YES! Events 2006-2007

Amazon Sustainability Jam August 10-15, 2007

Held in Acre, Brazil, by the Amazon River, forty young indigenous and non-indigenous leaders, activists, supporters, and journalists gathered from all over South America to coordinate efforts that promote balanced ecosystems and protect forest inhabitants. The conversations and action-planning that took place at the Jam created deepened understanding of the oil development crisis and helped build strong collaborations that will counter this threat to the rainforest and its indigenous people.

“This Jam created deeper alliances among diverse people. All the representatives left with a fire burning in the their hearts to follow up with strategies and continue empowering the grassroots communities with information. We also saw how to create alternatives that make the indigenous communities so self-sufficient, they won’t need to give up their land for exploration, which is one of the most precious things they have. It means their life and survival as indigenous peoples, and the survival of the last lung of the earth which is the Amazon Rainforest.”

Tashka Yawanawa, 35,
Chief of the Yawanawa Tribe,
Rio Branco, Brazil

Leveraging Privilege for Social Change June 12-19, 2007

This event, held in Green Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, connected, supported and inspired 30 diverse and committed young people with wealth, fame and/or social impact whose lives are dedicated to building a thriving, just and sustainable world for all.

Art in Action Camp July 8-13, 2007

A week-long camp at Mayacamas Ranch in Calistoga, CA, that empowered young leaders to use theater, public speaking, dance, spoken word, hip-hop, rap, puppetry and prose as tools for education, self-expression, and social change.

Global Collaborative Meeting June 3-6, 2007

This meeting of the 12 Global Collaborative members (a group of young leaders from 5 continents) took place in the Santa Cruz Mountains. It was the second meeting of this group and the first meeting since a year full of learning exchanges between the collaborative. This meeting was a time for the group to reconnect more deeply with one another, reflect on the exchanges and collaborations that had taken place in the past year, harvest the learnings from the experiences and discuss what the collaborative wants to do together in the future.

YES! Community Summit May 28-June 1, 2007

This gathering brought together YES! Board, Staff, Global Collaborative members, and key organizing partners for 4 days of deepening relationships and facilitated discussion about the vision and future or YES!. The summit was a major milestone in the strategic planning process YES! has been navigating for the past year. It was held in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

Leveraging Privilege for Social Change Workshop April 29, 2007

This workshop explored some of the following questions with Ocean Robbins, Maya Hackett, and members of our local community in a fun, one day format. Privilege: What does privilege mean to each of us, and how does our unique journey with it affect who we are and how we impact the world? Leveraging: How can we have maximum impact? How can we use our lives, connections/ relationships, opportunities and resources to live healthy lives and work collaboratively for social change? Social Change: How can we deepen our understanding of the realities of our times, and develop, build and implement effective models of transformation? Our Place In It All: What would it look like to bring our lives and our resources into alignment with our highest life’s commitments? How do we shed guilt, and the cultural baggage around money and/or fame, and find a healthy relationship to our privileges that serves our purpose and contribution?

Flagstaff Indigenous Gathering on Healing and Collaboration

YES! sponsored the Flagstaff ( Arizona) Indigenous Gathering held at the Colton House on November 4 and 5. “It was a great success for the Native American community,” said Evon Peter, organizer of the event and co-founder of Native Movement. The gathering consisted of twenty young changemakers from the Flagstaff area — including leaders in the Navajo Nation, the Hopi Nation, the Gwich’in Nation, and the Chicano, Jewish and European-American communities — who where interested in building closer relations between one another and synergizing their organizational work. Three families attended the gathering with their children.

The gathering provided an opportunity to bring together some of the diversity of peoples who live in Northern Arizona to begin to heal some of the historic divides between communities and to nurture relations grounded in trust, authenticity, and shared commitments. This was accomplished through whole group and small group activities as well as games and story telling. Participants also briefed one another on the work they are doing in Northern Arizona, and explored the interrelatedness of the many forms of work they are doing on behalf of issues as diverse as indigenous empowerment, language preservation, environmental protection, localization, public health, human rights, and social justice. Many new partnerships were formed and gathering participants continue to collaborate on behalf of shared goals.

