Everyone needs to experience joy, perhaps especially as the country navigates a pandemic, political divisiveness and the tumultuous struggle for racial justice. Through dance and philanthropy, the Vermont Dance Alliance and the Black Freedom Fund are working to help people nurture their joy and support racial equality in the Green Mountain State and beyond.

In late June the alliance, a statewide nonprofit that supports dance artists, released the video "TRACES 2020 Virtual Performance." It's the pandemic-era version of the group's annual one-day event. Since 2017, TRACES performers have danced outside in Burlington on sidewalks, alongside public sculptures, on the waterfront where audiences encountered them by design or by chance.

This year, the 11.5-minute video, produced by South Burlington's Extensity Creative, features 31 dancers of all ages performing 30- to 60-second pieces in backyards and woods, on picnic benches and industrial stairs. The pieces are elegantly interwoven and set to music by local musicians. It's the most intriguing and satisfying dance video this viewer has seen in a long time. Clever, energetic and filled with surprises, the video exudes joy and captures normally ephemeral live dance as a forever-accessible gem.

"People need this outlet of movement and connection to community," said Burlington's Hanna Satterlee, founder and executive director of the Vermont Dance Alliance. The group hasn't sponsored in-person events since the pandemic began and won't for a long time, she said. Hungry for interaction, participants enjoyed Zoom rehearsals and collaborating on the video; the alliance is sponsoring more dance video projects as a result. For example, on Monday it launched Dancing Digitally, a five-week interactive series on five local choreographers' new works.

"TRACES 2020" also came at a time when alliance board members "wanted to give back immediately to an organization working for racial and social justice," Satterlee said. After considering numerous national groups, they discovered the Vermont-based Black Freedom Fund, which perfectly fits the alliance's mission of empowerment. Just before the credits at the end of the video, viewers are invited to donate.

Christal Brown is an artist, educator, entrepreneur and chair of the dance program at Middlebury College. In early June, she launched the Black Freedom Fund to support Black artists, families and entrepreneurs who are under-resourced due to COVID-19 or other challenges. Through it, she said, she aims not only to provide monetary gifts but also to help create the conditions that support joy.

"Most of the things that we relish in this country that are African American made are from the outgrowth of joy, not pain," Brown said. "The publicity of the pain overshadows the joy of the music, the dancing, the love. It overshadows a lot of the work we've done to be able to be joyful people."

Brown appreciates using "TRACES 2020" as a vehicle to raise funds because the video exemplifies the complexity of bridging different life experiences. Just as performers must understand each person's part, so must we "recognize what goes into each person's reality" to change systems of racism and oppression, Brown said. The collaboration of the alliance and the Black Freedom Fund is "a way of leveraging our realities."

In the Middlebury area, where Brown and her young son are among the few Black residents, her neighbors and allies recently began asking for advice on how to support racial justice.

One day she responded, "'I can do this. I can make something for you. Hold on. Give me a minute,'" she recalled. Almost that quickly, Brown created the Black Freedom Fund under the auspices of her nonprofit company INSPIRIT.

"There's a pain point that's happening right now, and there's a lot of confusion," she said. "When change happens, it has to happen person to person ... in a meaningful way. I wanted to stand in the gap between different communities" by making it easier to give.

In less than a month, the Black Freedom Fund's crowdsourcing campaign surpassed its $10,000 goal and the gifts keep coming. As of Tuesday, 184 people had made donations of $20 to $1,000, totaling $14,457; some businesses had also donated, bringing the total even higher.

Brown put $10,000 in an investment fund and is using the overage to make a gift of about $500 each month. Through professional and personal networks, she identifies recipients around the country for whom that amount would be significant. To date, there's enough to last about 14 months; after that she'll begin drawing from the investment's accruing interest.

A recent gift went to a man with whom Brown grew up in Kinston, S.C. Initially, he got caught up in crime, but after seeing many of his friends die or be drawn into "the prison pipeline of a small town where there's no opportunity," Brown said, "he totally flipped his life around." He's now married, has a son and is a generous force in his community, serving meals to the homeless, doing fund drives and cooking for neighbors, according to Brown. The man recently underwent a leg amputation and cannot work while waiting for the prosthetic. The Black Freedom Fund covered his July rent.

"Black joy is a reservoir," Brown said, that allows people to persevere despite loss, pain and misfortune. Sometimes a gift can help refill it.

