Always an honor to be invited to share dialogue and ideas at Pancakes & Politics - but especially with fierce sisters and friends in the work Latrice McClendon from @knightfdn , @kyleemitchellwells from Ballmer Group and @wendylewisjackson from @thekresgefoundation . Each of us telling the story of great work happening in the D by community, nonprofits, for and with and led by youth - from neighborhood to neighborhood. #pancakes&politics
Thank you @nu_detroit and Ben Falik (@rushmorethenewf ) for running this piece about Jews and Whiteness. Some themes touched on in @sonsofdetroit_film
The film is premiering THIS WEEK: May 14th, 7:30 pm Michigan Theater in Ann Arbor and May 17th, 7pm Detroit Film Theatre in Detroit. Q&A led by Angelique Power from the Skillman Foundation.
Tickets here: /soddetroitscreening
“I have this memory. It’s 1990. I’m standing in the stairwell of my East Berlin apartment building. My girlfriend is next to me, tears streaming down her cheeks. Quiet and confused, my face is twisted into a question mark. I’m staring at our mailbox. Scrawled across the front is a swastika and the words Juden Raus.
All that’s going through my mind is that this is some sort of mistake. You got the wrong guy. I’m a white boy from Detroit, partly raised in a black family. I have shit to deal with and my own fair share of hangups, but this isn’t one of them. This is someone else’s story.
And there I was, standing in that stairwell in Berlin, confused and blind to myself, unable to see what that swastika had to do with me—because my generations before had worked so hard to make sure I wouldn’t. The fear they had lived with had been converted into a survival strategy: become white, succeed, don’t look back. “
@rebootjewish@jewishdetroit@jeremyxido@grtchngnzls@skillmanpower@downtownsynagogue@amandaxido@jmham@detroitjewsforjustice@jacobsmith88@detpubtheatre@muzachary@bellbiba@fainaland@michstatetheaters@detroitfilmtheatre@jjcuris@midnightolive@repairtheworld@sfjewishfilm
Thank you @grahamorama and the @detroitnews for the very thoughtful piece on @sonsofdetroit_film . Interviews with @jeremyxido and Marsha Battle Philpot (aka @marsha_music ). Read the article here: https://rb.gy/ohkw4w
Join Marsha and Jeremy on Sunday May 17th at the @detroitfilmtheatre for a post screening Q&A with Angelique Powers (@skillmanpower )from the Skillman Foundation. Come watch the film with us and have your questions ready.
Also Sons of Detroit is the opening night film of the Cinetopia Festival on May 14th in Ann Arbor.
Get tickets for both screenings here: /soddetroitscreening
Part love letter, part detective story, the film follows a white man raised as part of a black family on Detroit’s East Side, who returns after 20 years away to find the block gone and the family scattered. He and his cousin, recently home after 20 years in prison, set out together to uncover what happened to their family, their block, and the golden age of 1970s Detroit that made them. Watch the trailer here:
@amandaxido@grtchngnzls@michstatetheaters@cinetopiafilmfest@mediumallure@dianaddrumm@hardworkingmovies@jmham
Cousin cities. Detroit came to the Southside of Chicago. Skillman staff embarked on a learning journey. Day One was about place. We rooted ourselves in history, present and future. In organizing and policy and youth. In power to the people, cause power to the people don't stop.
Thank you @lisayunlee and @tiff_beatty , thank you @marquismiller1 - thank you Hyde Park, Kenwood, Bronzeville. Cousins for life.
Free bus rides for students. Over $1M for afterschool programs. City events planned by teens. These are some of the headlines coming out of Detroit.
Tune in to Our State of Education on WJR 760 AM radio OR download wherever you get your podcasts to hear from Detroit’s new mayor, Mary Sheffield; Department of Youth and Education appointees, Dr. Chanel Hampton and Jerjuan Howard; and community organizer, Imani Foster, about the city’s groundbreaking plans to make Detroit a place of opportunity for young people.
American shero Ruby Bridges was my table mate at this year's NAACP Fight for Freedom dinner. Inspiring night of speeches from awardees Letitia James, Hakeem Jeffries, Kristen Cole and Detroit's own hero Dwan Dandridge. Keep watch, keep walking, keep bending the arc. Thank you Kamilia and Rev Anthony for a night that lifted us and challenged us. We hear the call for freedom. Always worth the fight.
Ashe. The divine, universal energy inside each of us, connecting us. Ashe. A sacred word that when spoken gives momentum to our work, an invocation and blessing, begetting transformation. When signed it is one hand laying gently and on top of a fist. So many ideas, hugs, reflections and provocations this week at the @abfephilanthropy conference. Emerging grateful for this soulful space, deeply inspired, ancestrally rooted and ready.
Ashe. Ashe. Ashe.
Celebrating National Reading Month with Detroit’s smallest and most excited learners! Thank you @miside_detroit for inviting us to share our love of reading with your early childhood class! ☺️❤️
#nationalreadingmonth #marchreadingmonth #reading #detroit #education
The Special Education Symposium was filled with hope, innovation, chess, and big ideas. Across public, private and religious schools there are superhero scholars and teachers who are ensuring classrooms are inclusive and innovative. This is because all students have unique needs and the better we adapt to meet them, the more we all grow, learn and thrive. Thank you Yeshiva Beth Yehudah for hosting this symposium and for dedicating time and resources for students beyond your walls, beyond your community, and instead to all students across Michigan.
Detroiters are setting the agenda for our city, and especially the youngest Detroiters. Today was Mayor Sheffield’s last community meeting focused on the future of education and centering youth in City decision making. Nearly 10,000 people weighed in online, nearly 1,0000 in person. The most community-led Mayoral transition in history. Whose voice? Youth voice.
Big. Day. Mayor Sheffield announced we have an entire team dedicated to Education and Youth Affairs. A keen focus, a citywide priority that will braid schools, after school, transportation, neighborhood planning, safety and all city services together all around youth. Youth as part of the process and centered in the work. Our goal? When anyone is asked “How are the children?” Each of us can answer “the children are well”. Go Detroit 🖤
What does LOVE designed in policy look like? Every single pregnant woman and new mom in Detroit will now receive $1,500 before the baby and $500 a month for the first entire year of the baby's life. So many hands came together to make Dr. Mona and Luke Schaefer's dream come true. And from the Mayor to the Governor to friends from across the state we all came today to help it launch.
