Service Learning Proposal

Date: 2/23/12

To: Professor Tweed

From: Kira Peterman

Re: WST 4015 Service Learning Proposal

Mission Statement: To engage in local-to-global activism by supporting sustainable relationship-building alongside members of the farm working community, the Youth and Young Adult Network of the National Farm Worker Ministry (YAYA), and La Via Campesina. Through communication and cooperation we will strive to work with our community partners towards the shared aim of agricultural justice. Furthermore, we intend to make connections from the local farmworker community to the global food sustainability movement.

Organizational Structure:

§ Task-based committees

§ Hold members accountable to completion of assigned tasks

§ Maintain effective communication with group members and community partners

§ Committee Chairperson: liaison for committee

§ Meeting facilitator

§ Ensure meetings run smoothly and in a timely matter

§ Hold meetings with Committee Chairpersons

§ Co-liaisons

§ Communicate with community partners

§ Attend YAYA meetings

§ Secretary

§ Record keeping

§ Attendance

§ Ethics Committee

§ Ensure mindful enacting of project

§ Oversee three strike policy

§ Failure to complete task or attend a designated event results in one strike

§ First and second strikes result in voting restrictions

§ Three strikes result in a meeting with the Ethics Committee and Professor Tweed to discuss the member’s role and future participation in the project

Nancy A. Naples states that many feminist NGOs are “transformed from advocates to professionals serving the needs of neoliberal states” (274). By conceptualizing the issues faced by farmworkers as systemically correlated with the adverse effects of globalization, we are modeling ourselves from the Network of Maquila Workers Rights in Central America, as Maquila workers also face oppression in the workforce based on flawed neoliberal policies (273). In this vein, our group is democratically structured and focuses on working with, rather than for our community. Our goal is to prioritize the needs for which farmworkers express a desire for solidarity. In the spirit of feminist NGOs that have come before us, we endeavor to work as professionals within a committed network of organizers, activists, and farmworkers to prioritize an ethic of communal involvement and service. We have chosen a model that stresses personal accountability, which is imperative to success in any cooperative situation.

Our group’s effectiveness shall be assessed through measures of active participation, thoughtful communication, and shared aims of members, which work together to create group cohesion. We will also critically assess our effectiveness by considering how well we work in solidarity with our community partners and demonstrate feminist organizing as exemplified in course materials.

Community Partner/Global Theme:

We propose to address the larger systemic issues of the treatment and unfair conditions of farm workers, focusing on women farm workers. We know that “women produce 70% of the food on earth but they are marginalized and oppressed by neoliberalism and patriarchy” (What Is 1). These systems of oppression often deny peasants and food producers basic and equal access to the food they produce. As the price of food increases and food is scarcer, women become malnourished, “as they eat last after providing for their children and family members” (Desai 21). One possible way of addressing this issue is to “produce food for local consumption” (Desai 24). To lay a foundation for both environmental and production sustainability, it is key that the community eats the food it grows. Local production and consumption can also indirectly address situations of “unsustainable exploitation of workers,” who are denied not only equal access to food but also other resources, such as safe housing and acceptable working conditions (Two Years 1). By establishing themselves as producers of their own food and giving value and recognition to both the unpaid and poorly paid labor that they do, farmworkers can pave the way for larger systemic and institutional change in regard to equal access and fair treatment.

Our local issue relates to lack of resources and tools available to migrant farmworkers. We will take steps toward providing resources and tools to them by working with YAYA on a community garden project, garden tool donation and long-sleeve t-shirt drive. We may engage our global partner, La Via Campesina, in our donation drive. Throughout this project, weekly email with the La Via Campesina will clarify how our progress works in accord with the organization’s needs.

