Category: Community
Eden Place Nature Center’s Farm to Table Fundraiser: Tomorrow 4-8pm
This year’s inaugural event will feature organic and fresh food from Eden Place and local area farms. Enjoy a four-course meal prepared by three of Chicago’s best restaurants, live music and a host of special guess attendees. Enjoy Delicious Cuisine Creations from Majani Restaurant, Roe’s Gratitude, Sweet Blooms, and Eden Place Farms.
Tickets still available online! Event will be at the Nature Center, with street parking on the north end. See event info on Facebook here.
Talking (and Sampling) Water at Sherman Park in Chicago
This past Tuesday I had the good fortune to go to the Sherman Park branch library of the Chicago Public Library system in order to do an hour-long program on water and sustainability for neighborhood teens. The librarian who invited me, Faith Rice, encouraged me to be as “hands-on” as possible instead of just lecturing, which suited me just fine — so I brought my surface water testing kit, turbidity tube, bucket, and assorted supplies in the hope that we could leave the library and do some sampling of the lovely, meandering lagoon of historic Sherman Park on Chicago’s South Side.
As I made the drive from Roosevelt in the Loop down to Garfield Avenue, it began to rain. Perfect, I thought, for an afternoon dedicated to talking about water — but the downside was that the rain caused some of the teens who walk or ride their bikes to the library to go home early before our 4pm session. Nevertheless, when I arrived I was welcomed by Faith’s colleague, Lala, who got me set up in the lovely old library’s classroom and assured me we could step outside to the park and get a bucket of water for testing.
I ended up ditching my planned slide presentation and just having a free-ranging conversation about water with three kids: Destiny, a high school senior; Tiara, an 8th-grader; and Lawrence, another 8th-grader. Despite not knowing me from Adam, they were very talkative and willing to share their knowledge about the water cycle, as I asked them to say what comes to mind when they hear the word “water.” We soon trekked outside with Lala to the nearby edge of the park’s lagoon, where we gathered a bucketful of water to do three trials with our turbidity tube outside in the intermittant drizzle. (Average reading was 9cm or 120NTU, which indicates a high level of turbidity — something obvious just from looking at the murky water.)
We took another bucketful of water back into the library’s classroom to do a few more quick tests before the kids needed to leave by 5pm. As we re-entered, we caught the attention of the security guard, who betrayed her interest in our somewhat noisy (and wet) experiments — so I invited her and an adult patron to join us. They let the kids do all the work, but we also chatted about their ideas and assumptions about the quality of water in the lagoon as well as the ongoing issue of lead contamination of Chicago’s drinking water.
The kids measured the temperature of the water (26 degrees C, a bit high for most aquatic life, but indicative of our near-shore sampling and the hot summer in Chicago); pH (8.9, fairly alkaline but still within an acceptable range); and nitrate (0-0.1ppm, a relatively low level of a nutrient that can cause harmful algal blooms). While we didn’t have time to conduct more comprehensive tests, the kids were able to assess the current water quality of the lagoon as “so-so” — OK in some respects, not so good in others — which pretty much jibes with most of my water quality sampling results on the Chicago River the last several years with my Roosevelt University students.
Beyond those quantitative assessments, though, what impressed me about the afternoon’s adventure was the importance of parklands and water bodies here in the vast urban landscape of Chicago. Just as the Sherman Park branch library is an oasis of education, literacy, and community programming (for kids and adults alike), so too are the meadows, woods, and lagoon of Sherman Park itself a vital natural resource for the neighborhood’s residents. Getting one’s feet a little muddy at the banks of the lagoon taking water samples drives that point home in a tangible (and fun) way.
Chicago Agreement on Climate & Community: Local Voices
A week before the Chicago Climate Community Forum was held on 3 Dec 2017 at the Field Museum, I was fortunate to participate in the filming of the newly released Chicago Agreement on Climate & Community, which debuted at the forum attended by over 2,000 people last Sunday. Here’s the video, which brings to life the text of the Agreement.
The Agreement is a living document which you can read, provide feedback on, and sign (if you so wish) yourself and/or on behalf of an organization. Please share this video and the Chicago Community Partnership website with people you know as we build a movement to mitigate climate change here throughout the Chicago region.
