The annual Be the Media! Mini-Conference helps participants understand the link between strategic communications and organizing strategies as well as learn essential communications tools and techniques.
Date: Thursday, December 3
Time: 9am - 5:30pm (lunch provided)
Location: Third Sector New England’s NonProfit Center, 89 South Street in Boston (close to South Station, click here for directions.)
Cost: $15 - $35 sliding scale, includes lunch
The theme of the fourth annual Be the Media! Mini-Conference is: The Changing Media Landscape: Opportunities and Challenges for Marginalized Voices
Read the concurrent workshop options below, decide which you will attend, and register below as soon as you can. We have sold out the past two conferences.
The conference is designed to serve change makers at all levels of communication experience including those who are doing communications work as part of their current positions, such as organizers, executive directors, or policy advocates.
Sponsored by: Progressive Communicators Network and Third Sector New England
Co-sponsored by: Amplify Me, Resist, Press Pass TV and Teen Voices.
Made possible with support from the Frances Fund and the Wellspring Fund of Peace Development Fund.
OPENING PANEL
The Changing Media Landscape:
Opportunities and Challenges for Marginalized Voices
The digital revolution has dramatically changed the way news is being consumed and transmitted. We are witnessing an explosion of news content and media platforms on the internet, such as the rise of blogs, cyber news sites, citizen journalists, and social media. Will the age of new media lead to the demise of traditional media, such as print newspapers and magazines? How could traditional media transform, adapt, and survive in this media evolution? What are the opportunities and challenges for independent/community media in this era? How will the changes affect the participation of marginalized communities? How will federal media policy affect control and access in this new media environment?
Be the Media has invited the following local communications practitioners who are in the midst of this media evolution to share their perspectives on the changing media landscape:
Howard Manly, Senior Editor, Bay State Banner
Jason Pramas, Editor/Publisher, Open Media Boston
Victor Anaka, Youth Reporter, Press Pass TV
Mary Thang, Editor, New England Ethnic Newswire
Jordan Berg Powers, Outreach Coordinator, Free Press
Moderated by Betsy Leondar-Wright
MORNING WORKSHOPS - 11:15am to 1pm
Workshop 1: Strategic Communications 101
This workshop will examine how to get your message out to current and potential supporters (donors, volunteers, policy makers etc.). We will look at: 1.) Best (and worst) practices for cause-related marketing; and 2.) Resources to move you forward. This workshop is designed for both the savvy and the clueless who are responsible for promoting their nonprofits to key audiences. Presented by: Kelley Chunn
Workshop 2: Framing for Racial Justice I: The What and Why of Racial Justice Framing
Note: This is part one of a 2-session workshop. Participants must be available for both the morning and afternoon sessions.
Despite the election of the nation’s first black president, racial disparities in education, health care, wealth, housing, sentencing, and many other issues continue to persist in the United States. Unless we challenge the myth of a post-racial society and address the issue of structural racism, we will not be able to dismantle this system of maintaining inequalities. This 2 –session workshop is a mini version of Progressive Communicators Network’s upcoming 3-day Racial Justice Framing Institute, in collaboration with smartMeme and United for a Fair economy. In session one, participants will develop an understanding of structural racism, learn the components of framing a story, and see examples and opportunities for using a “racial justice” lens to frame justice issues. Presented by: Doyle Canning, Smartmeme; Tom Louie, PCN-Boston/New England; and Amaad Rivera, United for a Fair Economy
Workshop 3: Socialchange: Using Social Media to make change!
Twitter, Facebook, blogs, webinars... you've probably heard of all of these things, but do you know what they mean? Join Press Pass TV to find out what the basics of social networking and get your own accounts started! Presented by: Joanna Marinova and Cara Lisa Berg Powers.
AFTERNOON WORKSHOPS - 2:45pm to 4:30pm
Workshop 4: Strategic Communications Case Study: City Life/Vida Urbana’s Anti-foreclosure/Eviction Campaign
Representatives from City Life/Vida Urbana (CLVU) and their partner organization United for a Fair Economy will share perspectives from their successful anti-foreclosure/eviction campaign. CLVU's campaign included a melding of organizing and communications strategies through dramatic protests, civil disobedience, message development, and timely media opportunities. CLVU worked with victims of foreclosure and housing rights advocates to formulate a campaign that prevented 11 out of 14 evictions in 2008. CLVU's anti-foreclosure/eviction campaign was featured in a recent Bill Moyer's Journal. Presented by: Jim Brooks, City Life/Vida Urbana and Steve Schnapp, United for a Fair Economy.