In addition to hopefully having a positive societal effect, our project will also greatly contribute to our learning experience by relating to the course goals and objectives as defined in the course syllabus. We will gain a practical understanding of how women/feminists construct activism both locally and across borders through personally undertaking a project that acts on both local and global levels. Additionally, as has already happened in our discussions on our project, we will find how “unexamined assumptions” (course syllabus) effect how we act in both theory and practice. We will probably encounter this problem again in our project and will have to learn how to deal with it in whole new ways, as well as learn to deal with other issues that come up in our path. Each of the potential conflicts, however, will ultimately give us a better understanding of how feminists must work to accomplish the results they desire.

Project Proposal

We plan to work with YAYA on their various events, specifically during Farmworker Awareness Week.

Through working together actively and effectively as a group, we plan to tackle this service learning project by breaking up into task based groups to complete each aspect of the project. Group members will complete portions of the project according to interest and are encouraged to ask for help, opinions, and constructive criticism from each other. Using our communication tools like social media and email to make decisions and gain feedback gives every member a chance to be included. To include other members of the community, group members will invite participation from members of their organizations and jobs. We realize that educating as many people in the general community to the needs of the farm workers of Fellsmere, can help encourage more volunteering and thus a sustainable relationship with the Farm worker community we are working with. For advertising, members will contact media outlets we through giving fliers and telling those from nearby businesses to donate funds, long sleeve shirts, and gardening tools to the community.

Building on our community partner YAYA’s existing relationship with the farmworker community, we intend to learn the most effective way of utilizing our local resources in order to maximize our outreach. Through this bond, we aspire to grow as individuals, as well as develop building blocks for better understanding of global and transnational feminist issues.

Project Timeline:

1. February 22: Initial contact with Lariza Garzon of YAYA to confirm partnership

2. February 24: Contact Global Partner

3. March 1: In-class presentation by YAYA

1. The historical events that have led to the current oppressive conditions of the agricultural industry

2. Solidarity (sustainable relationship), privilege, power dynamics, etc.

3. March 10: Fundraising Event

4. March 17: Fundraising Event

5. March 31: Participate in YAYA’s Community Garden Project

1. 8 am Depart Orlando from NFWM office

2. 10 am Arrive To Fellsmere

3. 10:15 am Welcome, introductions and instructions

4. 10:45 am Gardening begins!

5. 1:00 pm Lunch (vegetarian options available)/ short soccer game

6. 2:00 pm Back to gardening!

7. 4:30 pm Debrief

8. 5:15 pm Dinner

9. 6:00 pm Depart Fellsmere

10. 8:00 pm Arrive to Orlando at NFWM Office

11. Date TBD: Debriefing meeting

Works Cited

Desai, Manisha. "Transnational Solidarity: Women's Agency, Structural Adjustment, and Globalization." Women's Activism and Globalization: Linking Local Struggles and Transnational Politics. By Nancy A. Naples and Manisha Desai. New York: Routledge, 2002. 15-33. Print.

Naples, Nancy A. "The Challenges and Possibilities of Transnational Feminist Praxis." Women's Activism and Globalization: Linking Local Struggles and Transnational Politics. By Nancy A. Naples and Manisha Desai. New York: Routledge, 2002. 267-81. Print.

“Two Years After the Events…” La Via Campesina: International Peasant’s Movement. La Via Campesina International Peasant’s Voice. 12 January 2012. Web. 23 February 2012.

“What is La Via Campesina?” La Via Campesina: International Peasant’s Movement. La Via Campesina International Peasant’s Voice. 9 February 2011. Web. 23 February 2012.

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Campus Engagement #1

Kira Peterman

WST 4415

Professor Meredith Tweed

9 February 2012

Campus Engagement

As my first Women’s Studies Campus Engagement event, I attended a presentation by the Global Perspectives office here on campus. The speaker was Tina Rosenburg, and she was talking about “How Peer Pressure Can Change the World.” Ms. Rosenburg emphasized how peer pressure, though often thought of as only a negative influence, can also work for the good of society, and frequently does.

