Lynda Barry starts with a poem as an initial stetting of the stage, often one by Emily Dickinson. I'm trying to think of what poem we might start with?
Also using her book Syllabus to start thinking about what the feel of each class will be. I want to draw up a lesson plan, ie, which will be open to change, etc. but also have a sense of structure to keep us on track in some way.
Gonna add notes for that here, please share any thoughts you have.
I'm working on this, which is due Jan 5. It's quite the application, and is getting me to tap into whatever not-waiting-until-the-last-minute powers I have. It's a pretty long shot, since they said they're still not officially taking applications from founders of spiritual communities who are not either Rabbis or Cantors, but they encouraged us to apply if we felt called to complete the super long application since they are open to making special exceptions, and correctly feel that filling out the pieces of the application provides useful written content for the venture no matter what.
When I have a slightly more edited version of my answers I'll post here, b"H tomorrow or the next day.
I just wrote to Dan Glass, principal of the Brandeis School in SF to suggest starting a maker series there as well. On the plus side, they were very excited about BNA when I first met with them, and seemed really interested in exploring collaboration ideas. Also, they are at the forefront of bringing this way of working and thinking into schools -- they have a makerspace in their school that is part of their curriculum, and I sense that they haven't yet figured out a way to integrate their Judaic Studies into that space in a meaningful way. Also, as a very liberal/nondenominational school they are pretty open to experimentation in a way that might be trickier at least initially in a school of a particular denomination. They also run something called the Ethical Creativity Institute, which from what I understand, is trying to look at the question of bringing a tinkering mindset to spiritual and religious tradition in an authentic way, so they've definitely been trying to think along these lines (and have been getting funding for that).
That said, it is pretty far away from Berkeley, ie, at least 1.5 hrs by public transportation or car so it would involve a serious time commitment. I think that they could be a solid institutional partner to test what we're working on with another age population, so my sense is that it would be worth the time. I will update when I hear back from Dan!
Hey Rockin team members! Rachel B. made the incredibly awesome suggestion that we keep a private log here of all the things were doing, key contacts made, grants applied for, thoughts thought, etc. as a way of all keeping informed in a centralized way. The hope is that this will also provide good foundations for blog posts, which would be reeeeally great to have posted in a more regular ongoing way. Aliza pointed out that it would be great for the blog posts to have a more focused approach to illustrate what we're actually doing, but I want to hear more about that from her.
I'll try to fill this space out regularly from here on in, and at some point it would probably be good for all of us to have the ability to edit, yes? I think also ppl could comment in the comment section on each blog post, so we could all see questions, thoughts, etc.
Love to all,
Adina
© Atiq: Jewish Maker Institute