Link:
Vermont Dance Alliance and Black Freedom Fund Partner to Empower - Seven Days

As you would expect, Women's Health August cover star, Danai Gurira, is something of a real-life superwoman. The playwright, actress and activistwho is best known for her roles in Black Panther, Avengers and The Walking Deadalso fights the good fight off-screen.

Indeed, as well as opening up about how she views fitness as a form of empowerment, the 42-year-old Hollywood star tells us in a new interview how she's pushing for lasting change against racism. 'Concerning the fight for racial justice, a fight that so many have devoted their lives to over so many years, a fight that has stubbornly refused to be won, Im daring to hope,' she says, shortly after George Floyd's death sparked mass global protests. 'This is a moment that could bring about some real change and honour the labour of those who have come before. I desire to help that change come to pass in any way I can. Thats what inspires me to keep going.'

Speaking about what that progress should look like, Danaiwho is currently working on adapting Chimamanda Ngozi Adichies bestselling novel Americanah into a ten-part series adds: 'We need sustainable reforms. Id like to see anti-racism popularised in our culture, our society, language, commonality and ultimately throughout the system. That would allow for true justice to be the norm and not the exception.

WH's cover star also lets us in on the secrets of her sculpted physique. In addition to following a nutritious pesca-vegan eating regime, she exercises up to four times a week with personal trainer AJ Fisher, focusing on evening out muscle imbalances while improving strength, mobility and cardiovascular function. Their intense sessions include circuit training and moves inspired by Pilates, in which she alternates high-intensity intervals and active rest.

While her workouts might primarily be for moments in front of the camera, they leave her feeling seriously good. [Women] arent encouraged to understand how powerful their bodies can be, Danai explains. I love it when women find their power. I love it when I find a different ability in my body that I didnt know I could find or I could learn I always encourage any young women I speak to to explore that part of yourselfFind the thing you enjoy and it might be lifting weights, it might be boxing. Of course, all the astounding martial arts there are to learn. Its an exciting kind of playground to play in and to find another part of yourself.

Read the full interview with Danai Gurira in the August 2020 issue of Womens Health on sale now. Pick up an issue OR why not get Women's Health delivered directly to your door. SUBSCRIBE NOW

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Danai Gurira on Empowering Fitness and the Ongoing Fight for Racial Justice - Women's Health

If you want to leave it all and start a community, you should focus on inner work first. If you focus only on action, you risk building yourself another prison. You might just change one form of unhealthy lifestyle and toxic relations for another as a result.

Living in less and less livable cities to attain an unhealthy lifestyle with a toxic job situation makes many wonder, what if they started a community? You may have talked about it with people around you. Congratulations! Seeing what you do not want is the first step out of helplessness and stagnation. Youre so much further than many who just endure unbearable situations. They keep going in the wrong direction by numbing and relativizing. However, the fantasies of moving to a farm and living in a community need to be considered carefully. Boldness is good. It drives potential for change. However, an action needs vision. Otherwise, it may end up as a nightmare as a Japanese proverb warns us.

I am sharing with you some reflections that came into my mind when talking with people who want to create a community and be self-sufficient. One might argue that I have no expertise because I have not done it myself. I have not even tried. The reason why I have not undertaken such a project is not that it is a bad idea. To the contrary, I have met many people who lead a fulfilled life in egalitarian communities. And it has been beneficial for their health. Personally, I prefer to neither live in a community and strive for collective autonomy nor fit the mainstream employment system. This decision is based on knowing my limits and predispositions. I believe that a life that is an expression of ones unique set of gifts when creatively combined brings fulfillment. I have conducted dozens of interviews in communities in Germany and the US. Furthermore, I have met many people who want to leave their mainstream lives and create a community.

First, I would invest in self inquiry before moving anywhere. If you are escaping from something rather than pursuing a project, you may end up reproducing old dissatisfaction. Once you find yourself in a new situation you may start daydreaming about another life as an escape from the discomforts and challenges. So much empowerment comes from knowing your purpose and your capacities. If you have a dream, it is a better investment to put hundred percent into it in order to verify whether it is really what you want instead of moving to a community as an escape from temporary frustration and stagnation.

Second, it is worth spending some time in at least one community. Both egalitarian communities where I have conducted interviews welcome interns and visitors.Twin Oakscommunity has an orientation program, which can give you an overview of things to consider.Paxus Caltaoffers personal coaching to help you find your place in communal world. This can be vacation well spent with a lot of self-knowledge as a result no matter whether you want to join one of the communities or not. By seeing what you like and dislike about the experience you will be better equipped to define your own vision. Living in such settings can give you an idea about things to consider and prepare for in case you still want to create a community. We go to school to be adapted to the system. Similarly, spending some time in a communal setting may be a necessary preparation for unlearning what may prevent flourishing in a group.

