While most twenty-something males are concerned with the athletics, girls and grades, Eric Barthold has something else on his mind: stopping sexual violence on college campuses.
Since 2010, Barthold’s Mules Against Violence (MULES) has been raising awareness among Maine’s Colby College student body about the issue. The idea came to Barthold one day while sitting in his “Boys to Men” class where a girl was presenting research concerning sexual assault on campus. In that moment, Barthold realized something needed to be done and that it had to start with men.
Originally, he and two other students formed the group Male Athletes Against Violence, but they changed the name to accommodate female members. (The mule is the school’s mascot.) With that, the group set on their mission to educate the student body and “challenge male athlete stereotypes,” according to Collectively.
So far, group activities include joining the college’s Quilting Club to knit a giant quilt in the middle of the Student Center and encouraging male athletes to attend the Take Back the Night rally every year.
Unique to MULES, though, is the Man Box activity. This hour-long presentation, which targets men, starts with one simple question: What does it take to be a ‘real’ man? From there, a conceptual box is drawn with the responses being written inside it. On the outside are the answers to the question about what characteristics aren’t thought of as being associated with men.
“You almost always get: strong, powerful, controlling, drinks beer or can hold his alcohol, can get lots of girls, heterosexual, no emotions,” Barthold tells Collectively.
On the outside, though, are all the traits that aren’t considered masculine, such as emotional, sensitive, caring, drives a Prius or skinny jeans.
“The exercise shows the anxiety that guys feel to be manly,” Barthold explains. “If they’re in the box, they’re OK. But if they fall outside the box, they get targeted.”
The final questions Barthold asks the group concern how men protect themselves from being perpetrators of sexual violence and how women protect themselves from being victims. While the men have an answer about women, they can’t answer it about themselves.
Due to the success of his program, Barthold has expanded it to all-boys middle and high schools with the hopes of starting change at a younger age.
MORE: How to Fix Alaska’s Culture of Sexual Violence
Category: Bridging the Opportunity Divide
How A Venezuelan Program Inspired Massachusetts to Save the Music
Across the country school budget cuts have led to diminishing music programs, but Massachusetts is borrowing an idea from Venezuela to carry on the tune.
The Massachusetts Cultural Council (MCC) announced plans this week to set aside funding for a program inspired by El Sistema, a free, music-education program founded in Venezuela, making it the first state to do so in the United States. The new program, SerHacer, translates to “to be is to make.”
El Sistema, which focuses on “intensive ensemble participation” from as early as pre-school, was founded in 1975 by Dr. Jose Antonio Abreu to help poor Venezuelan children learn to play music, according to its website. More than three decades later, the program has transformed into a philosophy that’s gaining international traction. In 2009, Dr. Abreu was awarded the TED Prize for his mission to expand the program. Venezuela’s El Sistema reaches more than 500,000 students with plans to increase that number to 1,000,000 annually.
MCC Executive Director Anita Walker began supporting the idea after a visit to Venezuela with the New England Conservatory and Longy School of Music, two higher-education programs that practice the philosophy. The Council plans to award $55,000 toward the initiative, according to Erik Holmgren, who is leading up SerHacer.
The first batch of recipients in Massachusetts include programs such as Sistema Somerville, the Cape Conservatory in Hyannis and the social service Kids 4 Harmony, according to WBUR. The state plans to open free instrument lending libraries to students while also conducting studies on the benefits of music education.
For schools like Springfield High School of Science and Technology, the benefits are obvious. Music director Gary Bernice tells WBUR 99 percent of his 500 students, most of which hail from low-income neighborhoods, had no experience with instruments before joining band.
“It’s no secret that our dropout rate and graduation rate in urban centers is not great. But for students who are in our band…for more than one year, they are almost twice as likely to graduate high school than their peers,” he says.
MORE: Music and Mentorship: How an Austin Org Is Helping Foster Kids Survive the System
The Savvy People That Are Saving Prescription Drugs From Landfills and Giving Them to Needy Patients
Most of us are aware that Americans waste a lot of food, which has spurred nonprofits like the Food Recovery Network to avert some of that loss and give it to hungry people. But you may not know that Americans also toss out an astonishing amount of perfectly good prescription drugs as well. These drugs end up in landfills, flushed down the toilet or burnt in incinerators where they can harm people or the environment, keeping them from people who could use them.
