GI Global Associate Issues Progress Report on Project in Colombia
One of the core issues of the Goldin Institute's mission has been our work partnering with communities to promote co-existence, reconciliation and peace-building efforts.
Our partners in Colombia have made great strides in achieving this mission by building community-driven reconciliation tools that are an inspiration to our global network.
Since 2007, when we convened with local and international partners in Colombia to launch the National Partnership for Child Soldier Reintegration, we have continued to seek ways to help local leaders create new and more effective ways to reintegrate former child soldiers.
One community leader who came from the 'National Partnership teaching-tree' is our global associate based in Bogota, Lissette Mateus Roa. Last month, Lissette updated us on the progress of the pilot project began in her hometown in late 2011 called Pedagogy of Care and Reconciliation (PCR).
Lissette explained in the video update how the project is helping bridge the often deep-rooted differences that exist between teachers and students in the schools within her own community. The causes of these differences are complex and unique to the culture of Colombia, but in general are related to the country's decades long civil conflict. Lissette reports that in the schools that have participated, the makeup of the students is a direct sampling of the larger population at whole - especially in rural areas. This includes students who are likely to have experienced the domestic violence, learning challenges and poverty often associated with those displaced in Colombia by the civil conflict.
As Lissette points out in both the update video and also in this more comprehensive report:
[quote]Most people need new tools for relationship building ... that is what we workshop together with the teachers using the main methodology called ESPERE. In these day-long sessions, two main components make up the training: Forgiveness and Reconciliation ... people learn how to forgive and trainees of the project learn how to empathize with those they may have viewed as being different."[/quote]
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[img path="images/IMG_0394.JPG"]Above photo: Teachers consult the ESPERE guide at a recent workshop outside Bogota[/img]
[img path="images/IMG_0067.jpg"]Above photo: Goldin Institute Associate Lissette Mateus Roa leads a break-out circle at recent ESPERE workshop[/img]
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To broaden the reach of this innovative new approach to reconciliation, Lissette's team has built an online social platform where training tools can be accessed as well as an online library of all supporting documents related to the PCR project (audios, videos, and photos). Perhaps most importantly, the social platform allows teachers and administrators the opportunity to provide instant feedback to improve the reconciliation methodology by reflecting on their own direct experience.
We continue to be excited to be a part of Lissette's project as she sees it through being more fully implemented. The ESPERE method has already shown great promise in being a model for improving the structural and social aspects of reconciliation and as part of the PCR, more widely applied internationally. In fact, we are currently exploring how to apply the same techniques being used in the PCR project by Lissette and her team to our partners in Uganda.
We invite you to join us and Lissette in completing the PCR project – find out how your donation can work directly in peace-buiding efforts.
Update on Pedagogy of Care and Reconciliation Partnership Project
In this short video, Lissette Mateus Roa brings us up to date on what the partnership project has meant to the teachers, parents and students involved. This multi-sector approach has allowed for practices on how best to bring about change that will allow for acceptance and a better understanding of the issues faced by those impacted by Colombia's decades-long civil conflict. As Lissette so clearly states herself in the video:
[quote](Our) School is about ... How to forgive ... how to learn about another people ... how to see another people through new eyes."[/quote]
- Lissette Mateus Roa
Lissette was kind enough to share her own personal photos taken at the most recent workshop she conducted, which are also included in this video.
We are excited to continue to partner with Lissette on this project and see it come to life and expand further. Please view the video above and find out how you can become more involved in support of Lissette and the Pedagogy of care and Reconciliation Project.
First Pitch
Like the film we featured and reccomended to our network recently, this is a story much bigger than the game of baseball - and although cholera continues to be one of the most dire issues faced by the Haitian people, seeing one of the kids featured in the movie realize his dream and throw out the first pitch at the Toronto Blue Jays game last night is cause for celebration. Way to go Japhney!
Lessons From Isaac
Drawing parallels between his native New Orleans and Haiti, writer Lolis Eric Elie writes a short and compelling piece on why we should care ... " Haiti is similar (to New Orleans). If you took it out of the world market picture, financial markets would not collapse. But if you took Haiti out of the cultural picture through its music, its architecture, its visual arts, we as a world community would be greatly impoverished."
Huffington Post Features: Kony 2012?
Goldin Institute Article Featured In Huffington Post
Goldin Institute Article Featured In Huffington PostCan the #Kony2012 campaign grow to #rebuilduganda2012?
With over 30 million views this week, the super viral Kony 2012 video is clearly raising awareness of the horrors of the LRA in Uganda. But is the Kony 2012 campaign a good idea?
The Goldin Institute is pleased to share this article published in the Huffington Post on March 9, 2012 summarizing our response to the Kony 2012 video and campaign.
Whatever happens with Kony and the Kony 2012 campaign, the Goldin Institute will continue our work towards community-driven child soldier reintegration and prevention strategies in Uganda and impacted countries around the world. Far from being invisible, former Child Soldiers are directly engaged in our ongoing work to build a National Partnership for Child Soldier Reintegration and Prevention in Uganda.
Community Driven Solutions for Ending Gender-Based Violence
ENOUGH: by the women of Haiti.
Thank you to everyone who tuned into the Dec. 20 video premiere.
