3/25/2015 Workshop Casa Latina Klarissa

Final Course Reflection - Brad

Brad Holland

Final Reflection

            The rise of information technology must be accompanied by a push for ­­evaluation on its uses and accompanying societal consequences. As an educator and peer participating in the Community Technology Literacy & You project, I must regularly stop and reflect on community informatics topics including digital divides and identity within communities. Over the course of the last ten weeks, these are the two topics that I found myself reflecting upon most. Likewise, I was consciously aware of them during classroom discussion and community service learning.  

            In a society that is rapidly becoming more dependent on technology, there exists a digital divide between people with tech-prowess and those without. This division has an important role in determining the economic and social position of people in developed nations such as America, where most white-collar jobs require rudimentary computing skills. The digital divide is strikingly similar to the cycle of poverty. People who are digitally literate can use information technology as a tool to gain further knowledge, advancing themselves economically, intellectually, and technologically further ahead of the digitally illiterate. The digital divide is apparent to me during my daily life when I interact with people of different generations. Older generations that did not grow up using information technology have a much more difficult time understanding the potential of technologies such as the internet, mobile computing, and social networks. People like my parents often ask me questions that I simply Google to provide an answer. My first reaction when encountering a problem is to look it up online, whereas they usually ask their immediate peers for information. To take it one step further, my parents’ parents would most likely would have scoffed at the idea of an internet search, because their generation is even less digitally literate and cannot comprehend the scope of online information. I feel it is important for the digitally literate to help teach and encourage those who lack similar skills; digital literacy opens up a whole new world of information and opportunity.

            This course’s focus on identity made me think about how I perceive myself within the mix of thousands of individuals that I interact with on a daily basis. There exist countless forces in the world that try and sculpt or mold our characteristics using outward social pressures. It requires immense strength to be an individual and think freely. How we perceive ourselves affects how we interact with others. This became important during our workshop sessions, because we as volunteers were not present to simply instruct from a top-down hierarchy. The bi-directional learning goals of this course required us to perceive ourselves as community members on the same plane as the women in our workshops. This train of thought is radically different from my other university courses, and is especially liberating when I began to consider the inclusiveness of our efforts.

            Our workshop sessions were not the only inclusive community in this course. Thanks to a welcoming classroom environment, my classmates, instructor and I felt comfortable discussing personal matters as they relate to our cohesiveness as a group. I can confidently say that I am comfortable with my identity among these people, which allows for more wholesome and meaningful interaction. There are countless things we can learn from each other if we allow our individuality to flourish and use technology to support the communication process. This course is certainly a step in the right direction, but we have much more work to do.

Reflections from Class

Looking back on this quarter and my experiences working with Casa Latina, the two themes that stuck out to me is digital divide and women leadership. Digital divide is something I have always had an interest in. I even thought of incorporating it into my CHI Competition submission, for the theme this year was "Appropriating Technologies for New Cultures". The project asked us to “showcase your best abilities of "maker cultures" to build new connections and to make less-voiced cultures be better heard.” Although it isn’t entirely related to the Casa Latina work we were doing, a reading that I did for this class highlighted some aspects of the competition.

Author Alysa Hullett of “Why more women in leadership will mean few women in poverty” emphasizes how the spreading of resources among underrepresented communities is important for giving a voice to communities and organizations such as Casa Latina. She states how people have “failed to speak up about wage theft in the past due to fear and a ‘lack of power’.” Some things can be improved though by informing workers of their labor rights in the United States, and letting them know that claims can be filed. This is just one example how resources can be a game player in giving the voice necessary for change.

From here you think about the “digital divide” notion in America, and wonder how this plays a role in being a barrier to that voice that is needed. How prominent is this digital divide within various communities in America, not just Casa Latina? This class has left me wondering about other identities that face a digital divide. What about people with disabilities, or those within the LGBTQ community? What about someone who is a minority and a citizen versus someone who is a minority and a non-resident, or undocumented?

There is also the questions I have about women leadership in America. The same author, Alysa Hullett, brought up some interesting statistics about women leadership and women poverty in America. She also popped some questions in my head, such as who is responsible for this poverty? Who can change this? Are they groups, or are they individuals? Surely there are some solutions (which would take time to implement), but what solutions or action steps would be right ones?

