The end game for this curriculum: Folks have the power and resources to invent their own ways to create healthy neighborhood communities. I started thinking about this curriculum as involving two types of folks: Those who live in the neighborhoods impacted by historical injustice and environmental inequities. And those who live outside the neighborhoods. I've … Continue reading Thinking about: Environmental equity curriculum (part 2)
At the upcoming April 2026 meeting of Environmental Justice Evanston I am due to propose a curriculum for leadership development. The desired outcome is to increase the number of people who can lead environmental equity efforts in Evanston. This need comes together for a couple of reasons. The Evanston environmental justice movement has matured in … Continue reading Thinking about: Leadership curriculum for Evanston environmental equity
Last week I had coffee with two friends from my days teaching and helping lead the learning and organizational change graduate program at Northwestern University. One - Beth - is Head of School at a private Montessori school in the Boston area. Beth is an amazing leader; she gets results and creates a workplace where … Continue reading Design (and other) lessons from a K-8 school leader
Early on in my community-listening learning journey this year, I wrote that I was interested in working with groups in three related areas: How a group listens to the community members it serves. How a group makes sense of what it is hearing from community members. How community members move from only sharing ideas and … Continue reading My three elements of community listening work
Earlier this week I attended another open session of Evanston's Environmental Equity Investigation (EEI) project. It was unfortunately sparsely attended (my perception) by community members. Maybe 10-15 community folks, about 1/3rd the participation of a previous session. Unfortunate in part because the session was well designed and facilitated and could have easily accommodated 40-50 real … Continue reading The limitation of relying on a single style of community meetings
Jeff Merrell 