Conventional methods of social science research overly confound social determinants of health and adolescent development, relying too heavily on individual level measures of change. This translates into a dominant and inaccurate pathology that treats and assumes young people of color (YPOC) as “risk” or problem, influencing the ways in which policies, practices, and investments in academic achievement, student support, staff support, and school discipline are implemented, perpetuating inequitable conditions for YPOC.Listening to Heal (LtH) is a community-engaged inquiry process that explores the experiences of trauma for YPOC in the context of school, including the impact on social emotional health, adolescent development, learning and achievement, school discipline, and the school to prison pipeline. LtH builds on RYSE’s Listening Campaign (LC), a similar and preceding inquiry that revealed young people’s profound, collective experiences of oppression, the stigma of place (being from Richmond, CA), and not feeling valued or belonging.
LtH’s aim is to effectively serve the needs of YPOC by 1) understanding their lived experience in the context of ongoing trauma 2) informing more effective school based interventions and strategies, and 3) influencing/advocating for school and other institutional policies, protocols, relationships, and investments that are restorative, just, and healing.
1. I CAME TO THIS DAY BY WAY OF...
People
Places
Opportunities
Struggles Privileges
Successes
ObligationsSurprises
Benefits Other…
Welcome to Listening to Heal!
Please reflect as you get settled
3. Building Beloved Community
Our goal is to create a beloved community and
this will require a qualitative change in our
souls as well as a quantitative change in our
lives.” - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Beloved community is formed not by the
eradication of difference but by its affirmation,
by each of us claiming the identities and
cultural legacies that shape who we are and
how we live in the world. - bell hooks
The larger your beloved community, the
more you can accomplish in the world. -
Nhat Hahn
5. Building Beloved Community Today
1. Picture yourself at one of these ages: of 13, 16, 18
2. How did adults at school characterize you at this age?
3. How different or similar was this with other adults in your life (in your
family, community, work, etc.)?
4. How did these characterizations impact/influence you then?
5. What impacts/influences do they have on you now? In your work?
6. What would you have liked for adults to know at that age that they did not?
7. What would you like for your students and/or peers to know about who you are
that they might not know.
6. RYSE creates safe spaces grounded in social justice that build youth power for young
people to love, learn, educate, heal and transform the lives and communities.
RYSE provides:
➢ Sanctuary and safe space
➢ Opportunities to connect, heal, learn,
and lead
➢ Programs in Community Health, Youth
Leadership, Media, Arts & Culture,
Education & Justice
➢ Trauma response and triage
RYSE, 2016
RYSE is a:
✓ Home
✓ Center
✓ ’Beloved Community’
✓ Movement
7. • Hopelessness
• Scared and scarred
• Trapped, angry
• Numb, trying to forget
• Drugs and alcohol
• Facing the fear or running away
• Harm to self and others
• Seeking support was rarely
mentioned
Trauma is…
• Pervasive, assumed, and multi-
dimensional
• Organized through silencing and shaming
• Experienced with adults as unempathetic,
judgemental, and punitive
Impact and coping
Youth Want and Need
• Someone to listen and care
• Alternatives to what they see
• Opportunities to lead and learn
• Adults to do our work and healing together
RYSE Listening Campaign, 2013
RYSE’S context
9. History,
Legacy &
Structure
Systems &
Institutions
Community
& Place
Individual &
Interpersonal
Interacting Layers of Trauma and Healing
Nation Building by Enslavement,
Genocide, Colonization, Economic
Exploitation, Displacement, Cultural
Hegemony, White Supremacy
Systemic Subjugation of POC by
Interacting Policies & Systems: War
on Drugs, Mass Incarceration,
Segregation (de jure and de facto),
Anti-Immigrant Policies, Climate
Violence, Media Assaults,
Displacement & Redlining
Atmospheric Distress that
includes Interpersonal, Family,
Community Violence & Exposure;
Sexual Exploitation, Lack of Safe
Passage & Safe Spaces,
Underinvestment, Oversurveillance
Embodiment and Expression of
Distress through Personal
Traumatic Experiences; Bullying,
Family Systems Stressors, ACEs,
Shame and Blame, Generational
Transmission
Collective Liberation by Truth &
Reconciliation, Reparations,
Redistribution, Open Borders/No
Borders, Multi-racial Solidarity,
(Re)imagined Social Compact
Lead with Love and Justice by
Healing-Centered & Restorative
Practices, Listening Campaigns,
Collective Care, Adaptive, Responsive,
and Proximate, Power-sharing (Nothing
about us without us)
Build Beloved Community by Radical
Inquiry, Popular Education and Culture
Building, Celebration and Affirmation;
Healing Spaces, Arts & Expression,
Base & Power-Building
Honor Resilience and Fortitude by
Listening & Validating,
Processing/Integrating Personal
Traumatic Experiences, Family Healing,
Tailored Supports & Opportunities,
Loving Connections & Structure
Dehumanization and Distress Liberation and Healing
RYSE, 2017
10. “The most lasting and appropriate transmission
of knowledge is IN community [place] through
lived experiences.” —Dr. Alexis Pauline Gumbs
Radical Inquiry: connection, proximity, empathy
Desire-based research does not deny the
experience of trauma, tragedy, and pain, but
positions the knowing derived from such
experiences as wise.” - Dr. Eve Tuck, 2016
”… community is the context, and tenderness is
the methodology.” – Father Greg Boyle, 2007
11. Tenets of Radical Inquiry
1. RI is grounded in relationship and healing. The process is more important than the
results, and the results are collectively deemed and held.
2. RI employs multi-modal platforms of expression and sharing.
3. RI is focused on transforming systems. The problem is structural, not behavioral.
4. RI actively challenges and disrupts dehumanizing frameworks of social science
research.
5. RI enables and inspires transformative praxis that centers the priorities, needs, and
interests of YPOC.
6. RI requires more rigor and resources than conventional research and praxis.
12. Listening to Heal
Listening
Campaign
(2013)
YPARs
(2014-2017…)
Listening to Heal
(2017-2018/9)
Inquiry as intervention
Localized data shared with
all
Trauma and Healing
Learning Series (annual)
Understanding coping
Chat Lounge
STPP/School Climate
Gender Justice & Safety
Inquiry in schools
Inquiry with adults
1st Share out in Fall
2018
Policy wins!
Kids First Richmond Ballot Initiative
Positive Schools Climate Resolution
Fall 2018:
Rethinking PD days
Ongoing listening space for adults
14. Building Beloved Community
Work across roles and systems
Insert text here.
tex Remember that we are in service to young people, not systems
Prioritize relationships
Foster social-emotional health AND socio-political
development
Conduct race and power analysis in ALL the work
15. Building Beloved Community
Address the social ecologies of violence
Insert text here.
tex Name and validate young people’s experiences
Tell young people we love them
Commit to healthy struggle and vulnerability
Stay/get proximate and support those who are
16. Building Beloved Community
Avoid judgemental and limiting frames
Insert text here.
tex Good vs. bad coping - it’s all coping
Zero tolerance, abstinence only
Overemphasis on behavior change
Underemphasis on systems change
17. Building Beloved Community
Heal and build together
Insert text here.tex Invest in collective care and healing
Create affirming and reflective space(s)
Discuss our wounds, make repairs
Bear witness
Stay adaptive, take risks