SWF Communiversity Convergence in Detroit

On March 7th - 9th, SWF team members traveled to Ann Arbor and Detroit, Michigan, for a Communiversity Convergence. The Convergence began with SWF and members of the Values-Based Partners network engaging in a public lecture at the University of Michigan, followed by a Build-It Workshop and community gathering at Freedom Dreams the next day. This was the second annual Communiversity Convergence in Detroit - a new March ritual and an important community/network-building and reconnection point.  We invite you to learn more about the Detroit Convergence. 

COMMUNIVERSITY CONVERGENCE WITH DETROIT VALUES-BASED PARTNERS

Over the last decade, SWF and Solutionaries across Detroit from Freedom Dreams, Feedom Freedom Growers, Birwood House, Open Works, and the James and Grace Lee Boggs Center have developed values-based partnerships. Inspired by and rooted in the vision and work of James and Grace Lee Boggs, Detroit VBPs and SWF have worked collectively to transform “wastes” to resources to activate new spaces, design and build new infrastructure, and hold critical conversations about the context and urgency of a Solutionary approach. 

The March convergence in Detroit built on this foundation of shared work, and is part of SWF Communiversity’s ongoing series of urban acupuncture installations at Values-Based Partner sites nationwide that engage Communiversity participants and VBP communities in design, build, and Civic Arts projects.

DAY 1 | PUBLIC LECTURE AT UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN 

On Thursday afternoon, Detroit Values-Based Partners and SWF teams went to the University of Michigan’s Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning. SWF Executive Director Emmanuel Pratt delivered a lecture that emphasized the need for a Solutionary approach to building public trust, utilizing SWF’s practice of Regenerative Neighborhood Development, the Commonwealth, and the Communiversity as a demonstration of Re-Mapping the Publics. 

The lecture culminated with a dynamic Q&A that engaged Values-Based Partners from Feedom Freedom Growers, Birwood House, Freedom Dreams, Open Works, and the Boggs Center, along with Emmanuel, elevating the urgent need for a paradigm shift. Each VBP highlighted their varied, and sometimes harmful, experiences with university research and city planning and development cycles. They also emphasized the importance of “small is beautiful” approaches to re-generating neighborhoods, which reflects the Boggs’ call of, “We are the leaders we have been waiting for.”

DAY 2 | BUILD-IT WORKSHOP AT FREEDOM DREAMS

On Friday, Freedom Dreams welcomed neighbors and Values-Based Partners from the Boggs Center, Birwood House, Detroit is Different, and SWF, along with University of Michigan students inspired by the public talk the day before, to participate in building and filling new garden beds and refreshing existing garden beds with new soil in preparation for the upcoming growing season. 

The Build-It Workshop at Freedom Dreams echoed the recent refresh of the SWF Community Garden at The Commonwealth. In late February and early March, the SWF team rebuilt 20 garden beds, refilling them with soil and spreading wood chips around them. 

Partners from across the Values-Based Partners Network converged early Friday morning at Freedom Dreams and immediately got to work, utilizing Interlocking Ponies and Burros to create a public work-shop in an alleyway. Collectively, over two hours, Values-Based Partners worked to build 6 garden beds, load a pickup truck with soil and woodchips, fill the 6 existing and 6 new garden beds with about 20 cubic yards of soil, and spread wood chips around the 12 garden beds in record time. By early afternoon, the Freedom Dreams site was ready for the upcoming growing season and the debut of their first season of markets.

After the Build-It, neighbors from across Detroit, VBPs, and SWF shared lunch and dialogue and reflection about the day’s activities and the importance of the Values-Based Partners’ Network. People used interlocking ponies as seats, as they gathered in a circle reflecting on the transformation of the Freedom Dreams site which just two years ago was filled with high grass. Freedom Dreams has transformed the land through daily actions embodying “small is beautiful”: mowing, picking up trash, and landscaping, along with the construction, maintenance, and activation of the new spaces, including the garden beds, combinations of chairs and tables, a small windmill, and the Meeting House, creating active nodes for community building within the neighborhood. These active nodes reflect the larger community growing locally and nationally. 

Most importantly, SWF and Values-Based Partners recognized the remarkable growth of humans across the VBP network, including younger team members and apprentices like Knowledge, Alysse, and Derek, who demonstrated their leadership skills throughout the day’s Build-It Workshop activities.  The VBP network took joy in witnessing them stepping into leadership roles and supporting each other. 

There GROWS the neighborhood!