After all this time spent on personnel inquiry and experiential learning, you are ready for the third step. This is probably the most difficult one because it goes against all the conditioning that has been skillfully put into our system. If you want to leave the system, you need to start with the inner work of questioning. Replacing the old with a new setting may actually turn out even worse. Imagine you wanted to escape the nonsense of being employed. If you reproduce a similar atmosphere and problems as you experienced in a job you hated, you risk to be in a similar situation and ask yourself what had been all this effort for. Not only this, you may not be able to numb and use the salary to compensate for your suffering.

If we want to live a radically different life, we need to touch upon the beliefs and automatisms that serve the status quo. We need to address the core of who we are. Since we have been inculcated into our beliefs and rationality at the age of unconscious learning, you may find yourself in a group of people who want to live a different life but are emotionally attached to the vices, habits, and influences that are powerful in preventing any success in creating an alternative. There are two questions that you need to ask yourself and deconstruct your conditioning.

What are my true needs?

There are many ways to analyze how you perceive what you really need. For example, you can experiment living in different conditions as I did for myself. You can look at your habits, addictions, rewards that you think you cannot live without understanding deeply their function in your life. What meaning does the system attribute to them? How do they help you cope and prevent you from facing head on potential discomfort?

I once met a man who wanted to start a community. He also seemed to have problem with alcohol. Whatever he was escaping from, I doubt a community would fulfill his needs because he has not addressed the underlying causes of addiction. It is also worth considering the additional work needed to respond to this craving instead of doing the work to heal from it.

It is important to understand what you really cannot live without. There are things that make us flourish. And things that we got used to even though they do not serve our best selves. Whether you do it alone or in a group, it is a great preparation for setting the priorities for your community. Obviously, you dont want to live in a setting that feels like a compromise and deprivation. However, our perception of deprivation may be shaped by the commercial interests. For example, shampoo has been used since 1930s but many of us cannot imagine not using it.

How do I meet my needs?

This second question is about rationality behind the organization of production. We have been imbued with images and stories about efficiency and productivity. They are well adjusted to maintaining the current system. However, if you want a change, you cannot apply the same set of beliefs. Take farming. I was surprised seeing that in many alternative projects, people follow relatively conventional methods of organic farming imposing working in the sun and unnecessary labor. I have heard of cases of burnout, injuries, and exhaustion because of farming. This is quite ironic that people who want to escape the constraints of the capitalist system put themselves in a situation of the type of labor predominating in a system where human life is not valued. Instead of doing farming in a strenuous way, it is worth investing time in understanding how to work with rather than against nature. There are many publications and movies that describe approached to farming with minimal human labor, energy use and tools. The most famous isFukuokas philosophical bookbut there are more practically orientedbooks.

What is the gain of trading a boss who does not care about your wellbeing for the self-exploitation resulting from ignorance and beliefs inculcated by the system that does not want you to be autonomous?

Studying alternative forms of production and meeting basic needs is essential if you want to liberate from the constraints of the system. It requires giving yourself space for creativity and experimenting. The problem with pursuing the beaten yet labor-intensive path is that you may create a lot of sunk costs and emotional investment in the methods that undermine your community in the long run. And then you follow the problems of mainstream institutions and organizations, which you so much disliked. I have heard of a project producing farming tools as a form of liberation. A true liberation would be not to need to rely on tractors and other machinery while bringing satisfying results and making work an enjoyable pastime.

(Help Katarzyna bring her book Imagine a Sane Society to the world and available for free by donating to thecrowdfunding campaign. You are also supporting Cambia and Twin Oaks this way.)

Teaser photo credit: Twin Oaks Community Facebook page.

Katarzyna Gajewska, PhD, is an author and educator. You can contribute to her crowdfunding campaigns to help publishing the feminine utopia Imagine a Sane Society or other forthcoming Creative Commons books. She has brought out many articles on egalitarian communities based on in-depth interviews. For updates onmypublications:Katarzyna Gajewska Independent Scholar My publication list (selection):...

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So You Want to Leave it All and Create a Community? - Resilience

On Tuesday, July 7, in an economic protest dubbed Blackout Day, Black shoppers, people of color, and allies are being encouraged not to spend any money, and if they must purchase something, to buy only from Black-owned businesses.

