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2017 Class Update: Nov. 1st

Today in class, our 2017 Periclean cohort successfully tied up a few loose ends, preparing for our final fundraisers (Cookies to Go-Go, and Meal Swipes) and trips to The Burlington Housing Authority, and solidifying a few ideas for our Spring Project. 

We will be hosting our final Cookies to  Go-Go event for this semester next Wednesday on November 9th. Be sure to order your cookies and support our Voices of Sustainability Conference! Similarly, our Meal Swipes fundraiser, taking place December 5th- 9th, will also be benefitting Voices of Sustainability. 

While in class we also were able to confirm that we would have Pericleans at The Burlington Housing Authority for these last few weeks until the end of the semester. This was exciting for our cohort because it will mark a full semester of us positively contributing to our local community. In addition to continuing our relationship with The Burlington Housing Authority in the spring, we have been wanting to take on something else for our local spring project. So far our thoughts have been centered around hosting a festival of some kind at The Burlington Housing Authority. This festival could look something like a health and wellness fair for the children we have been working with this semester. As a cohort, we also tinkered with the idea of giving the students we have been working with this semester a project for them to complete and then teach their families about at the end of the semester through a presentation or poster fair. It is very important to us to have input from The Burlington Housing Authority before we move forward with any local project for the spring, so until we hear back from our contact we will continue to brainstorm new ideas for our spring project.

Towards the end of class we had a guest speaker, Dr. Cahill, come to our class to speak about the philosophy of ethics and how we can use the tools she provided us to help with our restorative plan for our Periclean cohort. Dr. Cahill spoke of a spectrum that could help us identify our individual and cohort feelings about our actions taken while pursuing the KIND Grant; one end of the spectrum signified feelings of wanting to “sweep it under the rug” and not recognize how big of a deal it was, while the other end of the spectrum signified feelings of wanting to punish ourselves for our actions repeatedly and having it create shameful and  negative feelings towards ourself. After explaining the basics of the spectrum, Dr. Cahill opened her presentation up to us for questions and discussion. 

In order to continue to thoughtfully move forward after this presentation, I think that each member of our cohort needs to really think about where we fall on that spectrum in regards to our actions with the KIND grant. In addition, I think that going forward we will all need to be cognizant of each other’s feelings and attempt to help each other with the healing and restorative process. I am hopeful that this will bring us closer as a cohort and will truly be a teachable and transformative moment for each of us. 

Peace, Love, Periclean.

Shay & Periclean 2017

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Quick Update: 4/12

As of April 12th, 2016, the Periclean class of 2017 has accomplished a lot. However, all that we have accomplished has not come easy. Recently our class has called upon every member to step up our commitment levels. We are realizing that January of 2017 is approaching quicker and quicker, and we still have much to do in terms of planning our conference in Namibia. We also have a lot of fundraising left to do in order to make this conference happen, and, similarly, we still have a lot of progress to make towards completing our local project in Burlington, NC. Although we recognize that we still have a few tasks to complete before January of 2017, I believe we are well on our way to achieving our goals.

In terms of fundraising…

We have planned a silent auction for April 22nd from 4-7pm to help raise money for our conference. Additionally, as of next semester we have decided to take over the Cookies to-go-go Periclean fundraiser to help with funding for our class, so stay tuned and plan to order cookies! We also have made Pura Vida Periclean bracelets to sell in order to help us raise funds. Hopefully all of these fundraising efforts, in conjunction to our Gofundme page and our letter writing campaign, will help us reach our fundraising goals for the semester.

In terms of our local project…

We are still working on the logistics of it all, but we have decided that we want to create something along the lines of a demonstration garden in downtown Burlington, NC. We were hoping to pair this demonstration garden with a donation box for our class, hoping to both raise funds and spread awareness of the issue we are trying to address in Namibia. We are trying to locate a place to put this demonstration garden, but have had difficulties in finding a suitable location equipped with people to help take care of the garden while we are not here (ex. summer vacation or after we graduate). On a more positive note, we also recently went into BSS, a local middle school in Burlington, and taught the students about the Periclean Scholars program at Elon, our goals for our project, and the issue we will be addressing while in Namibia.

In terms of the conference/ documentary…

We have solidified our first speaker for our conference in Namibia! Receiving this news was a big win for our class and gives us more motivation to reach our goals. In addition to hosting a conference, we will also be filming a documentary about our project and the issue to further promote our cause after the conference takes place. We have decided to send a crew of two Pericleans to Namibia this summer to get to work on the documentary and already have a lot of cool ideas floating around about it. I am excited to see what footage comes from this summer adventure and what other progress we can make towards setting up the conference as the semester comes to a close.

Peace, Love, Periclean.

The class of 2017

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Class of 2017 Update: September 15th, 2015

Hello all! This past weekend two members of the 2017 Periclean Class, Kelsey and Christian drove to Durham, NC and met with the Redwood Group to learn a bit about their business and how they work on and evaluate grants. Snaps to Kelsey and Christian for taking the time to go visit our friends at the Redwood Group! Also, snaps to Caila for taking on the role of Treasurer for our class while Mel is abroad!

