mkeinfocus

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Helping 53206 Through Gardening: Andre Lee Ellis Grows the Community Through Gardening

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“We need to take our hands off the trigger and put them in the soil, because if your hands are in the soil, you can’t have them on the trigger of a gun,” says Andre Lee Ellis. With a background in theater, Ellis never expected to be in the business of gardening, but a series of events led him to start the organization called We Got This. The program provides support and guidance for African American boys through gardening. Since its inception in 2011, We Got This has grown tremendously because of community support and has changed the lives of many young men.

Ellis and his wife moved to Ninth and Ring streets in 2011. Within their first week at their new home, they heard six gunshots outside their front door. His wife ran from the kitchen to find a young man lying dead in the street. There was a lot of bad activity on that street corner, Ellis explains, but on that same corner was a small plot of land with raised beds. One day, he asked a young girl playing in the street what the raised beds were. She responded with an attitude and said, “It’s supposed to be a garden, but don’t nobody grow nothing.” Ellis thought that should be changed.

With the idea stirring in his head, he was approached one day by a worried mother from the neighborhood. Her 11-year-old son had committed an offense and was being held at the police station. Ellis went with her to the station to convince the officers not to arrest the boy because the boy was participating in a program with Ellis that coming Saturday. He made it up on the spot, and when the officers asked the name of the program, Ellis said the same thing he kept repeating to the worried mother: “We got this.”

That Saturday, the boy showed up to the small plot of land across from Ellis’ house at 8 a.m. sharp. With the promise of $20, the boy worked with Ellis to start the garden. The next Saturday, the boy came back with five friends, promising them $20 each. Unprepared, Ellis told the boys that he didn’t have the money. Instead, he told them to raise their fists in the air and pose for a picture. He posted that picture to his network on Facebook asking five other black men to come to the garden and support the boys. By noon, seven men showed up. Each week, more boys would come to the garden, and with them came more people from around the city willing to fund their efforts.

The program has empowered young boys to make an honest income and provide for themselves. With close to 90% of them not knowing their father, Ellis and other men in the community are showing up to be that father figure and offer guidance that they haven’t had before. That mentorship is helping the boys find new confidence and imagining new possibilities for their futures. 

These efforts are taking place in the heart of the 53206 zip code. Ellis recalls the negative articles that cite facts about incarceration, claiming that the area is one of the worst places to raise a black child. But he lives there, he explains, and he sees the good that’s happening every day. What those articles are missing are the people who live in those communities who support their neighbors and build up their youth. Those facts completely gloss over the capabilities these young boys have and the possibility for change in this city.

Just like any other person in this country, these young men have the potential to grow up and become loving fathers, caring neighbors or anyone else they can dream of. It’s time we start paying attention to the neighborhood’s potential, not its statistics.

Learn more at wegotthismke.com.

Read the article in the Shepherd Express, part of the regular column “Hero of the Week.”

How Milwaukee Barber Shops Open Conversations for African American Men

On Saturday morning, in the busy barber shop on MLK Drive and Garfield Avenue, you will hear the sound of shears clipping, trimmers buzzing and men talking amongst each other. Gee’s Clippers always seems to be full of energy and people with hopeful faces. There is a welcoming atmosphere in the midst of the bustling barber shop.

On the other side of town, on 76th Street and Capitol Drive, you’ll find a quieter barber shop with a staff that seems like a family. Styles Par Excellence, managed by Dart Townsend, has a staff that supports one another and their clientele by being there to listen when someone needs to share their struggles. These barber shops, like others in the city, hold onto a culture that has been rooted in the African American community for decades. Barber shops have been a gathering place for black men, providing a safe space to talk and build self-esteem.

A barber is far more than someone that cuts hair; he is a role model, a health advocate and a reliable person to talk to. Especially to a man dealing with difficult life experiences like poverty or family problems, a barber is a steady person in his life who can empower him with a new haircut. As is commonly reported in the news, the rates of obesity, incarceration and poverty among African Americans are vastly higher compared to those of whites.

Most Milwaukee residents probably already know that our city is one of the most segregated cities in the country and home to the zip code with the highest percentage of black male incarceration. Those issues are real and present for too many local men, but barbers “can be an ear to those individuals that come from a broken home,” states Gaulien “Gee” Smith, owner of Gee’s Clippers. More than that, these barbers are embracing their role as trusted community members and partnering with organizations like the Milwaukee Fatherhood Initiative (MFI) to bring real solutions to this city.