The goal is to highlight the economic power of Black Americans. According to Nielsen, Black buying power reached $1.3 trillion in 2018, up from $320 billion in 1990.

Activist Calvin Martyr, creator of The Blackout Coalition, posted a video calling for Blackout Day back on May 8.

"Although this movement is exclusively targeted at empowering and uplifting black people all over the world, we welcome ALL people of color to stand with us in solidarity," a blurb on the informational website for Blackout Day reads.

"Black people alone account for an estimated 1.2 trillion dollars or more of spending in the economy annually. Together we have 3.9 trillion dollars in economic spending power. While we welcome allies who choose to stand with us, we make absolutely no apology for the fact this movement is FOR US & BY US."

Cisco tweeted that it would be postponing a planned security summit to Wednesday in order to support the Blackout Day cause. Soap and personal care brand Dr. Bronner's tweeted in support of the economic protest and said it would shut down its website, though the site was still functional as of Tuesday morning.

"This is only the beginning of a lifelong pursuit of economic empowerment as a reality for ALL BLACK PEOPLE," The Blackout Day site continued.

"United, we are an unstoppable force. We are a nation of people within this nation that at any time can demand our liberation by withholding our dollars. If we can do it for a day, we can do it for a week, a month, a quarter, a year and one day we will look up and it will be a way of life."

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Blackout Day is July 7, calls for boycott of non-Black-owned business - Business Insider - Business Insider

The plight of Black children in the child welfare system is one plagued with failure after failure from those who have been put in place to protect them.

As activist, sociologist and historian, W.E.B. DuBois, so accurately stated, A system cannot fail those it was never designed to protect.

Our foster care system was not designed to protect our Black children, but rather mirrors the oppression, discrimination and harassment Black people experience in this country daily. Our foster care system unfortunately reflects the history of slavery and the deterioration of the family.

It is the remnants of Black fathers being stripped from their families, in many cases unjustly, to fill prisons that were designed to control and suppress Black people through the intentional dismantling of Black families.

Our foster care system is the reminder of mothers left to cope with inadequate support, being torn from their children and succumbing to the shame and defeat of a race they were never positioned to run in, let alone win.

Our foster care system is the reminder of mothers left to cope with inadequate support, being torn from their children and succumbing to the shame and defeat of a race they were never positioned to run in, let alone win.

This is theworld Black foster youth live in. They not only deal with personal trauma and the soul-crushing experience of generational oppression that has bred many of the conditions that force them into the foster care system, but must also deal with the psychological trauma of systematic racism that runs rampant within the foster care system, the school system and society as a whole.

The Los Angeles Countys foster care system, which is the largest locally-adminstered child welfare system in the nation, is one filled with bureaucracy, red tape and the warehousing, recycling and dismissal of youth. Its leadership has historically placed more attention on appearances and optics than it does on safe, healthy outcomes for the children they are supposed to protect.

This is by design. And while it is not the fault of the Department of Children and Family Services current director, Bobby Cagle the disease of racism, discrimination and bias runs in the very fabric of decades of profiting off of the bodies of little Black and Brown children it is perpetuated by the current administration and those in charge by continuing to put a Band-Aid on a wound thats hemorrhaging.

Our first failure lies in assuming that a government system can actually respond to the needs of children and families who are experiencing neglect and abuse. There is an African proverb that says, It takes a village to raise a child, meaning that in order to heal, restore, protect and reunify children and families, we must rely on a community of people to ensure those children have healthy experiences and grow up in safe and healthy environments. This community must reflect the faces of the children and families it is seeking to restore, must be led by those who have lived experience, and must not profit off of their deterioration.

Our current system does not restore, it does not heal, it does not protect. Rather, it takes a child out of a bad (or allegedly bad) circumstance and places her in another one then another one then another. If the child is lucky and learns how to control their trauma, anger and frustration, they might have the great fortune of living consistently in a home with a family that truly cares about them and their outcomes. Too often, that is not the outcome. If we want a better future for our children, we must act now to create it.

Across history, weve seen that real progress often follows great adversity, when addressed with intention and urgency. In this time, and during what I see as aGreat Re-Imagining, we must seize this moment, apply it to our foster care system, and create a new future.

For almost two decades now, I have been dreaming of a village where displaced youth can live and thrive, be treated with respect and kindness, where their potential is honored and nourished. There is a model for this, a community calledYemin Orde in Israel, that has for the past 30 years built an educational village that is centered around hope, restoration, positive outcomes and empowerment for our valuable, most vulnerable children.