Chicago Community Climate Forum: Sunday 12/3 at the Field Museum
pdf version
Oxfam Hunger Banquet Today @RooseveltU 1pm
I’m honored to deliver a guest faculty lecture at this event today at Roosevelt University. Please come and engage in a meaningful conversation about how food insecurity is prevalent and relates to our community while you learn more about issues of hunger, sustainability and how you can help. Please register for the event here.
Sponsored by the Black Student Union and the RU Counseling Center, the Oxfam Hunger Banquet provides a chance for us to address the severity of food insecurity and starvation as it relates to our community, and will assist in fostering a community of care that will allow us to join in the fight against inequality, injustice, and oppression. Oxfam is a global organization working to end the injustice of poverty.
Roosevelt University’s “American Dream Reconsidered” Conference Planned for Sept. 12-15
Students, colleagues, and friends — please attend and participate in this major conference at Roosevelt next month, which should be a galvanizing week on our campus. The theme couldn’t be more timely, considering the tensions, rancor, and controversies of the current election season. In particular, I’m looking forward to speaking on a faculty panel addressing the presidential election (Wed 9/14, 4:15pm) and participating in Service Day on 9/15. The following text is from Roosevelt’s official announcement of the conference. Be sure to register soon!
What does the American Dream mean today? That’s the topic of a major conference Roosevelt University will be hosting Sept. 12-15 in Chicago.
At more than a dozen lectures and discussions, leading American scholars, activists and entrepreneurs will analyze the American Dream and how it affects millennials, education, health care, real estate, immigration, politics and more.
“The American Dream is about every individual who aspires to achieve more in life,” said Ali Malekzadeh, president of Roosevelt University and a native of Iran. “Understanding our national ethos of democracy and equality has never more urgent. At the American Dream Reconsidered Conference, we will present many viewpoints on what it means to be an American in these challenging times.”
The conference, sponsored by BlueCross BlueShield of Illinois, McDonald’s Corporation and other organizations, also celebrates Malekzadeh’s first year in office. It is being held in lieu of formal and expensive presidential installation ceremonies commonly held on university campuses. Instead, President Malekzadeh has led an effort to discuss the future of the American Dream and initiate a new scholarship program for six outstanding Roosevelt students. Among the highlights of the first annual American Dream Reconsidered Conference are:
• A conversation with PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel on “The American Dream — Globalization, Technology and Progress.” (Sept. 13, 12:30-1:45 p.m.)
• A lecture by Pedro Noguera, distinguished professor of Education at UCLA, on “The Five Principles of Courageous Leadership to Guide Achievement of Every Student.” (Sept. 12 , 6:00-7:30 p.m., Roosevelt’s Goodman Center)
• A panel discussion on “The Current State of the American Dream” featuring John W. Rogers Jr., founder and CEO of Ariel Investments; Melissa Bean, Midwest chair of JP Morgan Chase and former member of the U.S. Congress; Rabbi Abie Ingber, executive director of the Center for Interfaith Community Engagement at Xavier University and Ali Malekzadeh, Roosevelt president. (Sept. 14, 9:30 to 10:45 a.m.)
• “A Conversation on Justice, Race and the American Dream” with Martha C. Nussbaum, the Ernst Freund distinguished service professor of law and ethics at the University of Chicago and Jelani Cobb, professor of journalism at Columbia University and staff writer at the New Yorker magazine. (3:30 to 5 p.m., Sept. 13)
• “A Conversation on Community Leadership and Social Justice,” moderated by Samuel Betances, and including Tom Burrell, founder of Burrell Communications; Gloria Castillo, president and CEO of Chicago United; Father Michael Pfleger, St. Sabina’s Church; Dana Suskind, University of Chicago Medicine and founder of the Thirty Million Words Initiative and Omar Yamini, activist and author. (Sept. 12, 1:30 to 3 p.m.)
Other panel discussions during the week focus on: immigration (Sept. 14, 2 to 3:15); the Affordable Care Act (Sept. 13, 9:30 to 11 a.m.); the 2016 presidential election (Sept. 14, 4:15 to 5:45 p.m.); real estate (Sept. 13, 9:30 to 11 a.m.); and corporate America (Sept. 14, 4:15 to 5:45 p.m.). There is also a film on millennials created by undergraduate students.