To support her point, she gave several examples. The first was of a well-known program; Alcoholics Anonymous. Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) uses peer pressure in a positive way by placing individuals with alcohol problems in a supportive group of people who are going through the same problems and will work to keep everyone on track with their individual goals. The program is successful, and widespread. While AA is perhaps the most heard of example, Ms. Rosenburg also gave others. The two that stood out to me most were of a program called Emerging Scholars that is implemented at many institutions of higher learning, and the case of microcredit collateral.

The Emerging Scholars program was created for minority students studying math. There was a college who realized that the failure rate for African American students in a certain math class greatly exceeded the failure rates for white and Asian American students in the same math class. The failure rates were not correlated in anyway with math SAT scores, or grades in previous math classes. An individual at the university sought to understand why this was happening, and studied one math class to see what differences he could find among the groups. He found that the African American students most often studied alone, while the rest of the class tended to study in groups. He then reasoned that the other students were surrounded by math friends, and so could go to those friends if they needed help and were supported in their math endeavors. To test this theory of his, he started the Emerging Scholars program. In this program, students were made to study in groups, and after the usual lesson was taught, the groups were given a harder problem to attempt to solve. This was in no way a remedial program. It was found that the program greatly increased the passing rates for individuals involved with it, purportedly because of the influence of positive peer pressure.

Another example was in the case of microcredit given to people in small, low-income communities. People initially did not want to give microcredit, according to Ms. Rosenburg, because the women in the villages had nothing to use as collateral. An idea to solve this problem was to form those seeking microcredit into small groups. Each member of the group took out a loan, but none were able to get another one until every member of the group paid back their initial loan. They were, in essence, using their social standing as collateral. Positive peer pressure worked to make sure the loans were paid back, as women would be ostracized from the community if the money was not paid back.

The above examples illustrate the ways that positive peer pressure can effect society. It is clear that we must harness the power of such a method in efforts for social change.

Globalization Glossary

Globalization Glossary

Interesting thoughts about TOMS shoes, and how they may not be having the effect they claim to have: TOMS Shoes: Good Marketing, Bad Aid

Introductory Letter :)

Hi! My name is Kira Peterman, and I am a sophomore student at UCF majoring in Nursing with minors in Women's Studies and Health Services Administration. I want to be a midwife “when I grow up,” and plan to go to graduate school to get a Certified Nurse Midwife degree after graduation. I enjoy rock climbing, hiking, and most other outdoor activities. I enjoy cooking (mostly vegetarian), and I also love to read, though sadly most of my reading time now is devoted to reading for classes rather than for entertainment.

My desired career path is one reason I am interested in the global women’s movement. In the United States and internationally, adequate healthcare can be very hard to come by. This means that pregnant women and newborn infants may not be well cared for and therefore could suffer in the future due to not having the best possible start in life. I want to work to make sure every baby is cared for while in the womb and every woman has a safe childbirth experience through both being employed directly in the healthcare field and working to change things on a more macro level. With this in mind, I am most interested in learning about women’s health globally, and what is being done to increase access to healthcare, primarily prenatal and childbirth services.

In my opinion, the most difficult thing about learning how women organize worldwide is the fact that not all women or women’s groups work in the same way. Learning about how women organize worldwide is an extremely broad topic, and is very similar to learning how all of the human race organizes worldwide, and therefore a monumental task due to the sheer vastness of organizations and groups. How people organized, I would think, is based more upon the culture they came from, the education they received, and the rest of their background more than upon the gender they identify with.

From this class, however difficult the task may seem, I do want to gain a better understanding of how women’s groups organize internationally. Global and transnational feminism, is, quite simply, something I want to know more about. Change does not just happen by itself, and if I want something to be different from the way it is now I have to do something about it rather than just waiting for something to happen. I hope this course will help me see what needs to be done to alter society. With this in mind, I also want to gain firsthand experience of what it means to work towards change on a global or transnational level through the service learning aspect of the course.

I have read, understand, and agree to the terms of the course syllabus and the blogging protocols.

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