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Think

As a member of Denver INC, I am learning how to incorporate people all over Denver neighborhoods into community engagement efforts. Although I am only just beginning the interview process, I am very excited to continue interviewing more neighborhood residents with various backgrounds about their areas of expertise. This will help me to include more marginalized groups and perspectives into my work, and address the social justice issue of empowerment and inclusion. These interviews are especially impactful because they will be coupled with the social media work and spotlights I am doing. By highlighting stories that have not yet seen the spotlight, I will be elevating important perspectives to a platform that nearly the entire world has access to. This social change strategy of harnessing the power of social media is particularly important in the digital age, where we are all increasingly interconnected. Although some argue that social media can be harmful, and I don't disagree, I aim to amplify the positive effects of social media by demonstrating how it can bring communities together.

Connect

Through my work with my community partner, Denver INC, and my colleagues at CCESL, I am bolstering my ability to create effective and mutually beneficial partnerships in order to achieve my goals. For example, I work most closely with Logan at CCESL. He has an affinity for social media and video editing, which I lack. My interest and skills in interviews and graphic design on Canva have been helpful to couple with Logan's skills. Before doing this project, I hated group work because I almost always ended up picking up the slack. However, with Logan, this feels like a true partnership because we are maximizing our strengths to achieve our goals. I look forward to more projects with work balanced in this way in the future.

Working with Keith at Denver INC has also helped me to learn new approaches with community engagement. For example, he and I had a meeting about how to standardize the tech size of the interview process. He put into perspective for me how difficult it may be to get older folks to understand the tech side of what we're trying to accomplish. However, since highlighting their stories would be so beneficial for them, me, and Denver INC as a whole, Keith and I worked together to find a solution so that everyone's stories could be shared. We standardized the tech process and are currently working on developing an outline for how to send files my way.

Act

I am applying an anti-oppression lens to my actions in my community-engaged work by actively seeking out new perspectives from residents of Denver who live in many different neighborhoods. This will allow me to hear perspectives from not just one group, but from every group that is an important stakeholder in this issue. Community engagement initiatives benefit all Denver neighborhoods, but there are some neighborhoods that already have robust initiatives in place. For example, just this past week I attended a meeting with some residents of the Aurora neighborhood and I got to learn about how they have transformed their community into one that actively engages. To work collaboratively toward social change, I am developing skills of interviewing, Canva graphic design, streamlining tech procedures, attending events, and working in groups. These skills all help me achieve my goals because they allow me to work with others to create frameworks that work for me and for everyone else we are getting involved with.

Reflect

Connection is a crucial factor for pursuing social change, which is exactly why I wanted to join Denver INC. Their whole motivation is to create community engagement in Denver neighborhoods, which I think is so important, especially in this day and age. As a Public Policy and International Studies major, I am seeing the rise of political polarization in my work constantly. I firmly believe that the best way to come to consensus is by actually taking the time to communicate to one another and understand how our values intersect. I am so happy to be part of Denver INC and be part of this change.

My contributions also align with my personal and professional aspirations because I want to get involved in politics when I am further along in my career. I want to be someone who connects people rather than dividing them. My work with Denver INC is teaching me strategies for connecting people at multiple levels: interviews, conferences, and workshops. I hope to use these skills in any future job I pursue. Additionally, simply having an internship on my resume will be helpful for pursuing a job in the future. The skills that I am cultivating and Denver INC will be very helpful to politics-related careers, and I hope my future potential employers will recognize this.