I am proud to say that for the past nine months, I have been working on such a village that will hopefully be the model to transform our foster care system in Los Angeles and transform the playing field for foster youth from one of neglect and abandonment, to one of nurturing and support.

Simply put, the system we have in place today unjustly tears Black families apart and perpetuates the cycle of trauma, poverty, homelessness and incarceration inflicted on Black communities. Millions of dollars are poured into research and studies that prove that our current system does more harm than good, which is evident in the poor outcomes of our foster youth. What we need now is a reckoning of these facts and a safe haven that will replace our institution, and to ensure that children who genuinely need to be removed are welcomed by their village.

Charity Chandler-Cole The Chronicle of Social Change

Charity Chandler-Coleis CEO ofTransformative Management Solutions LLC, and serves on theLos Angeles County Commission for Children and Families.

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To Leave Racist Roots Behind, Child Welfare Needs a Great Reimagining - LA Progressive

At the heart of Pact is the promise of a better tomorrow. A nonprofit international development organization founded in 1971, Pact works on the ground in nearly 40 countries to improve the lives of those who are challenged by poverty and marginalization. We serve these communities because we envision a world where everyone owns their future. To do this, we build systemic solutions in partnership with local organizations, businesses, and governments that create sustainable and resilient communities where those we serve are heard, capable, and vibrant. Pact is a recognized global leader in international development. Our staff have a range of expertise in areas including public health, capacity development, governance and civil society, natural resource management, poverty, fragile states, monitoring and evaluation, small-scale and artisanal mining, microfinance and more. This expertise is combined in Pacts unique integrated approach, which focuses on systemic changes needed to improve peoples lives.

Department

Program Delivery (PDEL) - Pact exists to help create a world where those who are poor and marginalized exercise their voice, build their own solutions, and take ownership of their future. The Program Delivery Team, contributes to realizing this purpose by: Forging smart partnerships and treating all people with dignity and respect; Applying organizational policies and regulatory compliance appropriately and consistently; Facilitating team spirit among colleagues and promoting the organization through communications; Influencing decision makers through focused, relevant communications; Continually striving to learn and share knowledge and find small ways to make the workplace more enjoyable for all; Cultivating and harvesting innovation; Contributing to the organizations ability to think and act strategically at all times; Inspiring and spreading our desired organizational culture across the global enterprise.

Position Overview

Adolescents and Children HIV Incidence Reduction, Empowerment, and Virus Elimination (ACHIEVE) is a five-year, USAID-funded global cooperative agreement, which helps priority PEPFAR countries achieve and maintain HIV epidemic control among pregnant and breastfeeding women, infants, children, and youth. The two objectives of the project are to: i) attain and sustain HIV epidemic control among at-risk and hard to reach pregnant and breastfeeding (PBF) women, infants, children, and youth, as well as to mitigate the impact of HIV/AIDS and prevent HIV transmission among these populations; and ii) support the transition of prime funding and implementation to capable local partners in order to meet the PEPFAR goal of 70% of funding to local partners.

ACHIEVE is seeking a consultant to assist the ACHIEVE global team in researching and designing a new USAID/PEPFAR-funded community health and social welfare systems strengthening project focusing on orphans and vulnerable children (OVC) in Tanzania. The period of performance will begin on or around July 1, 2020, for a period of up to six weeks.

ACHIEVE will receive funding to improve national- and community-level social welfare systems, with a particular focus on supporting a skilled social welfare workforce at community and district levels to ensure quality service delivery for OVC, at-risk adolescent girls and young women (AGYW), and persons living with HIV (PLHIV). This activity will build on the progress made and best practices of the Community Health and Social Welfare Systems Strengthening Program (CHSSP).

Through remote and/or in-person meetings, key informant interviews and focus group discussions, and documents review, the consultant will gather information on the following items and incorporate findings into a set of recommendations and plans responding to USAIDs priorities for the ACHIEVE Tanzania project. The consultants information gathering will focus as needed at all levels of the social welfare system, including national, regional, council, ward and community (and will include government, non-governmental organizations, projects, networks, community workers, etc.). In-person meetings will be conducted with due respect for coronavirus safety precautions.