It was great to looking around and seeing the women leadership happening in Casa Latina. It was also great seeing the true meaning of “community” and “family” take place right in front of you. I remember at one workshop, one of the women’s husband ended up joining us and that was awesome! I didn’t expect a husband to want to be a part of the workshop, and for him to be interested and a part of the conversation was great. It reminded me of a conversation I had with a couple of the women on a different day. We were talking about how it would be great if some of the men joined us. It is much more about the women at the workshop, it is also about their allies, their supporters, their family, and their friends. Together, change can happen. Together we can holistically look at what is going on around us and understand what can be done to change current situations. I would be interested to see how support networks vary from community to community, and what happens if there is no personal support network available.

Walking away from this I am left with so many questions. It was a great experience overall, and the stories that were shared allowed me to understand the articles we were reading even more, and see the power that exists in available resources and support networks.

3/11/15
Casa Latina
Sarah White

Reflections on class:

I was reminded that the women at Casa Latina are a community that wants to get together, hear about each other's lives, visit, and take ownership of the classes and their success.

It made me wonder about the nature of programming in public libraries, which can be "one shot" lectures. I wondered if it doesn't make more sense for ongoing classes (even if they aren't always 100% focused) because so much of learning is about relationships. In an age where discrete facts are easy to get at, and you can learn how to do anything by googling it, classes become about creating relationships that sustain a person's motivation towards personal inquiry.

It also reminded me to build into lessons at Casa time for collaborative work.

Reflections on the project:

Looking forward to meeting with the public librarians and planning the schedule for April. I'm hoping we can make Douglass Truth welcoming!

2/25/2015 Workshop Federal Way Library Klarissa

Location: Federal Way Public Library

Time: 5-7

Date: 2/25/2015

We were all in the same room again, and the kids were mostly doing homework and reading. We couldn’t do a craft anyway. Brad and I played with the infant and her older sister since wifi was down. Other kids left to play in the children’s area.

At storytime the boys from last week were there and  ready to listen, but the girl was not. Instead, she was quietly reading out loud to herself from a book. When we moved to a different area to read, I asked if she just didn’t like the story. She said she didn’t want to listen, because she didn’t understand Spanish. And yet, she replied to the librarian,“sí, comprendo español.” I’ve also seen her interact with her mother almost exclusively in Spanish. Questioning her on this, she said that she didn’t fully understand it and it was dumb. I only said Spanish isn’t dumb, and dropped it.

This is an interesting moment for me, because I didn’t know how to respond. How do I create a space where I only speak English, but support and emphasize the children’s Spanish and Latino identities, as a wonderful part of them, not anything to be ashamed of? 

3/11/2015 Casa Latina Workshop Willa

Casa Latina
March 11th, 2015
4:30 PM - 7:30 PM


Brad and I worked with the children literacy child care this Wednesday. Because Ivette had to run the adult digital literacy, she could not be there to do her planned activity, which was taking a photo of a body part that you like, writing what you like about that body part and why, and printing that photo in black and white. We had two babies and two older children to do this activity with. It was a lot of fun. Many of us took photos of our faces because we like certain aspects of our face - our hair, our eyes, or our mouth. We also took photos of the babies and wrote things about how cute they are. Unfortunately, the photos could not be printed in black and white because of the nature of the printer. The digital cameras also were not charged and we didn't have the right cords to charge them. We ended up using the iPad and printing the photos wirelessly. In the end, some of the children gave their photos and writings to their moms.

Casa Latina 3/11/15 Sarah White

Casa Latina
3/4/15
Adult Digital literacy workshop

Since this was the first day back at Casa Latina (and the weather was good!) we only had a couple of attendees. We had a good discussion about the upcoming month at Douglass Truth. One of the attendees was interested in Skype, and was able to download it her her phone.

I began to wonder about students in the service learning class who assist. I seems as though there isn't a good role for them to fill that brings them into classroom interactions. I am wondering if -- for the Spring semester -- they wouldn't like to participate in a more formal way (as their language abilities allow). Perhaps they could research the class topic ahead of time and make a brief handout for the presenters and other assistants (i.e. a bulleted list-type overview of different tech related to the topic). Or perhaps they could design some slides with screenshots. There are a lot of possibilities, really just any way to participate in the planning/teaching in some way so they feel more engaged with the topic. Since we'll have a topic list ahead of time, they could sign up for the topics they want to research/present/help with at the beginning of class time.

