conflict resolution and ASSET

2/16/08



the week has been interesting and strange. my boss, veronica, has been out all week with a tooth surgery, and i've been in the office working really hard on my team service project with walnut way in preparation for the TSP review panel.

the first part of our training was in this beautiful house owned by a former teacher/police officer/current musician, and overall really interesting guy. i got there really early and ran into an old poetry acquaintance named eric, coincidentally a former ally, who also lived there. he invited me into the space and told me to make myself at home. i found myself a chair, and took in a deep breath. sitting there in the quiet, not having to rush, was fantastic. i sat in the sunlight in a corner of the room and took everything in. i felt like i could actually relax. i was so content, i wishing we didn't have to have training there to wreck the vibe.

announcements brought some news. first, we have an intern (?) at public allies. i believe his name is either john or dan (i'm terriblewith names) and he is a sociology major at uwm. it was kind of alarming to me to have a new person permanently inducted into the "process" we all started back in september. i am curious to see how active he'll be in the trainings and service days, and also to see what it means to have him around in general.

the second announcement was a little suprising. kim from uwm school of continuing education came in and started talking about the program. i feel very much like "those people" to him when he comes around. he's sort of in charge of the show since we partnered up with uwm continuing ed, but i don't think he gets it. in fact, he always mentions that he feels very awkward after speaking to us. for me, it's as if we are under glass performing.

well, he got up and started talking at great length, alluding to some new direction in our executive director crisis. suddenly, kate is standing up next to me, quietly. here it comes, she's gonna do it, i think to myself. she's wearing a blazer and has her hands behind her back, clasping an envelope.

it took a long time for him to get around to it, but he announced that kate would, in fact become the new executive director starting immediately. something else i felt was a subtle shift in the way the group was receiving her, as well as the way she held herself. i can't explain to much more of that, so i'll have to think about it a little more. i think the group was very surprised, particularly her tsp team. (she will no longer be responsible for their progress, or whatever it would be called.

i have mixed feelings about the whole bit. it isn't to say that she can't do it. i think kate's neat, but i was worried about one thing in particular: when someone would ask her a question, she'd get into the answering section. then, kim would cut her off and say exactly what kate said, as if though his saying it really made it valid. i thought immediately back to our sexism trainging, and to a number of discussions we've had personally. yes, i understand it must be a great honor to recieve some recognition, but why the hell was she letting him do that to her, especially in front of all of us?

sigh.

onto the training. we saw a video on a public allies fellowship opportunity at eagle rock school. it seemed very much like walden, the school i went to from middle to high school. it's a year-long commitment, and i wish i could do it, but i am not able to commit to something like that right now. the actual training on conflict resolution was hosted by olu. the training was nice. there's a certian way he spoke that was very soothing, the way his breath was encapsulated in each word. elaina mentioned that she hadn't been in a house in so long, and that it felt very good to be in someone's home. i think she was right, because it seemed like this was the first time our training space was really conducive to us getting into the session.

olu did a few activities with us, but the one i liked best was a dice game. he made up situations where someone would typically get really upset. what he had individuals do was roll 2 dice to determine how they would handle the situation. if they would handle the situation with agression, they had to roll between a one and a four; if they were going to avoid the situation, they needed to roll between a one and and eight. lastly, if they were going to try the conflict resolution, they needed to roll between a one and twelve.

strangely enough, the two folks in our group both chose to handle the situations with agression. both failed.

the next part of the day was our TSP review panel. it was comprised of the male fellows, a program manager (a different one for each session), and a former ally. shana mccombs was there, but shana lucas was nowhere to be seen. it wasn't discussed, no one offered any explanation.

the first group went, they seemed to have everything figured out, but were kind of indifferent to the project. they are doing a gardening development project that seems pretty neat.


our group was second. i was nervous about the whole ordeal, since many of our team members are indifferent to the project and have no idea where we are. (we've never had a tsp meeting where everyone was present. it's been frustrating.) initially, i was just going to keep the project really under wraps from anyone who hadn't bothered to invest anything into it. i couldn't do it. before we went up, i grabbed the tsp binder from my office and passed the proposal around for folks to get a good look at.


in spite of the minimal preparedness, i'd say our group kicked ass. seriously. i was surprised/relieved. everyone was really passionate about the project, especially when we were questioned about the relevance of the service aspect of the project. it was the first time i think i felt like we were actually a team. part of that was awesome, but another part of it was dissapointing.


i was really happy with my work. the porfolio was really helpful and gave the whole project a very professional approach. i will have an awesome portfolio. i also think that james did a really great job of preparing us, and so i had a better idea of what to expect. as a result, we came of polished and confident, not as if each inquisition were an attack.

i'm looking forward to doing this project, and have poured a lot of hard work into it. i feel that there are a lot of resources we haven't even gotten around to exploring. another really great thing about this is that it's really serving a need to preserve the local heritage of black america. i can't wait to see the finished result.