On the Table MKE is an initiative of the Greater Milwaukee Foundation and was introduced in 2017 as a forum for building relationships, generating ideas through respectful dialogue and putting those ideas in motion for the benefit of the community. It is a single day of community conversation taking place in myriad locations across southeast Wisconsin, all on Oct. 10, 2019.

This year, we are continuing our emphasis on bringing more youth voices to the table. As your students participate in this dialogue, they will be doing so alongside thousands of others in the community taking the necessary step for greater Milwaukee to become an equitable home for people of any race, status or identity. (If necessary, it is acceptable to hold your conversation on an alternate day in proximity to Oct. 10).

As an initial step, please register the table or tables you will be hosting with your students at onthetableMKE.org/register. The entire process is free. This will help ensure your students’ voices are heard within the broader community and will provide you with access to supplementary resources and communications.

This lesson is designed for a 60-minute period, and you can find an extension or follow-up activity at the end of this document.

On the Table MKE Lesson Plan

PURPOSE: The purpose of this lesson is to bring a regional conversation into individual classrooms. Adults will encourage students to critically consider what’s going on in their communities and explore opportunities for change. Students will be empowered to understand their role in the broader community and potential impact for shaping change. This has been designed as an independent lesson that can be implemented within any classroom or group of students and the hope is that it will spur future conversation and action.

OBJECTIVES: • Students will be empowered to discuss high level community issues • Students can identify one way in which they can impact their immediate community

STANDARDS: • CCSS.ELA.SL.1 – ELA Speaking and Listening (Common Core State Standards Initiative)

• Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions • SS.Inq5.a – Inquiry, Civic Engagement (Department of Public Instruction))

• Explore opportunities, informed by the knowledge and methods of the social sciences, for personal or collaborative civic engagement with community, school, state, tribal, national, and/or global implications.

Thursday, Oct. 10, 2019

MATERIALS: • Student handout • Class webs (positive and negative) • Photos (to be projected or printed)

PREPARATION: • Divide class into small groups • Create asset webs in the front of the room (similar as the webs in the student handout)

LAUNCH (activate learning): 7 minutes • Pull up photos of Bria Smith, youth activist in Milwaukee. Also, have your students watch her ‘March For Our Lives: Bria Smith’

YouTube video. Wait to provide context. • Ask students to look at the first box on the handout, and think about those questions as you show the photos. • Allow students personal journal time to record what they see, think and wonder about the photos.

FRAMING: 8 minutes • Bria Smith is an 18-year-old youth activist in Milwaukee, WI who sits as the President of the Milwaukee Youth Council. A senior at

Franklin High School, she has organized and mobilized young people of color to voice their concerns when it comes to inner city gun violence. She works with PEARLS for Teen Girls, an organization that encourages women empowerment, and has crafted a website called honeyforyourtea.com to give young girls of color the platform to speak of their experiences with discrimination and oppression through writing. Bria’s future career goal is to continue her work through film and journalism.

• This is an example of youth leadership and youth power in action that is happening in your community today. This young person is organizing and fighting for social, racial and economic justice within their own city and schools.

• Today, all over greater Milwaukee, thousands of people are talking about issues that matter to them—things about greater Milwaukee they are proud of, and things about greater Milwaukee that they’d really like to see change. For the rest of class today, you will be a part of the same conversation.

• Today is about you feeling empowered to have meaningful conversations, and to generate ideas for improving your community. Youth voices are not heard enough, so we want to remind you that your voice really does matter.

DISCUSSION: 35 minutes • As a class, define community—will you be talking about your classroom, your school, neighborhood, young people in general, your

municipality, your country, the world, etc.? This should go in the center of the web. • Once community has been defined, have students take 3 minutes to write on their handout things about their community they are proud of. • Using the prepared web at the front of the classroom, have students share out while you record on the class web. • Talk about how it is always good to start with what’s working, and it’s also important to identify what isn’t working. Using the t-chart

on the back of the student handout, students will turn to their small groups and answer the following questions: What challenges do you see? What opportunities do you see for change? Here are a few additional prompting questions:

• What issue do you think is the most important in your community?• How has this issue affected your life or those you know?• What do you think is causing this issue?• What would your community look like if a change were made?• How can you be part of the solution?

• Caution: As students identify challenges in their community, you will have to be careful to move them from complaint into action. Here is one question to help students focus on action as they consider their issue: What are some of the things you have control over?

• After 10 minutes of small group discussion, each group will share out on one thing they want to change, and one way they could change it. This can be done in a variety of ways:

• Round robin, moving from group to group • Providing an additional minute, each group writes their responses on a post-it note. This could allow you to categorize them as

students share.• Next, students will individually respond to sentence stems in the handout.

DEBRIEF: 10 minutes • People in our community want to know what you’re talking and thinking about today. • Pass out the action pledge cards. These are part of your SWAG kit.• On this card, have students write down one action they plan to take as a result of their conversation. We are encouraging all

On the Table MKE participants to do this and post it to social media with the hashtags: #onthetableMKE and #yourvoicemattersMKE. • Collect action pledge cards.

FINAL FEEDBACK: On the day of On the Table MKE, an online survey will open at surveymonkey.com/r/OTTMKE2019. This link is printed on the back of the action pledge cards. All hosts and participants are encouraged to take the short survey. Timely completion of the survey enables the Greater Milwaukee Foundation to report accurately and representatively back to the community about the themes, priorities and ideas that emerged through these conversations. To the best of your ability, please additionally assist your students in accessing and completing the survey so the final community report is inclusive of their voices and participation.

EXTENSION ACTIVITY:

On the Table MKE participants are eligible to apply for small amounts of funding

to strengthen community, deepen civic involvement and cultivate new ideas

developed during their conversations. If your classroom had a great idea that you

would like to implement, consider applying for Ideas to Action funding. Information

about criteria, funding ranges, application and selection process will be posted at

onthetableMKE.org.

IDEAS TO ACTION

• What do you see?

• What do you think about that?

• What does it make you wonder?

SEE – THINK – WONDER

WHAT ABOUT YOUR COMMUNITY ARE YOU PROUD OF?

STUDENT HANDOUTS:

WHAT NEEDS TO CHANGE IN YOUR COMMUNITY?

What challenges do you see? What can you do to change it?

DIRECTIONS: Choose three of the following prompts and respond in the box below.• If I had $500 to impact my community, I would…• One thing I’d like my mayor or village president to know is…• I am super passionate about helping my community change…• My role in changing my community is…• One thing I could do tomorrow is…

WHAT CAN YOU DO TO MAKE CHANGE HAPPEN?