Happy International (Working) Women's Day at the Women Who Rock Un-Conference

Yesterday, Ivette and I went to the Women Who Rock Un-Conference, an annual event put together by feminist scholars at UW in collaboration with other community members, focusing on social justice movements and music. Check out the website here.  The really cool thing was that this was not a "UW" or academic event, but really intended whole community- anyone in Seattle that wanted to talk about social justice. It was an awesome day, starting with a march to the un-conference from a few blocks down.
The speakers while we were gathering for the march reminded us of the "international" in international women's day and added in "working"- speaking of the colonization and oppression of women in other countries, who make our consumer goods and do other reproductive labor for our capitalist lives.  The main "un-conference" event started with, after the blessing, a panel of women of color activists speaking on the events theme- "Rocking Media Justice." All of them shared their stories (Thank you!) and had so much to say about social justice and media, especially using media in the fight for social justice. A question from the audience that stood out to me was someone asking how we can balance the fact that while our new technologies and media platforms can be tools of the movement, they are also produced in oppressive settings and really environmentally destructive ways, which is a great question. The panelist woman from Mexico who answered that did so wonderfully. She said that you should be aware of the conditions it's made in, and then own it. And then use you're technology, your smartphone, whatever for social justice. Okay, she said this so much more beautifully and much more than this, but I can't remember it all. Another panelist added that we should urge our institutions to divest from oppressive and environmentally destructive companies like we did during the South African apartheid. (There is a student divestment movement at UW).
 After that, at the skill swap, which was basically a tabling session, Ivette and I represented LatinaTech, or "Starting Where We Are"  It was a great way to talk to other people doing things in the community. I was really surprised at how well I was able to talk about the project, as I'm usually flustered and nervous in speaking to strangers.
One of the other tables swapping skills was ZAPP, Zine Archiving and Publishing Project, a really cool project to encourage people to make zines and archiving them- I picked up a flyer from them with instructions on making an 8 page mini zine from one piece of paper and one cut, as a cool idea to do with the kiddos. Now, to just think of what we should make zines about.
I wish I had been able to be in two places at once and check out the dialogue that was happening up stairs at the same time as the skill swap as well as check out the workshop by the Fandango Project, who did a performance at the opening. But it was still a great day. I found many community projects to look out for, and couldn't even list all the amazing things going on. This was a really a celebration of all the great things so many people, especially women, especially women of color, are doing in the fight for all facets of social justice.

A Letter to my Feet

Dear Feet,
I do not tell you enough how much I appreciate you. You are my main mode of transportation, getting me from one place to another everyday.
I know I don't take very good care of you. I subject you to hard, flat and or tight shoes, or run barefoot down gravel paths and you've always stuck with me. I've strapped you to a board and you've carried me down mountains, and I've squeezed you into tight climbing shoes and you've balanced me on the tiniest projections as I climb up fake mountains. You've balanced me in tree pose, half moon pose and warrior III. You've marched with me for social change.
You do so much for me. I don't want to say that I can't live without you- that would erase the experiences of those who don't have feet and live just fine. I will say that without you, my world would be different; our built environment is definitely built for the able-bodied.
I wish I could say that I promise to take better care of you in full honesty, but I will try. Especially you, lefty- I know the tattoo hurt, and you deserve for it to stay beautiful.
Thank you for all you do, I appreciate you.
Love

2/18/2015 Federal Way Library Workshop Klarissa

Location: Federal Way Public Library

Time 5-7

Date: 2/18/2015

We were all in one room today, kids and adults. The planned theme was “Using Technology with Kids” as a family workshop, but the women had specific things they wanted to work on.

There were four boys around 6-8 years old present, which was a bit of a pickle as we had only three iPad minis. We tried to encourage them to share, to play games together, such as the word guessing game on the Osmo. The played the word game for a little bit, but then one broke off to play the chef game with the Tiggly, then another wanted to play that game and soon everyone wanted to play that game on their own tablet. It was not as easy to make that a work together game, and so one boy was left out, upset. Although Brad tried for a while, for some reason he was unable to get the other tablets to download games. So I let the other boy use my Surface tablet, though the only game I have is Jetpack Joyride. That started a commotion over everyone now wanting to play that game. It’s never fair with children, is it? I could probably say the same with adults though, we want what they have, not what we have.

