The University of Michigan-Flint kicked off three years of research and activities related to its "Cracks in the Pavement" grant from the Mellon Foundation, Nov. 6, by hosting nearly 200 local leaders, community members, UM-Flint faculty, students, and staff to explore creative approaches to building democracy at the regional level.
"We chose to kick off our research activities by hosting this community symposium to elevate the work that is already being done in this community, and to help students and faculty think about ways to incorporate democracy as a concept in their coursework," said Jacob Lederman, associate professor of sociology and the principal investigator on the Mellon Grant. "We want to foster collaborations between the faculty and community members so when the faculty are developing new course modules next semester, they're bringing in some of these themes and, hopefully, they'll utilize these connections and involve the community in their course design."
The symposium included three moderated keynote discussions and nine unique breakout sessions that explored topics ranging from immigration and labor to civic clubs to the role of the built environment in our concepts of community.
Closing out the symposium was a final conversation on the future of democracy, from the local to the global, featuring speakers like former Rep. Dan Kildee, president of the Community Foundation of Greater Flint; Jenna Bednar, professor of political science and public policy and cochair for the Presidential Initiative on Democracy, Civic Empowerment, and Global Engagement at the University of Michigan; Pastor Patrick McNeal, director of North Flint Neighborhood Action Council; and Kenneth Frierson.
Bednar used the day to learn from local leaders, informing her own work at U-M. "I was really impressed with how seriously everybody was talking about and building up the agency of the citizens of Flint. We can't have things happen to them; instead, things happen because of them, so it's really about empowerment. Civic empowerment is a term that is often thrown around, but I see it happening here," she said. "Today's group is highly engaged, but what about the rest of Flint? How do you diffuse the energy in this room and ensure it happens throughout the community? I think that is, in part, the strength of the associations that I heard about today."
This is an excerpt from the article, UM-Flint's "Cracks in the Pavement" Symposium brings the community together to showcase Flint's civic empowerment, written by U-M Flint's Kat Oak.