Nice ‘n’ Native Brings Indigenous Activists Together in Aotearoa (New Zealand)

Conscious Collaborations, with support from YES!, hosted Nice 'n' Native, February 17-25, a wananga (gathering) of indigenous peoples committed to the struggles and survivals of indigenous communities at Motakotako Marae, Tainui, Aotearoa. Over 40 indigenous nations were represented by the participants as well as 15 non profit organizations including Black Mesa Water Coalition, Native Movement, Asia Pacific Indigenous Youth Network and Te Mana Motuhake o Tuuhoe.

The week began with a powhiri (traditional welcome) and was solidified by the sharing of breathe as participants, organizers and the hou kainga (home peoples) pressed noses in a hongi before engaging in a week of physical, mental and spiritual transformation. The week was woven together with sharing of knowledges and struggles, paintball and touch rugby, traditional weaving, organic gardening, ceremony, stories of the plants, mountains and waters, a reggae festival and indigenous vibrations, sharing forum and a lot of laughter, dancing and singing.

Participants ranged from new born babies through to kuia and kaumatua (elders) who for the week slept together in the wharenui (big meeting house), ate together in the whare kai (eating house) and listened to each other to learn and be shifted as peoples who are committed to raising the consciousness of their communities.

All in all, Nice ‘n’ Native was a positive experience not only for the participants but the communities that the whanau (family) of Nice ‘n’ Native 07 engaged with as well. Conscious Collaborations will host Nice ‘n’ Native ‘08 in the Tuuhoe Nation in March 2008.

“Nice ‘n’ Native was the first time I had the opportunity to sit and share in a indigenous space. I felt a mutual understanding without words being spoken…and felt humbled in the presence of such strong Rangatira (leaders) from other countries around the world. I also came away with a clear vision and am done wasting time. Time is precious and now my energy is being given to my own, the ones who need it. Nice ‘n’ Native is an experience that empowered me and recharged me to give more back to my people.”

— Tia Taurere, 30, Greenpeace, Nga Puhi

New York City Facilitation Jam

The New York City Facilitation Jam was held October 17-19, 2006 at the Monroe Conference Center in Monroe, NY. It was a gathering coordinated by Global Youth Action Network and led by a team of YES! facilitators from Aotearoa/New Zealand, Kenya, and across the USA, as part of GYAN’s on-going support community for the region’s young leaders. This gathering built upon the experiences from three previous New York City Local Jams. This at times very challenging gathering illustrated the profound differences between the style of facilitation that is applicable at a World Jam, and the style that is most relevant to an entirely local group working in the heart of America’s largest city. The gathering also surfaced some tension-points between GYAN and the local community. Much learning ensued for all involved.

Rajasthan Youth Leadership Jam

By Shilpa Jain

The first-ever Rajasthan Youth Leadership Jam was held March 7-11, on a natural farm near Udaipur, in northwestern India. Called ‘ Asha Ri Got’ which means ‘a gathering of hope’ in mewari, one of Rajasthan’s 200 local languages, the event drew 18 participants from different parts of the state. There were six organizations represented by the participants, ranging from 18 to 38 years, who are working on a diversity of issues: rural youth development, rural health, rural income generation, community media (puppetry) on Gandhi's story, anti-globalization, and swaraj (“self-governance”) in an urban setting.

The Jam proved to be a wonderful platform for making new friends, engaging in meaningful conversations, reflecting on their personal visions and life journeys, and experimenting with healthy and vegan food. The Jam participants also explored together what swaraj means for both their personal lives and Rajasthan, especially in the light of growing environmental exploitation, industrial ‘development’ and social upheaval in the context of rapid westernization. For all involved, it was a new experience -- sharing oneself so deeply and openly and discussing many challenging issues in the social change sector, including questions about organizations, funding, and the model of development as a whole. Many of them were delighted with the unique experience and expressed a desire to be a part of more such gatherings. Enthused by the response, we at Shikshantar are looking to organize another Rajasthan Jam (tentatively planned for November this year).