BY MARTHA MARRAZZA

In print | Published November 6, 2008

Training for Change, an activist training organization, will conduct workshops this Friday and Saturday on issues surrounding community-building and anti-oppression. The workshop is entitled “Creating Community: Tools for Collective Empowerment.”

A group of students wanted to bring Training for Change to Swarthmore to address issues of marginalization that occur every day on campus. “I worked with George Lakey over the summer, and I was bouncing a couple of ideas off of him when he said that Training for Change did these types of things, anti-oppression work, so he gave us a contact there,” said Maurice Weeks ’09, one of the workshop organizers. “A lot of workshops are focused on how to win campaigns or do other things, and they always have a section on anti-oppression, but since I’ve been here there hasn’t been a workshop on oppression inside campus groups.”

Zoe Bridges-Curry ’09, another workshop organizer, said plans for the upcoming event began as early as last summer. “I think plans for the workshop started as a discussion among friends,” she said. “A community-building workshop was something that we wanted to see on campus.”

“There’s not one group of people who organized this, but there are representatives from several action-based groups on campus that got together at the beginning of the semester to make this happen,” Kavita Hardy ’09 said. “We’re really looking to reach people who are concerned with group dynamics, and that’s everyone from people who do sports to people who are feeling marginalized in the classroom. We’re not targeting a particular segment of the population since it’s important for any group to talk about these issues.”

The workshop will take place over two days this weekend, beginning with a shorter Friday evening session in the Admissions Commons and continuing on Saturday afternoon in Bond Hall. Attendees are encouraged to go to both sessions if possible.

Student organizers of the workshop focused on encouraging a wide variety of students to register for the event. “We have 99 people registered from so many different groups … there is an incredible diversity among the people registered,” Hardy said. “I think this weekend has a lot of potential.”

Dermot Delude-Dix ’09, another organizer of the event, said the workshop will benefit a wide variety of students, not just student activists on campus. “In the first meetings we were thinking that sports teams and other groups, not just activists, but cultural groups, comedy groups, even friend groups, should have access to this,” he said.

“It’s the kind of thing that a community like this should go through in order to remain healthy. I think we’re all excited to provide this opportunity for all students here, especially new students who may be taking on these discourses and ways of thinking for the first time,” Delude-Dix said.

Hardy agreed, saying that issues of oppression are present in a variety of settings at Swarthmore and deserve discussion. “I think the dynamics of some science classes make it difficult as a woman to speak up, for example. I think the dynamics of the IC community can sometimes be very exclusive,” she said.

Hardy gave more examples of oppressive power dynamics in social situations. “Team structures: when freshmen come in they’re not confident, and it takes really good captains to create an inclusive team. Not being able to talk in class because of power dynamics surrounding race … the point is that it often happens without people realizing it,” Hardy said.

Organizers worked with Dean Darryl Smaw in the planning stages and secured funding from the Office of Multicultural Affairs, the Fun Fund and the President’s Office, Hardy said. While an overwhelming number of students have already registered for the training, organizers said that the workshop is still open for a few more students.

Bridges-Curry said the Training for Change program is known for not only facilitating discussion but also for moving beyond that discussion to equip students with real tools for change. “They’re good at having discussion and internal work but also at focusing on concrete ways to address problems. They’re not just into discussion, they’re also into the practical side of things,” she said. “I have faith that they’ll have a workshop that is as useful as it is interesting for individuals.”

Hardy said the upcoming training will change the way students think about things like power hierarchies in their community. “I firmly believe that most of what people learn here is not from their classes but from things that happen outside class,” she said. “A training like this can be mind-blowing.”

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