One of those solutions is an event put on by Gee’s Clippers and MFI called “Real Men Real Talk,” a conversation for and about men. The idea came together when Gaulien Smith and MFI’s project director Natasha Dotson realized that men aren’t talking to each other about their personal issues. Dotson has witnessed how hypermasculinity can cause men to withdraw from their families and avoid confronting their problems. Smith has seen similar patterns in his customers and over time has seen more mothers bringing their sons to the shop, rather than fathers. Men have been withdrawing from the family because they don’t know how to act as fathers. But going to the barber is one of the key ways African American men have traditionally bonded with their sons, Dotson explains. “That’s what men did. It was a man thing.”

Real Men Real Talk is Dotson and Smith’s direct response to those problems. The recurring event is a workshop and open conversation which gives men the tools to be engaged with their families and steer their lives in a positive direction. Hosted in Gee’s barber shop, the gathering is only for men and pulls in leaders and business owners from around the city to teach men about entrepreneurship, health and confidence. The moderator of Real Men Real Talk, Kwabena Antoine Nixon, explains the conversation provides black men a place for healing, a place to discuss their concerns and a place to feel welcomed.

“Barber shops are the heartbeat of the community,” Smith insists. They are one of the few places many of these men feel comfortable talking about their vulnerabilities. Many men don’t know where to look for help so they choose to go to their barber, someone they trust, a place they can let their guard down. “You can say the things here you can’t say nowhere else,” says Anthony Millions, a barber at Gee’s Clippers. “You can talk to somebody, another man, about things you can’t talk to your girl about.” These conversations allow men to talk through their frustrations, find guidance and be more present when they go back to their families.

Gee’s Clippers allows for one-on-one conversations between barber and customer, but Styles Par Excellence tends to be a group conversation in their smaller space. “Everything is on the table when you’re in the shop. Everybody is welcome to chime in,” says Townsend. “It’s like a group therapy session, so to speak.” Whether it’s a conversation between two men or ten, these barbers make sure their shops are a place for men to have meaningful conversations whenever they are needed.

The essential thing that barber shops provide is trust. When boys and men sit in their barber’s chair to get a haircut, they are sitting in the chair of a man they confide in. “In this day and time, for the most part, a barber is the only positive male role model a kid might talk to on a regular basis. We don’t have enough positive African American men out here,” says Smith. He believes barbers have a responsibility to impart as much positive energy and insight as they possibly can. While inside a barber shop, a man gets to escape from the burdens of daily life and be in a sanctuary that guides him to become a stronger man. 

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Riverwest's Woodland Pattern Book Center

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The Riverwest neighborhood is a gathering place for artists, writers, dreamers and those who choose to live slightly outside the norm. It is one of the few truly interracial neighborhoods of Milwaukee and has a vibe that is both welcoming and accepting. Many people who have lived in Riverwest for a long time consider it to be part of their identity.

But Riverwest was not always the creative hub that it is today. In the 1970s, if someone wanted to be at the center of the poetry scene, they would look to places like New York or California. So, in 1979, Karl Gartung, Anne Kingsbury and Karl Young started the Woodland Pattern Book Center to create a spoken-word scene in Milwaukee by hosting writers from around the country. They felt that Milwaukee needed a physical space where artists and idealists could come together to share knowledge and collaborate.

In Gartung’s manifesto, he wrote, “We exist to prove the living artist. We exist against isolation,” describing how important it is that the artist not make work in isolation. To allow the work to come alive, the artist needs an audience, whether that is a small group of people in a workshop or a large audience. And that is what Woodland Pattern has provided to the community since the very beginning.

The team made it their life’s work to strengthen the Riverwest neighborhood with Woodland Pattern at the heart of it all. After more than 30 years of helping build a community of poets in Milwaukee, Kingsbury, who remained the executive director, decided to retire. In March of this year, Kingsbury and the team at Woodland Pattern hired two dedicated and hopeful poets to take her place: Jenny Gropp and Laura Solomon. New to Milwaukee, Gropp and Solomon moved from Georgia as soon as they saw their dream job open up. “We are here because of the mission; that’s why we wanted to come,” Solomon says. They strongly believe in the idea of making art by sharing and listening to one another’s emotions.

