learn. Reflection is core to a deeper understanding of our mindset, our choices and what we choose to prioritize and focus on. Reflection is how we integrate our learning into our actions. That it is never ending is why we must find joy in the process of reimagining and reinventing.
¹ Co-written by Jaye-Alexiis Stephens, Josie Fung and Nogah Kornberg in conversations with I-Think Mentors.
² Chowdhury, Sayema. York U Faculty of Education FESI Webinar 1- Designing with /for Criticality and Community, August 19, 2020. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpHU_46TK0s&feature=youtu.be. August 19, 2020.
³ Hooks, B. (2018). all about love: New visions. New York: William Morrow.
⁴ Cheong, Nation. Conversation with Josie Fung and Nogah Kornberg. August 26, 2020.
⁵ Stephen, Jaye-Alexiis. Conversation with Josie Fung and Nogah Kornberg. Summer 2020.
⁶ Channing, Austin (quoted by CarlosHappyNPO). “‘When we are filled with love for other people, injustice becomes intolerable.’ ~ @austinchanning” 20 September 2020, 10:49p.m. Tweet.
