MSN Feb Meeting : Announcements and Recap

Hello folks! If you missed our Feb 2nd meeting, read below to check out the community announcements, get the slides and see what you missed. Here is the link to the slide deck, where you can see visuals and get a sense of the conversations that aren't covered in the recap.  Thanks for checking in! 

This meeting was focused on two things: appreciating the contributions of our long time MSN staff member, Medjine Lucien, and on starting the summer planning process. Medjine, who has just moved on to work for Waltham Partnerships for Youth, worked in multiple capacities on our MSN team over the past 4 years, so we did a little retrospective of all her contributions and heard appreciations from Nicole Rodriguez, her past supervisor at Moses Youth Center, in addition to multiple others in the community who have worked with and appreciated Medjine's quiet but steady leadership over those years. Good luck Medjine - we have a feeling Cambridge will call you back at some point soon, but we are glad Waltham young people have you in their corner now as well! 

Community Announcements at the Feb Meeting: 

• Mia Klinger, Cambridge Camping: What's Cooking Feb Vacation Program still has 5 spots left, all food and equipment provided, four half days of cooking fun and then a field trip to Haley House - all for middle schoolers at no cost. Link to register here. Also doing an April Vacation program for middle schoolers on STEAM and Nature! 
• Ayesha Wilson, Work Force: for 10th graders, there are spots available in Work Force across all sites, please spread the word. Young people must be in CHA housing or on Section 8 voucher: Ayesha can look up their names if you're not sure they are eligible. Please email [email protected] if you know 10th grader who is a good fit.  Also, running another year of scholarship workshops for CRLS seniors - link here.
• Emily Meyer, Cambridge Public Library: Library is running a Books not Binaries group about LGBTQ+ experience, first session is tonight, one every month. Also just approved a Feb Vacation comics workshop - back by popular demand. Spread the word. Also, she'll be out on maternity leave soon (has a due date in March!!) let's send her some love! Email her at [email protected].
• Mia Klinger, Cambridge Camping: we have some capacity to support families who are quarantining and who's children are out of school (zoom check-ins, etc). Please get in touch about ideas or families or connections that can help us use this capacity! Email Mia at [email protected].
• Maya Gonzalez, SEPAC (Special Education Parent Advisory Council) is advocating in a CPS Budget meeting about a request for improving after school options for students with disabilities and special needs. The high school has been most successful in increasing options and we need this to be part of CPS budget to make changes at all levels. Come support and speak to the gap in options! She put together this list of talking points that OST Providers can use to help advocate!  Register here to be in the budget meeting, Feb 12th, 10 and 11am (can do either.)
• Sarah Winter, Community Arts Center (CAC): Teen programming is open for 8th-12th graders doing public art, teen media, and even a class with CAC at Montserrat College: Anime & Manga English Writing Course (get college credit!!)  Check out programs here, this is a good time of year to join: CAC Teen Programs link. 
• Tagesech Wabeto, Community Engagement Team (Ethiopian community outreach worker): The CET team is already getting questions about summer and is doing monthly sessions for families to fill out applications and get help looking at options.  Make sure that Tagesech and her team ([email protected]) has the info/applications for your programs so that they can help families who are interested make it a reality, with support in their native language from the CET team! 
• Annie, MSN: Check out our slides of current programs for young people in middle school: we make these because you all are the folks who know young people and could encourage them to try these things - often it takes an individual tap on the shoulder to say "i saw this and thought of you....you should try this" - and the rest is history. Slides: https://bit.ly/AfterSchoolSlides21-22 
• Solomon Montagno, City Sprouts: City Sprouts is hiring a new Garden Educator who would be teaching science in Boston and Cambridge public schools and maintaining 3-4 of their school gardens. Check out the job description and please forward to your networks! 
• Kimone Simpson, Breakthrough Greater Boston: we are looking for volunteers to help us interview the amazing 50+ sixth graders who completed Breakthrough applications. There are two dates when it would be great to have folks from the network help out: Tuesday, Feb 15th (4-8pm) and Sat, Feb 19th, 9am-1pm. Interested? Fill out this form with more info! 

Next we talked about summer - where folks were in summer planning and how it felt to them. There were some great themes across the board, particularly wanting young people to make friends, feel belonging and have fun (and the adults to have fun alongside them). We also took some time to learn and test out the "annotate" version in Zoom, so folks could put a stamp on whichever thought bubble they felt represented their feelings on each question. Check it out: 

We had short breakout groups on a few of the topics mentioned here, particularly the social emotional skills and experiences we want young people to have, and cross-city partnerships and field trips. We asked folks before closing what was helpful to them, and what they want to have more time in MSN meetings to talk about before the summer: check out some great ideas and responses that we plan to build into meeting going forward!

• options for young people to meet up with other programs, or places across the city and do fun new things together (Ayesha Wilson, Work Force/School Committee)
• Social emotional tools for families (Mia Richardson, MSN/CCSC)
• Partnerships/meet ups/cross site activities/ 8th grade opportunities (Melinda Rosado, Gately Youth Center)
• I want to learn about East end House more. I want to discuss about more educational summer programs (Tagesech Wabeto, Community Engagement Team)
• Most helpful: programs are very interested in finding places to bring groups this summer (Emily Meyer, CPL)
• Knowing that the needs of special needs/disabled students are being discussed at program sites and not just in these meetings (Maya Gonzalez, SEPAC)
• I would like to learn/brainstorm more about what youth need for the summer (Puja Kranz Howe, GOLD/GEY)
• 1. Knowing there are people I can reach out to for help. 2. Hearing others experiences. I am coming from School Age to a leadership role in Middle School and there are things I don't know because I have spent all my time in School Age. (Marse Romero, East End House)
• It’s helpful to connect and hear more about opportunities and your experiences, great to meet you all! (Jonathon Leiner, Amigos K-8)
• Learned about Recess program and hoping to check it out this summer. (Nelita Depina, Russell Youth Center)