Workshop 5: Framing for Racial Justice: Putting Tools into Practice
Note: This is part two of a 2-session workshop. Participants must be available for both the morning and afternoon sessions.
This workshop is the continuation of our morning workshop. In this session, we will introduce smartMeme’s story-based strategy and its “narrative power analysis” tools as ways to analyze such factors as characters, assumptions, and power behind a story. Participants will practice using smartMeme’s “Battle of the Story” template to help develop effective “racial justice” messages on various issues and campaigns they are involved in.
Workshop 6: Social Media In Action
Social networking is a powerful way to reach a wide audience, and quickly. But what can these tools actually do for your organization? How should Twitter fit into your communications strategy? How can Facebook raise awareness of your work? This session will share advice and discuss various campaigns – both successful and not – to help you find the right strategy for your organization. Presented by: Sunanda Nair and Monique Nguyen of MataHari (eyeoftheday.org).
PRESENTER BIOS
Victor Anaka, Panelist, is a senior at the John D. O'Bryant School of Math and Science. In addition to being on the football team, Victor is an up and coming media critic and the host of Press Pass TV's Eat the Press. He also worked on several field reports this past summer with Press Pass TV, including A House is not a Home and Policing the Police.
Jim Brooks, Presenter / Strategic Communication Case Study, is the Tenant Outreach Organizer at City Life/Vida Urbana. He has organized and participated in numerous protest rallies and eviction blockades as part of CLVU’s anti-foreclosure/eviction campaign, often acting as the media spokesperson. Jim is also a long-time disabilities activist. He was an organizer for the Disabilities Liberation Front, a para-legal for the Disability Law Center, and head of Mayor Flynn’s Commission on Disabilities.
Doyle Canning, Presenter / Racial Justice Framing, is co-director at smartMeme. She works with a diverse community of social change practitioners as a strategist, trainer, facilitator, creative, and messaging coach. smartMeme's mission is to build movements and amplify the impact of grassroots organizing with new strategy and training resources, values based communications, collaborations, and meme campaigning. smartMeme uses the power of narrative to advance a holistic vision of grassroots social change that connects struggles for democracy, peace, justice, and ecological sanity.
Kelley Chunn, Presenter/Strategic Communications 101, has 25 years of communications experience locally, nationally and abroad. In Boston, one of the top ten media markets in the United States, she has worked as a TV news and public affairs writer/producer at all three-television network affiliates (WCVB, WHDH and WBZ). She wrote and produced newscasts, "liveshots" and special programming including a year long public service campaign called "Here's To Your Health" for WHDH-TV. She has served in the public sector as a communications specialist for the Massachusetts Housing Finance Agency (MHFA). There she worked as MHFA spokesperson, conducted community outreach, marketed affordable housing programs, planned special events and produced agency publications and videos.
Betsy Leondar-Wright, Panel Moderator, is a long-time economic justice activist who was the Communications Director of United for a Fair Economy for 9 years. She is the author of Class Matters: Cross-Class Alliance Building for Middle-Class Activists and co-author of The Color of Wealth: The Story Behind the US Racial Wealth Divide.
Tom Louie, Presenter/Racial Justice Framing, is a long-time organizer, public policy advocate and media skills trainer. He works primarily with grassroots activists and community-based organizations on immigrant rights, public education and language rights issues. Tom was the Director of Development and Communications at Political Research Associates (PRA). Prior to PRA, he directed programs at Mass. English Plus Coalition and Mass. Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition, organizing statewide advocacy and communications campaigns. Tom was instrumental in the formation of Immigrant Solidarity and Action Alliance which conducted collective community media and organizing strategies and trainings in greater Boston communities after the passage of Proposition 187 in California. He is a member of the Boston Media Action Tank, Latino Education Action Network, and Boston Parents Organizing Project.
Howard Manly, Panelist, is the executive editor of the Bay State Banner. His journalism career started in January 1982 at the New Bedford (MA) Standard Times and includes stints at the Washington Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer, New York Newsday, Newsweek and the Boston Globe. Prior to joining the Banner in August 2005, Manly wrote a thrice-weekly column on the opinion pages of the Boston Herald. Manly’s career in television started as an on-air correspondent on Greater Boston, a nightly news show airing on WGBH-TV. He also hosted Basic Black, a 30-minute, public affairs show on WGBH that focused on African American news. He is now a regular guest on New England Cable News during its weekly Banner Moments segment. Manly is the co-author of Lift Every Voice, a non-fiction account of the Boys Choir of Harlem.