During this class period we worked together to make some more strides in the development of our project, tied up some lose ends and solidified a few details for our fundraiser this weekend.
The past couple of weeks we have been talking about working a total of 10-30 hours a week as a class at the Loy Farm to practice the idea of sustainable development and today we voted to commit to work those hours for the rest of the year. This is an exciting development for our class because it ties back to Grow Biointensive, the organization we would like to bring to Namibia to help us implement our project.
After voting to work on the Loy Farm, we read over the proposal to fund the Ekamba Community Gardening Project. The implementation of this project would allow for the creation of a fresh community garden that would benefit a community of 38 people. The estimates on the proposal said that the entirety of this project could be fulfilled with $2,000 U.S. Although our class would not have the opportunity to actually work on the implementation of this project, we decided to provide half of the funds to make this gardening project a reality for the Ekamba community due to its ties to sustainable development.
Finally, in class we solidified all of the details for the Periclean Car Wash we will be holding this Saturday as a fundraiser. If your car is in need of a good washing, come to the Kangaroo this Saturday from 10AM-1PM for a car wash! It’s only $5, and we are better than Oscar and Angie!!! So come support us at the car wash! Hope to see you there!
Peace, Love, Periclean.
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Groups, Functionality, Tee-shirts and Other Things…

On Monday, we spent the first half of the class discussing what we had done last week while Carol was away. After giving her the 4-1-1, we picked the categories we would be working on for our midterm project. We started out with about 16 categories on the board including: politics, position within the international community, culture, environment, economy, education, history, human rights, etc. Realizing that the discussion over which topics to pick was taking longer than expected, Carol and the rest of the class decided that we needed to just take a vote on which 4 or 5 categories we would run with for the semester.

Our goal for Monday was to try and place everyone into a group so that we could have start working on the research component of our upcoming presentations. Luckily, we accomplished this goal and divided up into 5 groups.

This class got Ryan and I thinking about how we function as a group. Do we need to work on how well we work together? Is the way we make decisions the right way to go about it? Or should we be talking to Carol about a new way to make decisions in a quicker and more effective manner? Just some food for thought.

On Wednesday we had a Lumen Prize committee member, Dr. Lucinda Austin, and Sarah Vaughan, a Lumen prize winner, come to inform our class about the Lumen, a funded opportunity for students to conduct scholarly research.

We also discussed our Periclean tee shirt design again. We wanted to show Carol our design and confirm that it was “okay” with everyone. In addition to revisiting the tee shirt idea, we also revisited our discussion about the class structure.

Carol announced that in order to help speed up our class decision-making process, from now on we will be having half an hour timed discussions before the conversation is tabled. Carol also implemented the “rule” that once someone makes a point, they are not allowed to restate the same point until after everyone has spoken. Hopefully these two “rules” will help speed up our decision/ collaboration processes.

We then moved on to talk about the groups that we had set during Monday’s class period. As a class, we went over the basics of what each group would be researching and came to the conclusion that there would be some overlap amongst the groups.

After making sure that everyone approved each of the groups criteria, we took a class vote on who would be our Periclean Class speakers and began to spit ball ideas about our elevator video, which Oly and Cam will be the point people of. So, if anyone has any ideas/ comments make sure you notify them! Lastly, shout out to Devon for receiving the job at Smitty’s! We will definitely come see you!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Shay Thomas Introduction

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Hi y’all! My name is Shay and  I am from Charlotte, North Carolina. I am a double major in International Studies and Political Science, and am minoring in Poverty Studies and Social Justice. I am a Cummings High School Mentor, Best Buddies participant, Resident Assistant in the Global Neighborhood, member of the LEAD Program, and D.E.E.P (Diversity Emerging Education Program) peer mentor. I graduated high school with a standard diploma as well as a second diploma in Global Education. In high school I was involved in a few mentoring programs and a few service organizations, where I was able to work closely with children of all ages and further their education. In my spare time I like to hang out with my friends, travel, and cook.

Last year, I was lucky enough to stumble upon the Periclean Scholars Program on my own. I was looking through the Elon University website in attempts to find a list of the clubs on campus when I saw a reference to the Periclean Program. Having an avid interest in both international affairs and community service, I read the Periclean site and went looking through the Periclean Scholars blog to see what being a Periclean Scholar was all about. When I had learned more about the goals of the program, I decided that I had to apply. I was really nervous applying for the program because I did not know any other members and didn’t know anyone else who was applying. A few weeks later, I was thankfully accepted into the Program!

I am really excited about being a Periclean Scholar because of my interests in becoming a global citizen and service work, but also because being in this program allows me to branch out and meet other students who are interested in the same things as myself. I love learning about different cultures and human rights issues and I want to continue to expand my global education that I began in high school.

I am looking forward to learning about Namibia, forming strong bonds with the other Pericleans, and above all, executing our final project senior year!

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