The current status of CHSSP, including progress and gaps in strengthening the community-level social welfare workforce, strengthening community-level committees, and strengthening CBOs, as well as progress and gaps in rolling out the NICMS, the Comprehensive Council Social Welfare Operational Planning and Budgeting Guide, and other above-site initiatives;

Areas of focus of other stakeholders engaged in work relevant to the ACHIEVE project, such as PS3, D4D, Tanzania Technical Support Services Project, Kizazi Kipya, and UNICEF;

Government priorities relevant to the ACHIEVE project, including PO-RALG, MOHCDGEC (specifically, Department of Social Welfare), and National AIDS Control Program; and

The new Community Health Worker (CHW) policy and guidelines and other contextual issues or initiatives with a direct influence on the ACHIEVE project, including matters related to national and program-specific vulnerable children information systems.

Depending on the ability of ACHIEVE global staff to resume international travel, additional tasks may be assigned and period of performance extended.

Key Responsibilities

Key tasks under the ACHIEVE project will include:

Building the capacity and core competencies of the social welfare workforce in select councils, wards and villages/mtaa to enable the delivery of health/HIV, social, and protection services;

Collaborating with Presidents Office Regional Administration and Local Government (PO-RALG) to ensure upgrading of the system, capacity building and accelerating the roll out the National Integrated Case Management System (NICMS) at council, ward and village/mtaa levels;

Collaborating with PO-RALG and Ministry of Health to support the effective transition of CCWs into the community-based health program, in line with GoT guidelines;

Collaborating with PO-RALG and Ministry of Health Community Development Gender and Children (MOHCDGEC) to develop the national OVC service delivery coordination and monitoring framework;

Strengthening social welfare planning and budgeting at the community level to foster evidence-based community engagement and resource allocation using the Comprehensive Council Social Welfare Operational Planning and Budgeting Guide.

Major activities to be undertaken by the consultant, timelines, and deliverables are as shown in the table below. The final output is a report with key findings, recommendations, and technical inputs which ACHIEVE will use to draft its annual work plan and budget to be submitted to USAID on or before August 31, 2020.

Activity

Due (weeks after signing consultant agreement)

Deliverables

Update ACHIEVEs initial key informant list

1

Final initial list of key informants

Review key resource documentation provided by ACHIEVE, supplement with other relevant resources

1

Key background and resource documents identified and reviewed

Develop key informant interview (KII) and/or Focus Group Discussion (FGD) guides for each of the identified stakeholders/ informants

1

KII/FGD guides drafted, including key information needs

Draft schedule of initial round of KII / FGD meetings, all levels (national, regional, council, ward, community)

1

KII/FGD schedule, identified as remote/in-person depending on availability/ location of team members and key respondents

Conduct initial round of KII/FGD

3

Interview notes/reports

Identify, schedule, and conduct additional KII/FGD and/or documents review and data collection as needed

4

Completion of interview notes/reports

Participate in regular calls with ACHIEVE global team to provide updates

Weekly

Draft initial consultancy report, to include findings, recommendations, and technical inputs for ACHIEVE FY21 work plan

6

Draft report

Provide recommendations on operational considerations (staffing, office, budget, etc.) to optimize technical and program design recommendations

6

Operational recommendations (can be included in Draft report)

Finalize report based on feedback from ACHIEVE, Pact Tanzania, and/or USAID

1 week after receiving feedback

Final report

Basic Requirements

Pact is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate in its selection and employment practices on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, political affiliation, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, disability, genetic information, age, citizenship status, genetic information, matriculation, family responsibilities, personal appearance, credit information, tobacco use (except in the workplace), membership in an employee organization, or other protected classifications or non-merit factors.

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Health and Social Welfare Systems Strengthening Consultant, ACHIEVE/Tanzania - ReliefWeb

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The Covid-19 pandemic has upended several datafication approaches to healthcare, whether it is digital dashboards at the state-level to track and trace Covid-19 hotspots or a myriad of contact tracing apps that allow citizens to determine their exposure levels to the virus in a geographic span.

There have been manifold applications over the last few months, whether it is telemedicine practice by doctors, or the Delhi governments real-time information tracking application on hospital beds. In the context of the pandemic, AI based techniques are being used on a myriad on datasets right from cough patterns to lung X-rays to aid in early detection.

While India is still in its nascent stages in the evolution of its health data ecosystem and does battle larger capacity constraints in healthcare, it is important to diagnose some of the early challenges in the health data systems design. This article outlines them here from a regulatory standpoint along with looking at a few fixes that can herald a sound federated health data protection architecture.