Enough: by the women of Haiti is a documentary highlighting the Security and Sensitization Project in the Place Petion Camp in Port au Prince Haiti. This video was produced by the Goldin Institute in partnership with the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti and KOFAVIV.
Peace Negotiations Resume in Colombia
Our colleauges in Colombia welcome the latest development in the ongoing peace negotiations and hope that this is a step in breaking the cycle of violence. BBC News outlines the details for peace talks between FARC and the government of Colombia to end the 48-year-old conflict.
Haiti Update: Digital Storytelling Project
The Goldin Institute was excited to expand the Digital Storytelling Project by conducting an intensive week-long workshop in Port au Prince, Haiti in August 2011. In this workshop, Goldin Institute associates teamed with Professor Lisa Dush from DePaul University and her graduate assistant Heather Eidson to train seven local women in Port au Prince to complete their own stories from start to finish and share them with their peers on the final day of the workshop.
A consortium of women's groups in Haiti each selected participants for the workshop who were examples of courageous and thoughtful grassroots leaders tackling gender-based violence issues in Port au Prince. The stories were as unique as each individual participant but shared common themes of strength, perservarance and commitment.
The workshop followed the same principles as those taught at Chicago's DePaul University by Professor Dush. Three primary goals were met during the week in Haiti:
- To teach the participants how to draft, storyboard, write and produce their own digital story using their photographs and recorded voice.
- To bring together like-minded women who share an active voice in organizing against gender-based violence in and around the temporary camps that arose in post earthquake Haiti.
- To familiarize the participants with the basic computer hardware and software used during the workshop so that they could in turn teach the method to others or create new stories of their own.
Thanks to the generousity of many donors, the Institute was able to leave behind the equipment to produce future digital stories. The equipment included a computer preloaded with the software needed to produce a completed digital story, along with several cameras, a compact digital scanner and the recording equipment to supply the audio tracks for newly created stories.
Workshop attendees expressed an interest in sharing their new experiences and skills with others who might benefit from digital storytelling. We are confident that through our ongoing partnership with the women's groups, our colleagues now have a powerful tool for educating and raising awareness to the issue of gender-based violence.
[quote]The Goldin Institute team showed us how to construct a personal story with photographs–a work that we would not have been able to do without GI. I can say that the week will remain etched in my mind because I felt I learned many things and I am ready to go on to teach other women how to construct their own personal stories ... thank you very much for this work."[/quote]
- Workshop participant Getchine Lima
A special thank you to our partners at KOFAVIV and the IJDH/BAI, whose partnership made the week successful and meaningful. We continue to work with both organizations on the RAPP Project. The Goldin Institute Global Associate based in Port au Prince, Rose Getchine Lima was a participant in the workshop as well and her digital story will become part of her biography and posted at our website.
We were pleased to have a Chicago-based documetarian, Renato Velarde accompany us on the trip. Renato has started post-production work on the hours of footage he filmed of interviews with many of our associates involved with the ongoing security project (RAPP), as well as those working tirelessly behind the scenes at our partner organization KOFAVIV. Renato also filmed a brief overview of the women's workshop during this time - please continue to visit our site for updates and clips to view of Velarde's work.
We owe a great amount of gratitude to those who supported this project from its planning stages to its successful launch. Together we can continue to make a difference to those still jeopardized by the violence that plagues the makeshift communities that were meant to only be temporary shelters to women and their children. To find out more about how you can become further involved, please follow this link.
[slide] [img path="images/lisa_juliette.jpg"]Professor Lisa Dush (standing left) gives overview of digital storytelling to participants through a translator.[/img] [img path="images/writing_drafts.jpg"]Participants begin work on writing their individual stories or 'scripts' on the first day of the digistory workshop.[/img] [img path="images/workingjoemike.jpg"]Goldin Institute associates Joseph Genslak, Gia Biagi and Michael Di Maria offer instruction to workshop participants.[/img] [img path="images/lisa_standing.jpg"]Program Coordinator Lisa Dush checks in on the progress of workshop attendee.[/img] [img path="images/trav_lisa.jpg"]GI Executive Director Travis Rejman and Professor Dush listen to participant feedback, along with translator.[/img] [img path="images/audiorecording.jpg"]Digital story 'rough cuts' come together with audio tracks being checked for alignment with pictures.[/img] [img path="images/mikejoegia.jpg"]The team from GI and four of the Haitian participants pose for a photo sometime early in the workshop.[/img] [img path="images/joe_olguine.jpg"]GI Associate Joseph Genslak reviews a story in progress.[/img] [img path="images/ren_adjusting.jpg"]Filmmaker Renato Valerde checks the frame of his shot while documenting the workshop proceedings.[/img] [img path="images/renwithgetchine.jpg"]Renato and Travis (far right) interview participant Getchine about her work in curbing gender-based violence.[/img] [img path="images/kids_kofaviv.jpg"]Young women pose for a picture outside the KOFAVIV facilities.[/img] [img path="images/groupfeedback.jpg"]Back at the workshop, comments are exchanged about the value of participating in the digital storytelling workshop.[/img] [img path="images/postcelebration.jpg"]A post-production celebration is shared amongst participants and instructors on the last day of review.[/img] [/slide]