In addition, Gropp and Solomon were attracted to the book center’s uniqueness. Woodland Pattern is nationally known for its collection of more than 26,000 small press titles, including hand-made letter-press books by writers from around the world. Many of these books are made for live readings and meant to be handed out to the audience.

In the coming year, Woodland Pattern plans to open its own record label to record the live readings on vinyl. The book center regularly brings in spoken-word performers from around the country who create a safe space for emotions and ideas to be shared with the audience. “The space sort of functions as a sanctuary,” explains Gropp.

Woodland Pattern Book Center continues to make efforts to inspire the next generation to become leaders. “A lot of what I’ve learned from this place is respect and examination of what has come before and for the community that is all around us,” says Gropp. The center’s history is a large part of the neighborhood’s story. That story is one of a community open to trust, sincerity and acceptance.

Woodland Pattern Book Center is located at 720 E. Locust St. For more information, call 414-263-5001 or visit www.woodlandpattern.org.

View the article on the Shepherd Express website, part of my regular Hero of the Week column. 

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Marcela 'Xela' Garcia

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Marcela “Xela” Garcia grew up attending art classes at the Walker’s Point Center for the Arts (WPCA), a non-profit arts center that provided opportunities for her that she couldn’t find in other places. The center helped her grow and understand her place in a culture that was new to her. Born in Guadalajara, Mexico, Garcia’s native language was Spanish. When she came to the United States at a young age, she stood out. Because of her different language and customs, Garcia questioned where she belonged in her new environment.

“I had very supportive parents that instilled the power of my culture and my identity. I really found refuge in that, especially in the arts,” she explains. Art allowed her to ask those questions, helping her make sense of the world around her. Garcia uses her childhood lessons as a driving force to show others that art can transform lives and neighborhoods. So, in 2016, when the executive director position opened at the WPCA, Garcia decided to join the team and merge her goals with those of the organization.

Since the inception of the WPCA in 1987, the mission of the organization has been providing accessibility to the arts for youth and underrepresented people in the Walker’s Point neighborhood. The WPCA invites artists from around Milwaukee and around the world into its gallery to participate in arts education programming. With the varying ideas and experiences of the artists, the WPCA can incorporate vastly different cultural perspectives into their programs.

One of the many ways the WPCA represents the traditions of the people who have lived in the Walker’s Point neighborhood is through events like their 26th annual Día de los Muertos exhibition. The exhibit that opened Friday, Oct. 19, challenged the viewers to consider their ancestral connections and the meaning of death in communities. Local artists were invited to create altars that explored the theme of tradition, family, life and death.

The WPCA is a safe space for people to start a dialogue, which is why it has been seen as an anchor in the Walker’s Point neighborhood for the last 31 years. “We have what we need as a community, and oftentimes we don’t realize that,” states Garcia. The organization uses artist talks, exhibitions and community events to talk about relevant issues, such as immigration, gentrification and segregation. Through art, people are able to express how they feel about such issues, giving them a platform to explore solutions when they wouldn’t otherwise have one.

“At an early age, I saw the power the arts had in building confidence, pursuing leadership and finding a voice when you sometimes didn’t feel like you had one; in doing it in your own way, and in your own terms,” Garcia says. The first step to helping youth and underserved community members succeed is by opening doors that allow them to explore their creativity.

For more on the Walkers Point Center for the Arts, visit wpca-milwaukee.org.

View the article on the Shepherd Express website, part of my regular Hero of the Week column. 

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Jean Bell-Calvin

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This country’s health care system is complicated, difficult to navigate and not attainable for everyone. Jean Bell-Calvin and her team at the UW-Milwaukee Silver Spring Community Nursing Center are working to change that, starting at the local level. The team at the Nursing Center treats their patients differently than the average hospital. Rather than simply looking at symptoms, they take the time to speak with their patients about their day-to-day habits and stressors that may have caused the symptoms. “You have a right to be treated a certain way, have your questions answered and have somebody take the time to listen,” says Bell-Calvin, the Nursing Center’s director and driving force behind the clinic for the last 30 years.

