.,
I spent most of my 20's sleeping. My day-to-day life felt as if I was on a treadmill. While I was "performing" a career that was service orientated after a while I disconnected. I say perform for a reason, because sometimes our work becomes too comfortable that we are performing our duties not fully living in them. Sleep at work.....not physically, mentally.
I was tired of what the world had
to offer as a career option for me. I spent most of my career in the nonprofit world and also
working in Government. Last year I was in a rigorous graduate program studying
Social Policy at the University of Pennsylvania. While my fellow classmates
started looking for jobs in policy, I began searching for a job that would
fit my desire (travel, work with people hands on, provide opportunities to
developing communities). At the time,
the #BlacklivesMatter movement was pivotal and the recent killings of black ad
brown bodies were on the rise. I felt both helpless and angry. I also knew that
the struggle of my people stemmed from slavery and poverty played a starring
role. I sought to join the movement, but by equipping people with the knowledge
necessary to organize effectively but also by asking the right questions to our
elected officials. Lastly, from my studies at Penn I knew advocacy without
policy was useless.
I knew I didn’t attend this
rigorous privileged program at Penn to acclimate and work in policy as a
regular staffer(there is nothing wrong with the job it just wasn't for me). In addition, I spent
the year critiquing other organizations throughout my masters program and on my
personal time. What I found was that I was spending a lot of time critiquing
other programs and to be honest, I was tethering the line of hating and critiquing.
How many times do we sit back and look at other people’s lives via social media and
judge? As if we know them personally. Let me be honest, it is easy to talk
behind a computer screen and judge! Seriously, we can easily look at someone’s
life and decide we have all the information. We can also look at an
organizations program and think, “they are not doing enough”.
So part way
through my program at Penn I decided to stop being a spectator and I started to participate. I also knew that my contribution to the world and society was
beyond what I could do behind the desk in Senate or in the White House. The
fact is this: one organization cannot solve the social issues of the world such as racism, gender inequity , and classism.
Every social organization has a mission and vision and as global active
citizen, we should learn to RESPECT other organizations mission and vision and when we feel like
something is missing we can insert it into the world. Sometimes that’s in the form of creating
our own program; however, I challenge you to work with existing organizations
to help strength their day to day programs. That is what the Social Change
Agents Institute (SCAI) is: a place where people can add to the world despite
their career, upbringing, or socio-economic status.
What is the Social
Change Agents Institute?
The
Social Change Agents Institute (SCAI) is an interactive think-tank, which
aims to prepare individuals to transform both their lives and their
community through advocacy, policy and social entrepreneurship.
The
institute seeks to address poverty by working with people who are already
addressing issues of poverty and development through trainings, social change
trips, research and social enterprise development.
SCAI is
a place where people can come to contribute to the world no matter the location
and learn new tools in order to address poverty and development.
All in
all, it is time to STOP sleeping and it is time for us to come ALIVE and contribute.
For
more information on how you can get involved in the Social Change Agents
Institute Please email Scaiglobal.com.