Fifty percent of the Americans that the Commonwealth Fund surveyed said that they had failed to fill a prescription ordered by their doctors because of the price of the drug, and according to the CDC, 25 percent of Americans struggle with paying their medical bills.
Which is why several crusaders are working to get unused prescription drugs into the hands of people who need them. George Wang, whose Stanford, California-based nonprofit startup Sirum recovers these drugs, calculates that $700 million worth of prescriptions could be saved each year. He talked with Marketplace about “the absurdity of the waste and how gross it is, the fact that it’s raining down on families where these drugs are being burnt. It’s insane, right?”
One of the big culprits is nursing homes. Residents use a lot of prescriptions, but regulations require these facilities to toss prescriptions instead of sharing them between patients. Larry McCarty, a medical waste hauler who works for nursing homes in California describes, “brand new packages that have never been open and still have the saran over the top of them. Whole packages, just sitting in there.”
Sirum has developed software to make it simple for nursing homes to donate leftover drugs, shipping them to pharmacies that will give them to low-income people or those who don’t have insurance.
In Oklahoma, Linda Johnston, the Tulsa County Director of Social Service, heads up a program that involves retired doctors in collecting unused drugs and delivering them to the needy, saving $16 million worth of drugs so far, and countless lives. Johnston talked with Marketplace about one young man who’d received anti-depression medication from the program. “He wanted me to know he was not going to commit suicide, because he had his medication, he could take it.”
MORE: How Much Food Could Be Rescued if College Dining Halls Saved Their Leftovers?
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How Homegrown Roots Can Save Local Food Economies
When the local economy is threatened, what do you do?
While some may turn to outside forces for help, others turn to the people at the heart of the matter: the community. That’s exactly what residents of Asheville, N.C. did by bringing to fruition a homegrown solution through the Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project (ASAP).
With the changes in the tobacco industry and the trend towards larger agricultural farms, North Carolina communities realized that something needed to be done to preserve their farmers, which are constrained in size because of the mountainous landscape. That answer came in the form of a group of volunteers led by Charlie Jackson.
The group began by taking it to the streets, publicizing local farms and products through door-to-door campaigns, newspaper articles and radio announcements. It also printed a Local Food Guide as well as a weekly “Fresh at the Farmer’s Market” report, according to the Sustainable Cities Collective.
In 2002, the nonprofit ASAP was born.
Since then, it has expanded its efforts by starting the “Appalachian Grown” program, which offers certification to local farms, restaurants, distributers and grocers. Acceptance into this elite group entitles members to technical assistance, marketing support, training and a network of other local food providers.
Preserving an economy requires all generations, which is why ASAP is going into schools to educate youths through its “Growing Minds Farm to School” program. Working with schools, ASAP organizes school gardens, local food cooking classes, farm field trips and local food service in the cafeteria, as well as training teachers and dietitians.
The purpose of the program is to make local food a commodity which everyone can enjoy, which is why a large percentage of students receive free or reduced lunch.
For Jackson, though, the movement is about the community, so it leads the project, which has the added benefit minimizing infrastructure issues.
“It’s really important to ASAP that a just food system’s going to include everybody,” Jackson tells Sustainable Cities Collective. “Right now, we’re thinking about this as a movement. Focusing on local is an amazing way to create community dialogue and democracy that we don’t have in our food community right now.”
Through the work of ASAP, the western North Carolina agriculture economy is thriving, and Asheville has become a cultural hub. And for a region that was on the brink of disappearance 15 years ago, it just goes to show what a difference a little home fertilization can make.
MORE: This Startup Uses Urban Relics to Serve Up Local Food
Can Grocery Stores Change the Narrative on Food Waste?
An estimated 50 million Americans suffer from food hunger while the average family in the U.S. wastes $1,500 worth of food annually. Without the help of more conscious consumers and better food practices, that disparity is likely to only grow bigger. But food brands and grocery stores have an opportunity to step in and help make a change, according to a new report from brand innovation firm BBMG.
