I’ve written at length about the perceptions and the realities which isolate the poor in cities like Springfield. The children of the poor struggle in schools, people ascribe poor results on standardized tests to the schools, and not the populations they serve, and so fear to send their children to those schools, people see news reports of urban violence and misperceive the risk as place and not behavior related.
These fears keep us divided. They keep us from working together to solve the real problems cities face. The Canadian “Institute without Boundaries” is looking for partners to create design solutions to these, and other, problems which divide us.
The process is open and simple. The guidelines for submission are as follows:
-For the Connecting Divided Places project, we are looking for partners who would like to work with us for the 2014-2015 academic year, from September 2014 to June 2015; these dates do not limit continuing collaboration. Eligible project partners are accredited international institutions, governments, schools, non-profit and community organizations, and private companies.
To show your Expression of Interest, please complete the EOI Submission Form and in it:
1. Describe the kinds of challenges your city (and region) faces
2. List the goals you have for working with the IwB
3. Provide information about your organization
I plan on looking at the divisions in our schools. I’d love to have some thoughtful people working on ways to get those who could live anywhere in the region to decide to live here for the opportunity to send their children to our schools.