Healthcare data in India is fairly fragmented and scattered, given the interaction of citizens ranges across multiple diagnostic centres, hospitals, medical practitioners and pharmacies. There are also several distinct parts in delivery chain, whether its insurance agents, third-party administrators (TPAs) or intermediaries such as ASHA workers. The issues of fragmentation are acknowledged by the Health Ministry, in its electronic health record (EHR) standards document of 2016 that look at this digitisation of workflows in healthcare systems. The development of IT systems without a modicum of interoperability (i.e., the-ability of a hospital system of X to communicate with system Y in a different location) has led to redundancies with static silos of data repositories that have sprung up.

Developing such enterprise architecture systems in healthcare has been a challenge, even in developed nations, as seen with the National Health Service (NHS) Connecting for Health efforts in UK that were abandoned after seven years of existence. The key reason for the failure of the British system was attributed to its highly top-down nature and lack of any ground-up apparatus.

A digital public infrastructure-industry complex in India can be associated with the non-profit tech organisation, iSPIRT as its been closely involved in the development of digital public platforms around India Stack (a set of APIs that helped build a cashless economy) and the Bharat Health Stack, dubbed to be the UPI of healthcare with a planned system incorporating open APIs for EHRs. Commendably, iSPIRT has been organising a series of virtual open house discussions over the last few weeks to provide a transparent account of the underpinnings behind this health stack.

There are several design features that we see in common between the Unified Payment Interface (UPI) and the early patchwork of the health stack.Open APIs, distinct consent and data layers (dubbed as a data empowerment and protection architecture) and sandbox testing environments are some features that can be seen in both the system designs. The National Health Stack strategy document put out by Niti Aayog draws references to the past successes of federated digital initiatives such as UPI and the GSTN as an inspiration to building a platform approach on health records. However, several NGOs do bat for open source to co-exist along with open standards and open APIs as necessary design choices for the development of open digital ecosystems.

What are some first principles that we must keep in mind for governing health systems that are linked to public welfare? Do patients have agency over the access and use of health records by third parties? Would an algorithmic basis for EHR see individuals credit scores integrated on it as well? These are fundamental questions to consider if we are to futureproof the development of the Digital Health policy blueprint.

While the health stack has stressed the importance of data ownership by patients, the absence of a rights-based framework governing healthcare data (as a class of sensitive personal data) does warrant us to interrogate the role of ownership. This is especially important given the context of a prevalent data divides and digital literacy challenges. In this regard, a Digital Empowerment Foundation (DEF) study tells us that for about 90% of Indias population, digital literacy is almost non-existent.

Where such data awareness paradigms are scarcely socialised, data capture gets legitimised with the emergence of consent manager models, where fiduciaries manage consent on the data subjects behalf. As EHR adoption in India is still at nascent levels, the implementation of an ethical datafication model is critical, especially amid underserved communities.

Whilst we are still amidst a process to get a personal data protection law passed, there have been some initial efforts into building a privacy framework for the healthcare sector. The Health Ministry had proposed a Digital Information Security in Healthcare Act in 2018 that would enforce privacy and security standards for EHRs. This bill has been now subsumed into a more sector-agnostic framework driven by MeitY with the Personal Data Protection (PDP) Bill that looks at what constitutes personal health records, decision making powers on health data and penalties for breach of consent.

The Bill doesnt speak of the right to be forgotten of a patient or clarity on how a health stack built with a biometric authentication (Aadhaar) layer would solve for concerns around anonymity, esp. as health data is categorised as sensitive personal data. Consent in healthcare is associated with a higher threshold level (esp., on data sharing with third parties) as seen with how clinical trials are governed world over.

As the adoption of EHRs becomes imperative amid a glut of information challenges (both, the ones linked to the Covid-19 and those preceding it), there are three fundamental fixes we should prescribe for a plan-centric health governance design.

Firstly, improving interoperability by better data integration and harmonisation, such as the synthesis of twenty odd ISO standards into a more context-laden open standard that incorporates local clinical terminologies. Data portability is critical as there are healthcare institutions split between using different standards (such as SNOMED CT and ICT 10) or in some cases, no specific standards at all. While the Ministry of Health has veered towards adopting SNOMED CT in the National Digital Health Blueprint, it must ensure seamless data portability to allow interaction mechanisms with institutions that may still use ICT 10. The NHS Connecting for Health experience also forebodes the need for India to de-risk by avoiding the development of a singular central registry and focus rather on a multi-level hierarchy of EHRs.