While some cities like San Francisco are making composting compulsory to reduce the amount of landfill waste, it’s simply not enough.Forget training programs and reach for the controller. But BBMG found by making subtle changes in how food companies approach customers, they could help could alter how consumers are experiencing food and food waste.
The company predicts that reducing waste is possible through making smarter consumer choices and by tapping Generation X and Millennials — two generations who love to consume, but are conscious of the environmental and social values of products. The nation’s younger population can help shift food practices, but must first overcome tendencies to overbuy, a lack of time for shopping, misleading expiration dates and poor food storage, the report finds.
Which is why grocery stores can allay these concerns by providing a few simple nudges for its customers. One example is BagIQ, a startup that’s tailoring a consumer’s experience at the grocery store. The startup aggregates bought items to create a list of healthy recipes based on the recent purchases. Grocery stores can apply a similar model by emailing a customer recipe ideas after they leave the store or through creating meal-planning apps to help organize food.
Grocery stores can also make it easier to donate food to charity or create a game-like experience for shopping lists to help shoppers visualize what they’re buying. As for expiry dates, or “best by” labels, BBMG suggests simplifying language to “Eat me first” stickers to help people recognize food that may spoil, rather than going by often inaccurate dates.
Storing food properly is also a major issue. BBMG said consumers often admit to not understanding optimal storage to avoid food from spoiling sooner. Grocery stores can educate customers on strategic storing, including what should be washed before its stored, if fruits can go next to vegetables and what should be eaten first. An app that helps with meal planning can also help map out when to use fresh produce.
Finally, grocery stores can also improve on waste is by providing consumer rewards and incentives for how often they visit a store rather than how much they purchase. With a tendency to overbuy, incentivizing frequency rather than quantity teaches consumers that it’s not always best to buy in bulk.
While some of these suggestions may take some planning, most are simplistic ways for food brands to innovate the way we think about food. For the 50 million Americans who go hungry, that’s a step worth taking.
MORE: Let’s Hope This Is the Next Big Food Trend
How This Company Is Using Gaming To Teach Job Skills
It’s a common belief that young people play too many video games. Interestingly, one company thinks it’s found a way to tap that love of gaming to fight youth unemployment.
Cognotion founders Jonathon Dariyanani and Joanna Schneier knew something must be done to combat employee apathy and unemployment. Their unique solution? A series of software programs that combats employee turnover through the use of interactive games and simulation trials. The software teaches the hard skills required for the job, but also soft skills, such as how to convey empathy to annoyed customers or to analyze situational clues to solve a problem.
In 2013, 73 million youths were unemployed worldwide, according to the International Labor Organization, and in July the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported a 14 percent youth unemployment rate compared to 6.3 percent overall. Cognotion’s founders felt like something needed to be done.
“We really felt that after waiting for 10 years for disruption to the system, that a lot of the human potential which could be unlocked through the use of educational technology hadn’t yet [been invented],” Dariyanani tells Next City.
Right now, Cognotion has software for hotel clerks, government workers, retail cashiers and customer service representatives, and recently developed a medical game regarding the Ebola virus to train 20,000 doctors and nurses.
“We find that when we present the same industry-specific, job-specific information that’s contained in a training manual to somebody in the form of a game or with a mentor, it increases absorption, comprehension and retention,” Dariyanani explains to Next City. “We believe these sorts of products provide trackable, actionable and immediate educational benefits, so you’re meeting the learner where they are.”
MORE: The Program Giving Workers Without College Degrees a Leg Up
How Going to the Movies Can Help People with Developmental Disabilities
More than 65 percent of adults with disabilities are unemployed.
That’s a statistic Valerie Jensen was committed to change as the president of a Connecticut-based organization called SPHERE, which helps people with developmental disabilities.
One day, Jensen was inspired by an empty building that used to be a movie theater: Why not refurbish it and open it as a theater staffed by disabled adults?
Through plenty of hard work and collaboration with other organizations in Ridgefield, Conn., Jensen brought The Prospector Theater to life. Doyle Coffin Architecture designed the building, which features four theaters, a restaurant and a café, and chef Raffaele Gallo came up with the menu. Best yet? The program runs without any government funding, sustaining itself through donations and movie ticket and popcorn sales.