Anyway, that didn’t last long as it was then storytime. I sat and listened, amazed with the librarian’s ability to keep the attention of the boys, who were not wanting to stay still. I talked to the storytime librarian for a bit afterwards about children’s programs, the ones she runs and the research she’s done with education. Meanwhile, Brad was playing with the boys in the children’s section, running around on all fours, which was funny to see.

2/11/2015 Federal Way Library Workshop Klarissa

Location: Federal Way Public Library

Time: 5-7

Date: 2/11/2015

Today, there were only two children, one older kid and an infant. Another kid, middle-school age, was doing homework in the back of the adult room. We had planned to make Valentine’s cards, and started to make a few after some negotiation with our one attendee, who wanted to read.

Again we had to move into the adult room at 6, time for storytime. There were a few kids in the children’s section of the library who gathered for storytime, which is good because I had felt bad that the librarian had shown up and there were no kids with us who would sit through storytime. The infant was not feeling well and fussy, the other was reading on her own. Since there was not much for Willa and I to do, we made cards in the back of the adult room. 

A Letter to My Teeth

Dear Teeth,

I have a dentist appointment today and I would really appreciate it if you did not contain any cavities. As you may know, my beautiful smile is all due to you and to my social class. If my family was not in the correct circumstances to have you cleaned and checked every 6 months or so, you would not look so stunning. The privilege that you, my white teeth, grant me is ever so acknowledged. Not only do you allow me to eat whichever and whatever foods I might desire. You also allow me to be self-confident about smiling. You may be slightly crooked, but that crook would only be noticed by me. The others that may subconsciously judge us would never notice. And you may have a slight overbite, but this will never be considered a fault by others and will never endanger the health of your  fellow teeth. Overall, you are straight, white, perfect little teeth.

Imagine if you were not. Imagine if I or my parents could not afford the dentist. Imagine if you had needed braces when I was younger and there was not enough money to pay for such orthodontists. You would be crooked and perhaps stained. When people would look at you and thus me, they would question my hygiene. They would wonder if I took care of myself properly. They could even be repulsed and tend towards avoiding me. And what if it got worse? What if there was an accident and I lost a tooth? Or had a cavity that caused a tooth to fall out? People's thinking about you would increase tenfold. How could I smile? How would I express happiness? If I can't smile, how do I let someone know that it was a pleasure to meet them without them judging me? How do I get the job I just interviewed for?

So thank you for being you, pretty little teeth. But also thank you to my parent's social standard of good dental hygiene. Thank you for reminding me to brush my teeth and floss. Thank you for taking me to the dentist to get them cleaned.


Sincerely,


The woman who eats all the candies that are bad for you

3/4/2015 Workshop Casa Latina Klarissa

Location: Casa Latina

Time: 5-630

Date: 3/4/2015

Casa Latina was very quiet today.  Two older girls and two infants. Stephanie helped me with the kids. Since we had to leave early we didn’t bring any crafts, only the ipads which were almost dead. I have been a little hectic this quarter, and did not plan very well ahead. Again, planning. How many times do I need to learn this?  Since I have very little experience with children, it’s important, because I don’t have a “bag of tricks” to fall back on yet. Still, kids are very good at entertaining themselves and they found amusement in the bag of jelly beans that Ivette brought- doing blind tastings, trying to trick each other into not being able to guess the flavors in various combinations.

Ivette, Stephanie and I left early to be able to attend a lecture by Anne Balsamo on campus, one of the founders of FemTechNet. FemTechNet’s manifesto is at the core of our mission as Ivette laid it out(rewrite this sentence). The lecture was quite interesting, but not what I had thought it would be. The title of her newest book, “Designing Culture” to me, as an anthropology student seemed as if this would be theoretical and broader- a discussion on social construction through the ways we design informational technology perhaps. And I haven’t read the book, so maybe it is about that. But the lecture was about a project to digitally archive the AIDS memorial quilt- which is interesting in itself.

There is the idea of resisting the silencing of historical narratives, queer history and the still active creation of the quilt.

She talked about technological obsolence and the quickly shifting paradigms- how long will our informational technologies be useful as holders of history, artifacts, words, ideas and knowledge? 

Letter to my Calendar

Dear Calendar,

Although you and I have never really been close up until now, I want to thank you for keeping me in check on my activities throughout the day. I actually would like to also thank myself for being more proactive about it as well. I used to be more of a “got it in my head” type of guy, but grad-school (as we all know) is a completely different ball game.

