Event:2015/11/02 Becoming Omni Outreach

https://omnicommons.org/wiki/Event:2015/10/04_Becoming_Omni_Session_1 https://omnicommons.org/wiki/Event:2015/10/11_Becoming_Omni_Session_2 https://omnicommons.org/wiki/Event:2015/10/18_Becoming_Omni_Session_3

Becoming Omni - Outreach Working Group

Agenda

• Any updates?
• Review to do list from last becoming
• Plan next steps

Attendees

• Alex
• Maggie
• MaryAnne
• Julio

Review and Discuss Outreach Action Items

• Alex: Anyone have any updates?
• MaryAnne: Arnoldo Garcia is willing to train a group of us in estorative justice - just needs to know number of people and when we

want to start. Would want to do it with between 8 and 12 people.

• Maggie: Ben reached out to me this evening- we're in contact and talking about planning some type of social event, maybe not an ice cream social but something else fun.
• Building bloc has strated- way to go Builing Bloc!
• Maggie just created list of places to do possible outreach
  • could also draft blurb about ourselves and ways to get involved and email to groups
• Julio: Libbie, Joe and I met with Julie about scheduling time to hold cicle about working with David Kenan and possibly holding general circles- maybe introducing at the delegates meeting. I had to leave the meeting early and am not sure what the end result was. We've done some RJ stuff in the past with the nort okaland Restorative Justice Council and with Julie which happened in August. The RJ center at UCB is very independant from all of these things and Joe is very excited about getting Julie to be more active here in all of the things that are going on here. It sort of like a trade because they want to use the space too. I think I need to get with Joe and get some more clarity on that. i think teh idea is to get some more training than a few hours.
• Maggie: Then woudl you all train others and lead circles?
• Julio: I think we could lead circles in an RJ style but would need more- about a week long training- to start leading something called harm circles which you need more experience. Joe has a specific vision. I think it might be equivalent to holding a regular space maybe once a month and more later on to hold a regular space where people can share small things that come up and create a regular space to share concerns and also appreciations. I've got to talk to Joe- will follow up with him. Maybe even start a wg that would be more formal than emails floating around.
• Maggie: Created list for places to outreach.
• Julio: Have we talked about orientation? That might be helpful to talk about before we start doing outreach. What are our org values? Can peple come and shower whenever they want or can they cook and use the shower whenever they want? How are events put on? Sometimes conflicts get strated because people don't understand what the groud rules are- they are not opaque. And if you ask different people what the ground rules are different people will give you different answers. it may be useful to talk about that, define answers to those questions, and create a clear way for new people to get involved in a clear way that avoids conflict down the line before we start doing outreach to new people.
• Maggie: At Birdhouse we've been talking about having point people for different things. Offering that volunteer as a point person. An example of a model that could potentially be a model for doing outreach.
• MaryAnne: Depends who you're ding outreach to- different people and groups have different needs.
• Maggie: I think what I'm talking about would allow for that- just the point person would have the responsibility for making that decision, figuring out how best to outreach to a group and be the point person or contact person for folks from that group who are interested. like a cover letter- "We're Omni, we have an org crush on you, want to hangout and/or collaborate?"
• Julio: Curious about what that letter would say, just "hi, we're Omni- want to hold events here?"
• Alex: I think orientation and outreach point people are both great ideas. Maybe we could do orientation once a month before the first delegates meeting of every month. Good way for people to learn ground rules, figure out how to get involved, and ID top priority projects that need more people power.
• Maggie: I'm thinking about what the leter would look like.
• MaryAnne: I think you need to tell people how they can use the org in different ways. Tell people what is in it for them. Different kinds of ppl you're going to reach out to so need to have whole variety of resources and hooks that make ppl want to get involved.
• Julio: Tieing back outreach idea to orientation- the level of detail you communicate to group differs from how you comunicate to individual. If you reach out to POC group who isn't as radical we might need to include more explaination and context than if we were reaching out to a more radical space that might also understand more of that anti-oppression work. But also people more grounded in anti-oppression work might be disappointed in what we lack.
• Maggie: Yeah think that great and its sort of a chicken and an egg thing. Need a more diverse group to create space for more voices.
• MaryAnne: Process for doing events here is really cumbersome.
• Julio: Was going to bring that up because if we're going to do outreach and ask folks if they want to do events here they'll prob want to talk to you about how they can do events. You will want to know how to do that and might not know if you're not on the Commons WG.
• Alex: Another chicken in the egg thing. If we start doing orientation maybe we can orient ppl, create a list of top priority projects, and have lots of folks who join CWG if its on the list.
• Julio: CWG is so hard- not sure why anyone would want to do it. Know why I would want to do it. And there is an element of power there and I think we need to acknoeldge that.
• Alex: This is sort of a temp Outreach Group but what if we brought back orientation, created a perm outrecah WG and that obsorbed CWG- it might be more compelling. Myabe more people would want to do it.
• Julio: Even if there was more overlap I could train you all and if you're in an ongoing convo with them. Also CWG should prob dissolve. Its really solving a problem that was created by us. There must be abetter way to do it than what it is- just not sure what it is. It started as a way to steward the common spaces but then it morphed into events management. Also creating sliding scale event rental is hard. ALso good to have a point person who is familiar with scheduling ect. in each collective.
• Will propose perm oUtreach group- will come up w/ justification which will be importatnt to the delegates. Get more collectives, have orientation, Julio will train folks in using events system.
• Maggie: Can also say one person from outreach will rep folks at CWG meeting because theer is so much overlap you need a liaison.
• julio: Idk if we do this anymore but at one point we had a point person for each WG. Could craete a wiki page.
• Alex: Can we draft in google docs.
• Maggie: Lets us the one I just created! https://docs.google.com/document/d/125apwEjtnYDJ2GHFR6_ksC44eUla0DulQRMqUqPT4pQ/edit?ts=563829a7

Outreach action items from last BO

• Help Yar with starting Building Bloc - Joe & Libbie & Darin
• Facilitate a workshop on how to create a collective - Matt & ?
• Make a list of places that small groups of Omni volunteers will go to talk to people - Alex, Maggie, Libbie, Ben (kinda), and Maryanne
• Discuss how to represent and do outreach for Omni - All

Make propaganda - Daron & Maggie (will seek collaboration with MPM)

• Outreach and tabling for the Omni - ?
• Add people to omnicommons.org/cloud - ?
• Hold an ice cream social within 30 days - Ben & Maggie
• Make self-care posters - Gabbie, Alex & Libbie
• Follow-up with Arnoldo about doing RJ workshop - Maryann
• Follow-up with North Oakland Restorative Justice Council - Matt
• Follow-up with UC Berkeley Center for Restorative Justice - Libbie, Julio & Ben (kinda)
• Attend workshop in RJ practice - Everyone!
• Share Omni phone number & contact info - Matt

Actions to Follow-Up with Folks About

• Julio- will follow-up with Joe and determine concrete next steps regarding RJ circles
• Julio, MaryAnne, Maggie, Alex - draft proposal for slightly more permanenet Outreach WG - can explain why were doing it too
• Alex - will reach out to Gabbie (and Libbie- is she still here?) about making anti-burnout posters