What does it mean to create community and sustain these networks of care? 

For my second week with El Puente, we worked on understanding the infrastructure of community care. In moments of high tension, reaching out to your people is a unique lifeline that as a society may be taken for granted. When we began discussing what these lifelines look like t was difficult to pinpoint places, people, or even music that inspires students to resist and develop. This motivated me to facilitate a pod mapping session with the students where we created a map of our loved ones in our map to honor these networks of care. The Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective coined Pod Mapping as a way to describe those we go to for “ immediate ongoing safety” and create language to remedy the disruptions of peace in one's life. We went step by step in creating a clear outline of core networks and sub-hubs. It was motivating to hear each student's personal story with their map and understand more about what keeps them in these circles. Next, we moved to create a spatial awareness in their communities on what steps for them to honor these networks and develop new ones. 

In conjunction with this, I worked with Jeremy to lead voting in the school for the NYC Civic Engagement program of the people's money. For students, it may be the first time they are getting comfortable with voting and getting into the groove of what it is while critically questioning why this may be important or how it should be challenged. As I am new to this community, it was nice to hear about the student's and administrators' opinions on these kinds of programs.