Prospector Theater employees offer moviegoers first-run films such as “Interstellar” and “The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1,” plus first-class customer service. “We are returning the cinema to what movie going used to be like,” Jensen tells the Christian Science Monitor. “People will be dazzled by the fantastic customer service. And with that I hope their attitudes will be opened and changed about hiring people with disabilities. We want to break the cycle of unemployment.”
Prospector Theater shows many of its movies during the day — a must, Jensen explained — because it’s difficult for disabled people to find transportation for jobs at night. It also offers training to its employees in such skills as photo editing and cooking.
Jensen says, “Our goal is to have people leave us.” But not without helping plenty of customers have a stellar movie-going experience first.
MORE: Minnesota’s Bold Move to Hire More Employees with Disabilities
The City That’s Using a Trail to Unite Its Citizens
When people think of Indianapolis, one thing probably comes to mind: the Indy 500. Americans love their cars, and Hoosiers are no exception. So what happens when you pry people away from their combustion engines and encourage them to hit the trail?
The Indianapolis Cultural Trail, a pedestrian and bike path that opened in May 2013, is offering an antidote to the driving frenzy that has defined one Midwest city for the past 60 years. After decades of urban renewal, benign neglect, middle-class flight and a general malaise, the eight-mile-long trail serves as a type of public-space stimulus package — generating jobs, creating conversations about public art, providing a place for school children to exercise and offering people a long, winding, linear site for contemplation.
The Cultural Trail isn’t so much a massive de novo Frederick Law Olmsted-esque vision as it is an enhancement of the existing environment. As a place for cyclists, walkers and runners, the path was created with more than 11 acres of pavers elegantly laid out on existing sidewalks and right of ways. The trail winds its way through six different cultural districts — including the funky Fountain Square that houses antique shops and a vibrant arts scene and the increasingly chic Mass Ave (Massachusetts Avenue) corridor, which is dotted with everything from the 128-year-old Stout’s Footwear to gastro pubs like Black Market. The transit and leisure function of the trail got a true shot in the arm when the Pacers Bikeshare program began in April 2014. Mirroring other bike share systems in cities like Chicago and New York, the Pacers program offers visitors access to 25 stations with a total of 250 bikes, which means that both casual and serious cyclists are well served.
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The entire project cost $63 million, with $27.5 million coming from private funding and $35.5 million from federal transportation funding. The long-term economic impact of the trail — including new construction along the right of way, job creation and real estate investment, however — is estimated to top off at $864 million.
The trail came into being via the passionate stewardship of Eugene and Marilyn Glick, Indianapolis philanthropists (both now deceased) who worked for decades on a range of projects throughout Circle City — from donating a contemporary glass collection to the Indianapolis Museum of Art to fostering leadership programs for underprivileged youths. The Glick family gave $15 million to the trail project, committing in particular to creating a two-block Peace Walk, a section of the path that honors great national humanitarians like Booker T. Washington and Jonas Salk and invites visitors to slow down and reflect.
Commenting on the Glicks’ contributions, Brian Payne, founder and president of the Cultural Trail, says, “They appreciated the commitment to beautiful landscaping along the trail, and they were both proud that all different ages, races and economic sectors would be able to use the trail and make it their own.”
Payne also speaks passionately about the broader economic transformation wrought by this avenue of conviviality. “The Fountain Square has seen the most dramatic transformation with dozens of new apartments, buildings and retail stores,” he says. Beyond private investment and real estate, there’s much more: “A YMCA fitness center and bike hub with bike storage and repair functions have been built along the trail, and there are also future plans for an exhibit created by the Indiana Historical Society,” Payne adds.
Perhaps what is most exciting about the trail is that residents and groups are utilizing it in ways that are unique and thoughtful. Andrea Hunley, principal of the Center for Inquiry at School 2, says her teachers are taking full advantage of their school’s proximity to the Cultural Trail as a way to engage students with their environment. Her students run and go biking on the trail as part of their physical education courses; the school’s world percussion ensemble hosted a drum circle; and the fourth- and fifth-grade classrooms created an edible garden and seating area alongside the path.