Bell-Calvin has made it her life’s work to help the community understand health. If asked to talk about her life, she will tell you, “It is not about me but the wonderful team of people I work with and the people we serve,” yet she deserves enormous praise for her dedication to the people of Milwaukee. In 1988, Bell-Calvin took a job at the recently opened clinic and has worked to improve the programming to meet the needs of North Side residents ever since. The original goal of the clinic was to promote health, focusing on education and nutrition. But in the late 1990s, after being approached by Milwaukee County, the clinic transitioned to providing primary care for the underinsured. Through the General Assistance Medical Program, the clinic became a contracted insurance provider for the county and began to provide primary care to community members that otherwise could not afford it.

There is more to health than clinical diagnoses; the Nursing Center also takes into consideration the many factors that can affect people’s well-being, such as relationships at home, not being able to pay the bills or a lack of reliable transportation. The Nursing Center seeks to build a relationship with the people they serve and adapts their programming to meet the needs of the community.

A vital partner that helps them achieve this goal is the Silver Spring Neighborhood Center (SSNC), a non-profit community center that services the people in the neighborhood through programs relating to health and wellness, education and employment. The SSNC often looks to the Nursing Center for programming related to health and nutrition, providing an opportunity for the nurses of the UWM Nursing Center to go out in the community and learn what is needed to improve people’s health. “It’s about looking at people, finding out what their needs are and plugging them in,” Bell-Calvin explains.

Bell-Calvin and the UW-Milwaukee Silver Spring Community Nursing Center emphasize that primary care is not enough to keep people healthy; they must also be educated. Whether that means teaching people proper nutrition or helping them understand how to use their insurance plan, the goal is to empower people with knowledge. “This is the work I’ve been called to do,” says Bell-Calvin, and with that work, she continues to change lives one family at a time.

View the article on the Shepherd Express website, part of my regular Hero of the Week column. 

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Dasha Kelly Hamilton Helps Milwaukee Youth Find their Voice

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“We need each other.” Those are Dasha Kelly Hamilton’s words describing what she’s learned from young people she has worked with for the past 18 years. Our country and our city are changing because more people are speaking up, but the voices we need to hear the most are those of the youth in this country. For them to speak louder, they need a support system and the confidence that their voice matters.

Still Waters Collective (SWC), founded by Kelly Hamilton, is one of many organizations in Milwaukee working with local youth to help them find their voice. It is an outreach organization that uses creative writing and performance art to build community. The organization started as an adult open mic but has since grown to predominantly serve youth by partnering with public schools to teach poetry workshops. Words have power when we speak our truth, but the real power happens when an audience listens to those words and is affected by them.

The organization first transitioned to work with youth when Kelly Hamilton was asked to teach a workshop at a Milwaukee high school. Her world changed when she asked the class a simple question: “How many of you think your voice matters?” Less than a third of the class raised their hands, which surprised her. They were so young, she thought, but not excited by their ideas, thoughts and imaginations. “I was never there to teach them but to show them that they are important,” says Kelly Hamilton. At the end of all her workshops, she has each student write a poem because it “requires the young person to consider all the possible ideas in the universe... Recognize that you’re creative, and your voice matters. Magic happens by the time we get to that poem.”

Words Have Power

Kelly Hamilton reiterates one point to every one of her students before they perform their poems: “Every time you speak your truth in front of an audience, there’s someone who needs to hear it.” That statement is why poetry is so important. We all relate to one another and through words, we can come together to a common understanding. Listening can be just as powerful as speaking, and having active listeners shows these young people that their words have power.

Words touch our lives in many ways, and SWC wants to make sure that words are also being used to connect the people across our city. One of their core programs is the SWC Fellowship in which students from ages 18 to 25 complete course work and connect with local community members to build relationships. The intention is to cross the lines in Milwaukee’s different neighborhoods and show the participants of the program that they are welcome in any part of the city.

“These are young people who have figured out that their voices matter,” says Kelly Hamilton, but, as she explains, this is also a time in their lives when they could lose that confidence. Still Waters Collective ensures that they have a time and place to share that voice.

We all have stories hidden away where the still waters run deep. Telling those stories helps the listeners better understand their community and allows the storytellers to speak their truths to the community. The people of this city can empower each other by listening; by listening we can open a conversation.


View the article on the Shepherd Express website, part of my regular Hero of the Week column. 

