Occupy

[Philip Bloom]

So I've got a concern that I wanted to share with you regarding Occupy
and the Free Skool calendar, and I wanted to see what you think. I'm
concerned that with two weekly repeating events adding up to 10 events
total on the April calendar, Occupy very heavily dominates the TFS
calendar. Now, speaking as someone that personally likes Occupy, this
makes me uneasy. I feel like it kind of turns the Free Skool calendar
into a megaphone for Occupy, and I'd feel uneasy about this happening
with ANY group. I acknowledge that Free Skools are inherently
political because they offer a potential alternative to conventional
schooling, but by giving ourselves so wholly over to a single
political entity, it could alienate a lot of other people and serve to
dissuade people from participating.

I spoke to Roger, who is active with Occupy Tampa, and his response
was this: "That's a very legitimate concern. It's not simply that
Occupy is a political movement, it's also that we would want to see a
diversity of voices, people, classes, etc. I love that we're
supporting Occupy/having them put classes on our calendar, but I also
don't want the free skool to simply be subsumed by it either. Our
goals/methods/approach aren't unrelated/separate, but they are
definitely also distinct and likely should be treated as such.

I don't know how we would rectify that; either reducing the number of
Occupy classes, or increasing the number of other classes."

[Jill Silver]

What about taking Occupy Tampa out of the name i.e. documentary and
discussion night or Thursday night sidewalk chats instead?

[Sarah Capps]

I would suggest they give us more info about the individual classes. I believe it ok to have a standing night and time but we should be given a better description of what will be taught to make sure it is a new experience each week.

Cheers,
Sarah

[Charlene Chetelat]

Are they technically free skool classes even or are they open forums that occupy is holding regardless of whether free skool promotes them?

Seems like we promote things thay may be related to someone else who has another related business or a group that does related things, but it wouldn't happen without the free skool calendar and its promotion, whereas, these events happen with it without free skool involvement, though they've expressed appreciation of and for the free skool alliance and promotion. Does that make sense? They don't seem to be free skool classes, but other events we are promoting like friends of the free skool on the webpage, but I was under the impression those types of promos didn't go on the calendar.

Charlei

[Avi]

I agree with Charlie, and as she pointed out, we've had this conversation before. I don't think we ever made it "official" (although, I don't think we've ever made anything official ever), but the general consensus we had agreed to was that unless they are specifically being offered as freeskool classes/events, they shouldn't be on our calendar.

I'm all for the occupy movement, but putting what are basically their events on the calendar is a precedent that says to me that a tampa freeskool organizer can post whatever events they want for *any* organization. And I think we want to avoid that.

I don't have a problem with occupiers teaching freeskool classes on location (which could be considered a joint class, that's fine), but as Jill and Sarah were saying, they need to be clearly defined as tampa freeskool classes, with appropriate descriptions, and (I'm adding) not point to the occupy page. I don't think there's a problem with the descriptions saying something like "this class is being taught in conjunction with Occupy Tampa."

I don't want to offend any of our organizers / members / involved people who are really involved with Occupy, and while it's probably true that most freeskools are in fact anarchistic and political, I've never really felt that vibe here among the majority of those of us involved. If that's the route that people generally want to go, then that's fine, but if we become largely sucked up as part of occupy, I think we stand to lose a lot of people (not because they necessarily disagree (although some probably do), but just due to lack of interest.)

Sorry for the rant. I was originally just going to say "I agree with Charlie." Apparently I failed at that. =P

Avi

[Avi]

Phillip, to answer your actual question, I think the appropriate response is to change the class titles and descriptions (as was mentioned) or take them off the calendar. Or rather, take them off the calendar, and then add any - for all intents and purposes, "new" - classes that Roger (or whomever) submit with appropriate details.

[Jill Silver]

As an occupy supporter, it still made me very uncomfortable to see all
the Occupy classes on the list. I think I was wrong about removing
the Occupy name because if the classes would take place whether or not
freeskool was there, it is a promotion for somebody else and not a
freeskool class.

[Philip Bloom]

Agreed. I think we should take them off the calendar. Being a megaphone is not the way to go for us, in my opinion. We should encourage them to hold a special workshop if they want to do a free skool class.

[Cole Bellamy]

I agree, and I also think we can be supportive of what they do in a different way than plastering it all over the calendar. I mean, we can still support their events, mention them on the Facebook group, etc. But I don't think the official Free Skool Calendar is the place for them, unless we get a more specific event listing.

-Cole

> Subject: Re: [TampaFreeSkool] Occupy
> From: philip....@gmail.com
> Date: Sun, 25 Mar 2012 09:18:37 -0400
> To: tampafr...@googlegroups.com

[Roger Butterfield]

Ja, I think the lack of specificity is something of a problem. How about we try doing something with the 'our friends' section? We could link to a part of their website, such as their calendar page: http://www.occupytampa.org/calendar/.

[Charlene Chetelat]

Friends is a good idea. I must've been mistaken, but I thought they were already included in that.

--

"I held out my hands & asked where I could help & somebody grabbed me & pointed me towards the future & said, You've got your work cut out for you & I said, isn't there anything easier? & he laughed & said you could dig around in the past, but it's just busywork & that made perfect sense so I shrugged & started right where I was, along with everyone else."

Brian Andreas