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As schools seek new opportunities to use the trail, businesses have sought out locations that take advantage of the corridor’s cultural diversity. One such hub of activity is the Indy Reads Books outlet, which is located along the Mass Ave portion of the trail. Formally speaking, it’s a bookstore, but its mission also involves one-on-one tutoring sessions, literacy labs and ESL instruction.
The Indy Reads Books outlet was started because Margot Lacy Eccles, an Indianapolis philanthropist and supporter of the arts, asked a key question: “Are there any bookstores on the trail?” She believed there would be a symbiotic relationship between the two. The popularity of the store’s programs and the number of folks walking off the trail and into it on any given day stand as a testament to this sage idea.
Of course, some of the most compelling stories about the trail are coming from people just out doing their own thing. Carla Knopp, a local artist and explorer, uses this urban boardwalk as a place to display her latest art exhibits that she carries behind her bike in a makeshift trailer, which she calls IndyBam (Indianapolis Bike Art Messenger). “It’s perfect for subtle, spontaneous, un-orchestrated social engagements,” she says, welcoming these informal interactions with people as she takes her mobile gallery up and down the trail. In her estimation, she says, the trail should be applauded for “its ambitious scope and successful implementation.”
One of the trail’s main charms is that it encourages locals to get out and explore well-known but often overlooked corners of Indianapolis. In the past year, city residents have been utilizing these eight miles in ways that are both creative and compelling.
While the Cultural Trail is still in its infancy, it’s already changing the conversation about what the future holds for Indianapolis, and it has the potential to knit back together some of the city’s frayed and challenged neighborhoods — and that is a refreshing prospect.
For Kids That Struggle with Reading, Digital Literacy Programs Show Promise
Can an electronic device actually improve literacy skills?
Schools with high percentages of low-income students are seeing promising gains in reading ability and enthusiasm since they’ve introduced tablet reading programs in about 30 schools in Brevard County, Fla.
Mackenzie Ryan of Florida Today writes about Christopher Jamian-Fleck, a student at Emma Jewel Charter Academy, who earned his own tablet computer last year and became an ebookworm with the help of a reading program called MyON.
While home sick, Jamian-Fleck began exploring the program’s library of 20,000 books and learned to read with the help of a program that highlights each word as it is read. (Other features that can assist kids with dyslexia or those that simply need extra help include the ability to increase font size or listen to the book read aloud.) The eight-year-old zoomed ahead from struggling with literacy to reading above grade level.
His grandmother Marcy Fleck says, “He wasn’t a reader before this, and now he’s enjoying it so much. He finds out things he never knew he was interested in. And he can go at his own pace.”
In fact, Christopher wouldn’t be able to check out books from his school without the tablet program because it doesn’t have a library. The charter school couldn’t afford to build one, so it used funding from the United Way to pay for MyON and Kindle e-readers for kids. Many of the families in the school don’t have Internet access or computers, so the e-readers make it possible for them to read e-books.
The program appears to be working even at schools with well-stocked libraries; Ryan writes that one principal noticed check outs of old-fashioned books at the school library increased once the digital program sparked the kids’ interest in reading.
Teresa Wright, who directs Brevard’s Early Childhood and Title I programs is working to secure funding to allow more low-income schools to get the program and the tablets it requires. “We’re hoping that students will have access before the holidays,” she says. “Reading is like a sport, the more you practice the better you get.”
MORE: Can Texting Help Improve Childhood Literacy?
Why Do These College Students Live in a Retirement Home?
There are some unlikely residents at the Judson Manor Retirement Community in Cleveland, Ohio: millennials.
Thanks to an innovative program from the Cleveland Institute of Music, three students get to stay rent-free at the center in exchange for monthly performances.
But as you can see in the video below, these youngsters aren’t just saving money and practicing a little Bach, they’re also making a difference in the lives of older adults.
ALSO: This Unique Education Initiative Connects Lonely Seniors to Chatty Teens
Music is not only a form of entertainment, it also has healing powers. As AgingCare.com points out, music therapy can help with numerous conditions, including Alzheimer’s, chronic pain, Parkinson’s and more. For example, music can help an aging adult who is struggling with memory loss, because familiar melodies helps them recall past events.
“The young people do a lot for us,” a Judson Manor resident tells the CBS Evening News. Another adds, “They bring us alive!”
There should be more programs like this around the country.
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