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CORE El Centro

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Our current health care system is complex, difficult to navigate, and inaccessible to people with limited funds and recourses. Especially for people from different cultural backgrounds, these challenges can feel impossible to overcome. But CORE El Centro understands health differently.  To them, health is an elaborate web of pieces that we must tie together to be our best selves and that starts with a safe space to practice healing.  When co-founders Jayne Ader and Madeline Gianforte started CORE El Centro 16 years ago, they saw a need for an understanding of healing and access to health services in the community.  “People have this innate wisdom about their path and each path is different. So how do we help you find that,” says Ader.  Their goal is to inspire individuals and families to achieve optimal health by offering affordable services in both English and Spanish. 

co-founders Jayne Ader and Madeline Gianforte

CORE El Centro treats members of the community that have limited access to health care due to low income, language barriers, cultural barriers and other factors. Most of the organization’s clients are Latino, but anyone is welcome for treatment.  Their ability to connect with clients through language and culture is what makes CORE El Centro unique.  When a client first visits the building, they meet with a staff member called a health navigator, who discusses their health concerns, problems at home, and general troubles to truly understand the factors impacting their health.  “They can really connect with what you are going through,” says Carla Del Pozo, director of the Integrative Health and Wellness program.  These health navigators are able place the client with the best possible practitioners because they are trained community health workers and people from the community.  In order to heal someone, CORE believes you must first get to know them and understand where their pain originated from.

The organization is built with four main programs: Integrated Health and Wellness, Gardening and Nutrition, Children’s Wellness and Volunteers.  They offer one-on-one sessions in therapies such as acupuncture and massage, as well as courses like reiki, yoga, gardening and nutrition.  CORE El Centro has also built strong relationships over years with their partners, such as Aurora Walker’s Point Clinic, The Healing Center and others.  These close relationships allow CORE to confidently refer clients who are in need of different healing services than what they offer.  “Part of the mission is building community,” explains Ader. “By building community, you also heal.”  When people are given access to health care through language, cost and community members that understand their needs, people are able to better themselves and give back to their community. 

 

View the article on the Shepherd Express website, part of my regular Hero of the Week column.    

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Dr. Kyana Young and the Marquette University Strategic Innovation Fund

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 Dr. Kyana Young, a postdoctoral fellow at Marquette University, began working in the Global Water Center in 2016.  With a background in environmental engineering, Young’s passion is finding solutions for safe water to improve global and public health.  Soon after she arrived, it occurred to her that there was a lack of diverse groups of people represented in the building.  But it didn’t take her long to do something about that. 

She spoke with staff at Marshall High School and Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS), including Larry Farris, Toby Hairston, Rochelle Sandrin, Jan Haven, and Megan Sun, who helped her come up with an idea for a program that would provide opportunities to demographics that are underrepresented in scientific fields relating to water research.  She applied for a grant from Marquette University with the support of the group at MPS, and was awarded the Marquette University Strategic Innovation Fund Grant.  The grant made it possible for her to provide internships to students at Milwaukee’s Marshall High School and bring them to the labs of the Global Water Center to do hands-on research. When working in the classroom at Marshall High School, the youth learn how to write lab reports and do data analysis with their teacher Megan Sun.  The students are taught how to apply their newly learned scientific knowledge to solve real world problems.

Each student is assigned a project for the semester by participating companies and universities.  Young asked these organizations to host and mentor the youth, including Stonehouse Water Technologies, Youth Rising Up, Solar Water Works, DRM International Inc., Sun Yat-Sen University, Grand Valley State University, Assembly of God and Marquette University.  Dr. Young knew that the students needed more than community partners, they needed mentors like Dr. Moe Mukiibi, the chief technology officer at Stonehouse Water Technologies (the company with the most interns in the program), to make the program a success.  The program is meant to “create a path for them that could be life changing, so that they can see why they are working in a lab and see what this can become,” says Mukiibi.

 “When you provide an opportunity and you back that up with resources, this is what can happen,” says Young as she describes how the students have excelled far beyond the expectations of the program. “This impacts the global community.”  Thanks to Young and the team at MPS, these students have a chance to explore their interests and realize career paths that can make a major difference in their lives.   

View the article on the Shepherd Express website, part of my regular Hero of the Week column.