Throughout the year I have taken steps to better myself as a whole, and take on new challenges. Grad-school was a new leaf for me, and I really learned what it meant to prioritize and make the most of whatever was going on around us. In the EDUC 401 course, we started off with an article about reading in grad-school. You are given a wild list of readings in each class, some required- most recommended. After reading through the syllabus and the reading list, you are able to take a look and see what exactly you need to walk away with, and prioritize in a way that gives you the maximum amount of value in the little time you do have. You don’t have to read every word of every article given, and that is a learning lesson I actually enacted this year. When I was in business school, I freaked out in my accounting program if I even missed a chapter of any assigned readings. This year I was able to take a step back and re-evaluate the way I handle the infinitely long reading list.

This thinking can be applied to everyday life as well. There are only 24 hours in a day. For me, it is scary to think about the thought. I work as professional staff at UW, am a full-time grad, volunteer weekly with Gay City, and still desire to go to the gym 4 times a week minimally. All while ensuring I get my homework done, and cook all my meals (trying to eat more healthyJ), and trying to maintain a decent social life of course, and attend community/networking/campus events. It’s another thing that I am a neat freak and have to have my apartment spotless. Sometimes I have to let that slide though because I am too busy running around. This is why I have managed to keep a good schedule for myself and write in times not just for class or homework, but also times that I dedicate to working out, and even having the needed downtime “me time.” Prioritizing sleep is another thing I feel I have successfully done. I block out my weeknights after 10:30 (with very few exceptions) so I can make sure I have time to get ready for the next morning, and get ready to go to bed. This new time tracking and allocation system has managed to keep me constantly going, and seems to be working well for me. It’s funny to think that there’s reminders such as “you need to do this at this time.” This at least has allowed me to stay on things. If there is an assignment coming up that is of very high stakes, I send myself a couple reminders to keep track of the deadline. I try not to procrastinate, but it’s something us students are best at :P

Moving forward, I will continue to appreciate you. You have never failed me, or intentionally threw me off schedule. If it seems like I can’t make up my mind and change appointments around 50 million times a day, I am sorry! Also, sorry for silencing you so much. You tend to go off at the worst times, like that one time I was in a meeting with the Associate Vice-Provost of Academic Services (my boss’s boss), and Vice President and CIO of UW-IT (his boss). Did make a good laugh though! :D

Let’s keep on being awesome,

Freddy

A letter to my smartphone

Dear Smartphone,

              I understand and appreciate the limitless information you provide at my fingertips, but this capability comes with several drawbacks that modern society fails to recognize as problems. Because of your infinite sources of novelty and entertainment, people cannot spend a few minutes waiting in line without pulling you out from their pockets and checking to see if their cyber lives are any more interesting than their present ones. Gone are the days when people make small talk on the bus. People are so accustomed to your five-inch face that they are afraid of making real eye contact with strangers. Nobody is alone anymore. Sitting in pockets and purses, you maintain a constant connection with the rest of the world, reminding people how much they are missing every second of every day. It is this fear of missing out on new information, falling behind on game leaderboards, and becoming socially irrelevant that forces individuals to never let you go. People chain themselves to walls when you become tired, stopping everything they are doing to nourish you and make sure you stay alive just a few more hours.

              Smartphone, these problems are not your fault. People allow you to dictate their lives because they can’t imagine a world without you. Most folks used to consider you a useless nuisance (some brave ones still do), but every day more and more of your kind are adopted by consumers who want to plug into the digital realm. There are now more of you on this earth than there are people. Please, be nice to us.

Sincerely, 

Brad

Little Free Library with Casa Latina

In addition to the incredible work the Latina Tech crew has been doing on at Casa Latina, a small group of Library and Information Science students have been working to create a little free library (LFL) in coordination with Casa Latina to go outside Casa's building. We got an old newspaper stand and are in the process of converting it into the perfect LFL. The library start out with a collection of Spanish language children's books, generously donated in memory of Eliza T. Dresang. 

Working on this project has been a fun process thus far and we can't wait to work with members of Casa and artist Fulgencio Lazo (http://fulgenciolazo.blogspot.com/) to help us paint the library. We are focusing on themes that will accurately reflect and highlight the Casa community and those involved. 

Stay tuned for more details and look out for the LFL at Casa Latina!

- LFL crew