What do we have to do????

What do we have to do to get people to pay attention to whats going on in our world today..We are all so comfortable in our homes..Yesturday I was sitting at a local Brewery and the woman sitting next to me was reading the paper and I heard her say to her partner "The homeless problem is so sad I cant bare to read about it" I sat there thinking to my self you are right it is so sad and thats the exact reason we should be reading about it...I normally would never say anything to anyone but I couldent let it go..I leaned over and said "We should all be reading about it cause it is so sad...please dont ignore what has been put infront of you..." Im not sure if it was inappropriate but it felt right at the time...I just feel we are all connected and we have to help one another...we are not separate...I feel it in my soul we are not separate.....

Thank You for Inspiring me....

A BRIEF HISTORY OF CO

The roots of modern community organizing are as intertwined with the settlement house movement of the nineteenth century...as they are with the protest movements of the 1960s. 18
- Gary Delgado, Applied Research Center

I never thought about Community Organizing this way

1890 - 1920. The heyday of neighborhood organizing before 1960. Liberals and progressives sought to meet the challenge of industrialization - the bigness of cities and their chaotic social disorganization - by organizing immigrant neighborhoods into "efficient, democratic, and, of course, enlightened units within the metropolis." Since the emphasis of the reformers was mostly on building community through settlement houses and other service mechanisms, the dominant approach was social work.

1920 - 1940. Community organization became a professional sub-discipline within the social work field. Little was written about decentralized neighborhood organizing efforts throughout the Great Depression. Most organizations had a national orientation because the economic problems the nation faced did not seem soluble at the neighborhood level.

1940 - 1960. A new interest in CO from the social work perspective. This development dovetailed with the emergence of the distinctive approach of Saul Alinsky. Federal involvement in reshaping cities and their neighborhoods through the post-World War II urban renewal programs abetted this unique alignment. (Note: more information on Alinsky is included over the next few pages.)

1960 - 1980. Neighborhood organizing became widespread beginning in the 1960s. Literature analyzing events at the grassroots during this period is extensive. Experience with federal anti-poverty programs and the upheavals in the cities produced a thoughtful response among activists and theorists in the early 1970s that has informed activities, organizations, strategies and movements through the end of the century, though many major changes in CO have occurred since 1980.21

Neureoplasticity....not as simple as it seems

Neuroplasticity is not a trait found in a single brain structure, nor does it consist of just one simple type of physical or chemical event. Rather, the brain’s ability to be molded – its plasticity – is the result of many different, complex processes that occur in our brains throughout our lifetime. A host of different structures and types of cells play some part in making neuroplasticity possible. There are even different types of plasticity that, depending on one’s age, are more or less involved in reshaping the brain as it handles new information. Plasticity works throughout the brain not just in the normal processes of learning and adaptation (most obvious in the early developmental years, though continuing throughout life), but also in response to injuries or diseases that cause loss of mental functioning.

Thank you for this piece of poetry

Gandhi is Fasting
By Langston Hughes, 1943

Mighty Britain, tremble!
Let your empire’s standard sway
Let it break entirely—
My Gandhi fasts today

You may think it foolish—
That there’s no truth in what I say—
That all of Asia’s watching
As Gandhi fasts today

You know quite well, Great Britain
That it is not right

To starve and beat and oppress
Those who are not white
Of course, we do it too.
Here in the U.S.A.

May Gandhi’s prayers help us, as well
As he fasts today.

Cowboy and Indians....a childhood fooled

Growing up The Lone Ranger was my dads favorite television show. I never gave the thought of how this show depicted Native Americans a second thought. Of course I was very little and playing cowboys and Indians was the norm in most homes I visited. I remember my little brother and I playing and us both wanting to be the hero the cowboy riding the white horse saving the day... It really wasnt until I arrived at HSU and began recognizing the link between out countries horrific history with Native Americans and how they have historically been portrayed by the media. Its no wonder why so many stereotypes have continued to be accepted as the norm. When will be as a nation fed up with the media continueing these stereotypes. When will we decided enough is enough? I wish I knew, but I can say in my home and in my life I am more aware of what I say and what stereotypes I perpetrate against people more than I have ever been.