Joanna Marinova, Presenter / Social media morning session: With a B.S. in International Relations and Economics from the University of Toronto, Joanna has solid corporate experience having worked for Citizens Bank and Wellington Financial Management. She was the founder and president of Women in Life Learning, a Toronto based nonprofit. Joanna has over 7 years of experience and a proven track record in management, operations and development work in nonprofits.
Sunanda Nair, Presenter / Social media afternoon session, is part of MataHari (eyeoftheday.org), Media Justice Working Group and Resist the Raids! network.
Monique Nguyen, Presenter / Social media afternoon session, is part of MataHari (eyeoftheday.org), Media Justice Working Group and Resist the Raids! network.
Cara Lisa Berg Powers, Presenter/Social media morning session: With over 8 years non-profit youth work experience, Cara is currently a candidate for her doctorate in Education and Media Studies. Cara holds an MA in Transformative Media Arts and a BA in Screen Studies with a focus in Urban Development/Social Change. Cara has overseen program development and implementation for youth media programs in Boston, Lowell, and Worcester, has facilitated workshops at several local and national conferences, and is the author of By Any Media Necessary, a guide for youth organizing through media.
Jordan Berg Powers, Panelist, (jberg@freepress.net) is Outreach Coordinator for Free Press. Free Press is a national nonprofit working to engage citizens in changing the media system that has allowed a few corporations to control what we read, see and hear. He frequently gives talks on media, Hip Hop, social justice, Judaism, international politics, and the role of men in feminism. Recently, he has been a guest lecturer/presenter at the Women, Action and Media Conference, the Hip Hop Congress National Convention, Smith College, and the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He is also an organizer, political consultant, and freelance writer in Worcester, MA. Jordan has a Masters in International Politics from the London School of Oriental & African Studies; and a B.A. in International Development and a B.A. in Economics from American University.
Jason Pramas, Panelist, is a writer, media consultant, and political strategist. Currently, he is editor/publisher of Open Media Boston, an online progressive news, views, arts and tech publication covering the Boston, MA metropolitan area. He has been in regional and national leadership of a number of movements for democracy and social justice in the United States -- including the labor, peace, immigrant, environmental, anti-racist, anti-poverty, and alternative media movements. He is best known as the editor/publisher of New Liberation News Service, editor/publisher of As We Are ("the magazine for working young people"), director of the Boston Local of the National Writers Union/UAW Local 1981, director of the Campaign on Contingent Work (which he later refounded as Massachusetts Global Action), and as the architect and lead organizer of the 2004 Boston Social Forum.
Amaad Rivera, Presenter/Racial Justice Framing, is the Director of United for a Fair Economy’s Racial Wealth Divide Program. Amaad is the lead author of "State of the Dream 2009: The Silent Depression." His articles and publications have been featured in major media outlets such as the Washington Post, Black Agenda Report, Huffington Post, National Public Radio, Democracy Now, Too Much, BET.com, numerous local radio stations, CSPAN and Boston Neighborhood Network News. From founding the KidsVote Initiative in Holyoke, MA to participating in a delegation to Puerto Rico of academics and community leaders in exploring contemporary and historical barriers to economic mobility of Puerto Ricans in Holyoke, Amaad has been deeply involved in the community. Before coming to United for a Fair Economy, Amaad served as AmeriCorps Program Officer for the Massachusetts Service Alliance, co-managing a portfolio of organizations dedicated to addressing issues of poverty, health care disparities, environmental disasters, education inequity, civic engagement, volunteerism and youth development.
Steve Schnapp, Presenter / Strategic Communication Case Study, is the Education Coordinator at United for a Fair Economy. He helps design and develop UFE’s popular economics education workshops and materials, and leads workshops and presentations around the country. Steve has more than 30 years experience as a community-based organizer, educator, and activist in New York City and the Greater Boston area. He has studied popular education and led numerous training of trainers workshops for organizers, community educators, and social justice activists. Steve also taught Community Organizing at the Boston University School of Social Work and Springfield College/School of Human Services, in the 1990s. Before coming to UFE in October 1998, Steve directed the Management and Community Development Institute at the Lincoln Filene Center for Citizen Participation at Tufts University.
Mary Thang, Panelist, is the editor of the New England Ethnic Newswire, a nonprofit Web site that supports ethnic media and journalism and runs the annual NEENAs (New England Ethnic Newswire Awards). Her "Ask the Culture Connector™" Q&A column and articles on health, media and multicultural issues have appeared in the national Tufts University Health & Nutrition Letter, NewAmericaMedia.org and the bilingual (Chinese and English) Sampan newspaper. E-mail her at EthnicNews (@) yahoo (dot) com.
If you need further information, send an e-mail to Tom Louie at t.louie@progressivecommunicators.net or call 857-540-1316.
