Praxis 2021 Q2 Newsletter

"Another world is not only possible, she is on her way." - Arundhati Roy On Friday, July 9th, The Praxis Project hosted our annual Roots & Remedies convening for community organizers. It was powerful to reconnect, relax, heal, celebrate our organizing, and affirm our love for one another. We heard from many wonderful organizers on what liberation looks like, what it feels like to be rooted in community, and how our love shows up in our organizing. We invite all of you to reflect on the questions that guided our day: Liberation: Imagine and dream of a world of liberation and freedom—what does life look and feel like? What are you holding close, protecting, and building to make this world a reality? Rooted In Community: What do want people to know about you today? What do you bring with you? What do you love about yourself? What do you love about your work? What are you grateful for? Love: When did you first interacted with a meal/food/herb that you loved? When you think of a meal that reminds you of joy, of home, what comes to mind? Recipes, whether written or passed down orally, can communicate so much about our cultural histories and our origin stories. What recipe tells your story? How do you use food in your organizing and advocacy efforts? Close your eyes for a moment. Imagine a world where everyone has what they need to survive, where they are fully nourished. What does it look like? PRAXIS RESOURCES & EVENTS PRAXIS CONVENINGS Cooperatives and Democratic Workplaces - Learning Circle: Praxis was honored to partner with US Federation of Worker Cooperatives and Sustainable Economies Law Center to co-host a virtual Learning Circle series on Cooperatives and Democratic Workplaces for our network partners and fiscally sponsored projects in May-June 2021. Stay tuned for a forthcoming brief with resources, lessons learned, and highlights from community organizers in our network implementing democratic workplace practices! Equity & Community-Centered Policy: At Praxis, we are always looking for opportunities to center equity & community in policy. In July, some of the Praxis staff took our first post-vaccine work trip to Albuquerque, New Mexico to co-design policy considerations to improve community health. We were honored to be hosted by Southwest Organizing Project, and were joined by New Mexico Asian Family Center, New Mexico Voices for Children, New Mexico Black Leadership Council, Notah Begay III Foundation, and Native American Community Academy. We look forward to sharing our learnings and to continue to connect and build with our Albuquerque community partners.   Relax with Praxis: Relax with Praxis continues! This is a monthly space that we're offering on the last Friday of every month for our network partners and fiscally sponsored projects—with the only goal to have fun and connect.  Relaxation and play are often at the bottom of our to-do lists, so we hope that this space provides joy, creativity, connection, and community care without pressure to focus on work and productivity. PRAXIS LEARNING CENTER Moving from Disaster Preparedness to Disaster Justice: Centering Community and Racial Justice for a Transformed Future: Over six months in 2020, The Praxis Project, Living Hope Wheelchair Association, and Unitarian Universalist Service Committee convened a Learning Circle cohort of community organizers to develop a disaster justice framework from a racial justice perspective. This approach to disaster included social and structural disasters, and throughout this process we collectively shared experiences and tools for community-based sustainable disaster response and recovery. From the inequitable impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic to fires ravaging the West Coast, from migrant children being forcibly separated from their parents at the border to continued police violence against the Black community, we have witnessed an array of disasters in the last year and beyond. This broadened definition of disaster is a tenet of disaster justice, as is the need to center racial and social justice in its response. On May 6th we were joined by Jackie Sims at People's Alliance for Transit, Housing and Employment and Denisa Livingston at Diné Community Advocacy Alliance to discuss disaster justice in action. Access the brief or view the webinar recording and materials. PRAXIS MEDIA AYPAL: Empowering the Leaders of Tomorrow Today: AYPAL believes that the youth are not only the leaders of tomorrow but also the leaders of today. Youth have the agency, knowledge, thirst and passion to create community change that works for them today and also to serve future generations. The May Arts Festival brings Oakland's API community together for youth to share their culture through art as a means to create healing and connection in their community. Captions in English and Spanish/subtítulos en español y en inglés. Watch the full video. In Praxis Season 2: The final episodes of our podcast is out! You can listen to all of the episodes of In Praxis Season 2 on  Anchor, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and Stitcher. Transcripts/subtitles of all episodes has been provided on our website and on YouTube! PRAXIS ORGANIZATIONAL UPDATES Welcome New Praxis Team Members! We are thrilled to welcome Ali Ayoub, Accounting Assistant and Yeshi Tsomo, Accounting Associate who will both be supporting our finance department as well as our stellar 2021 Summer Health Justice Interns and Dileep Gopal Bal Fellow: Ileana López-Martínez, Uma Nagarajan-Swenson, and Raquel Motachwa!   Fiscal Sponsorship Updates: As part of the Praxis Project’s efforts to build power in communities to achieve health justice, we offer comprehensive fiscal sponsorship.  We are not onboarding new partnerships at this time as we actively build capacity for the program, which includes recruiting a Senior Accountant and People and Infrastructure Associate!  We're currently screening applicants, and are excited to announce these new team members in the near future.   PRAXIS IN PRAXIS U.S. Bancorp Community Development Corporation's Equity Summit: On June 16th, Praxis joined U.S. Bancorp's Community Development Corporation leaders and partners to facilitate a workshop on shifting narratives to center equity, justice, and authentic community partnership. Public Conversation for Change Leadership Fellowship (PCCLF): Praxis is thrilled to continue our collaboration with Staten Island's Equity & Belonging project, through PCCLF. Praxis is supporting local leaders in Staten Island develop and launch a Community of Practice to center and strengthen equity and belonging in services and programs in SI.  Feeding America: Praxis is collaborating with Feeding America's Humana Mobile Rural Pantry program to provide training and technical assistance on authentic community partnership and advancing health, justice and racial equity through October, 2021.  Toward Better Rural Futures: Praxis is partnering with ChangeLab Solutions, National Governor's Association, and our network of grassroots community organizers to conduct a scan and assessment of high-impact policies that advance equity in rural communities, as part of Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Thrive Rural initiative. Through this scan we have interviewed partners from rural and tribal nations, and are identifying promising policies to advance economic and racial justice. ABOUT US The Praxis Project is a values-driven national nonprofit organization that seeks to improve health justice through partnerships to build community power. Our Centering Community Quarterly Updates & Announcements Newsletter features news from The Praxis Project. If you'd like to stop receiving these emails, simply click here to unsubscribe.