On the last day of the conference, Thursday, Sept. 15, Roosevelt will award BlueCross BlueShield of Illinois American Dream Scholarships to outstanding Roosevelt students. The University community will also participate in the American Dream Service Day, when students, faculty, staff, alumni and friends of the University will volunteer at 30 nonprofit organizations throughout the Chicago area.
Roosevelt University, home of the American Dream Reconsidered Conference, was founded in 1945 to protest discriminatory racial and religious college admission quotas, and remains dedicated to providing access to higher education for all qualified students.
“Education is the key to achieving the American Dream,” President Malekzadeh said. “That’s why Roosevelt is hosting this conference.”
The American Dream Reconsidered Conference is free and open to the public, however reservations are requested. For more details and to register, visit: www.Roosevelt.edu/americandream. The conference will be centered at Roosevelt University, 430 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago, with additional events at RU’s campus in Schaumburg, IL.
INSS Conference in Uptown, Chicago IL, June 8-10
Next week I’ll be attending and presenting at the Integrated Network for Social Sustainability Conference, a national multi-site conference that is hosted locally by the Institute of Cultural Affairs in Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood. I’ll be presenting on Thursday 6/9 at 2:45pm in the Education & Culture session along with my colleague, friend, and co-author Mr. Michael Howard, executive director and co-founder of Eden Place Nature Center on Chicago’s South Side.
To see an interactive agenda, register, and attend the conference, check out this link. Hope to see you there! An overview is also available here (pdf).
Diversity Week at RU, Feb 29-Mar4
Mitchell’s Food Mart — A Thriving Throwback in Joliet
This essay was published as an op-ed piece entitle “Mitchell’s Still Has Magic for Me” in the Joliet Herald-News, p14, on 30 December 2010. I offer it here five years later as a commentary on supporting local economies and celebrating the unique small businesses in our home towns. Gladly, business is still good!
Normally I utterly detest shopping. But a few days before Christmas when my wife noted we were running low on some staple food items, I seized the opportunity with gusto: “Great, honey! I’ll run to Mitchell’s.”
A small, nondescript building with a friendly 1960s-vintage lighted sign, Mitchell’s Food Mart on Raynor Avenue in Joliet is the epitome of the small neighborhood grocery store, one run by the same family since opening sixty years ago.
Walking inside is like a journey back in time. Customers carefully guide half-size shopping carts down four or five narrow aisles packed full with meticulously arranged inventory. Each item features a little orange price tag that has been applied by hand (no UPC scanning here). The one register for checkout features a friendly and efficient employee who actually knows how to bag groceries and make proper change, both of which are lost arts.
The utterly delightful candy section, strategically placed alongside the checkout line, reminds me of every corner drugstore’s sweets aisle from my childhood days. It’s got a little bit of everything, much of which (in keeping with the store’s small-is-beautiful theme) is available in minute quantities. My two girls go gaga picking out five-cent Tootsies as rewards for being cooperative sidekicks.
The heart and soul of Mitchell’s, though, is the butcher counter in the back, a supremely wonderful meat-eater’s paradise (vegetarians stop reading now). The first thing I do here is grab a number, because Mitchell’s has the wisdom to use this time-honored system that is sadly neglected at most supermarket delis.
Above the lunchmeat slicers are posted the current won-loss records of Chicago’s sports teams, adjusted seasonally and updated daily. I always check the scores, then pause to regard the squadron of white-aproned butchers expertly plying their trade behind the counter, a sight I find endlessly fascinating.
Here in the queue is where one best experiences the singular magic of Mitchell’s. As folks stand waiting for their portions of hand-cut bacon or tender rump roast to be wrapped up in neat white paper, they inevitably start chatting. Time and again, I’ve had wonderfully entertaining conversations there with total strangers, or mini-reunions with old acquaintances.
From the outside, it’s hard to imagine how a small-scale operation like Mitchell’s survives, even thrives, in this era of cavernous supermarkets with their national supply-chain economics and over-the-top product selection.
But from the inside, it’s easy to see how.