Second, the building blocks of the digital ecosystem around the Bharat Health Stack must be inclusive in accommodating patient rights organisations such as the Jan Swasthya Abhiyan.The need to involve patient rights groups is imperative at this juncture, as patient data is at the heart of digital health databases. Data rights should be defined bearing in mind the patient, not the hospital as the key focus. Moreover, health data fiduciaries should bear greater responsibility in improving readability and accessibility of consent forms by allowing for these mechanisms to be available in vernacular languages. The onus should squarely lay on these fiduciaries to provide notices in multiple languages and empower citizens to better understand what they consent to.

Finally, how we build lean datafication approaches in healthcare lies in our ability to find the right balance on privacy, transparency and development. Justice B.N. Srikrishna, who chaired the data protection committee rightly notes, each data collection exercise should provide a clear purpose description and lay out a methodology for procuring the data. The Personal Data Protection Bill of 2019 currently under consideration does place the burden of proof for consent on the data fiduciary. However, the recently notified Telemedicine Practice Guidelines 2020 doesnt provide adequate clarity on preserving consent records. Anonymity is essential for data that is going to be classified as sensitive personal data as is safeguards around strict purpose limitation and allowing data processing in a fair and transparent manner. Several of these principles are echoed in the Data Access and Sharing Protocol of the contact tracing app, Aarogya Setu that came out in May 2020.

This balance between the protection of personal privacy, providing transparency and accountability for the institutions that govern this data (whether consent managers or data exchanges whilst ensuring the empowerment of the individual is at the heart of setting a prudent appropriate federated rights-based design for healthcare data protection.

See the rest here:
Heralding a new health data regime in India - Observer Research Foundation

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Today, financial inclusion non-profit Kiva is announcing a partnership under the White House-led Womens Global Development and Prosperity (W-GDP) Initiative with USAID to advance womens economic empowerment by increasing access to financing for women entrepreneurs and business owners. W-GDP is the first whole-of-government approach to womens economic empowerment and, as a part of the Initiative, Kiva will use catalytic capital offered through the W-GDP Fund at USAID to design the Kiva Invest in Women Fund (K-IWF), an innovative investing vehicle to positively impact women.

Kiva to scale gender-focused impact investing

Kiva has been awarded $2.5 million from the W-GDP Fund at USAID in an effort to identify innovative approaches to catalyze commercial investment for womens economic empowerment and equality. The contract will support an 18-month process that will engage major asset owners and gender lens investing experts in developing K-IWF, which aims to provide $100 million in critical capital for women entrepreneurs.

K-IWF will continue Kivas work of institutional impact investing through its Kiva Capital arm, a wholly-owned asset management subsidiary offering impact-first investment vehicles that aim to fill gaps in capital access for underserved communities in the current investment ecosystem.

This partnership with the Womens Global Development and Prosperity Initiative at USAID recognizes Kiva Capitals potential to deliver a truly innovative fund to the gender lens investment community, said Sarah Marchal Murray, Kivas Chief Strategic Partnerships Officer. We are excited to collaborate with and learn from this community of sophisticated global investors. Together, we can expand the pipeline of capital to economically empower women.

Since its founding in 2005, Kiva has deployed $1.4 billion through the Kiva.org marketplace. More than 80 percent of these loans, totaling $1 billion, has gone to nearly 3 million women around the world.

We know that investing in women's economic empowerment can boost country-level GDP and is vital for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, but critical funding gaps were thwarting progress even before the COVID-19 crisis, said Goldie Chow, Kivas Director of Impact. Scaling investment in women entrepreneurs is not only the next step in building pathways to prosperity for women but also crucial for country-level recovery and resilience.

The Design, Structuring, and Field-building Elements

The Kiva Capital team will use this innovative funding to launch a comprehensive fund design and structuring process. This will include the development of an impact framework and a shared learnings platform. Funding will also support the canvassing of the womens economic empowerment investment markets in Africa and Latin America to identify missing elements of investment capital to most effectively support women-led enterprises. In addition, via a global investor listening tour, Kiva will showcase new opportunities in the rapidly growing world of investing in women for both the social and financial returns.

Whats most exciting about this relationship is the opportunity to discover what the right kind of capital is for empowering women around the world, said Marchal Murray. Its not about more women entering the formal financial system, but rather a financial system that works for more women.

About Kiva:

Established in 2005 as the world's first personal micro-lending website, Kivas mission is to expand financial access to help underserved communities thrive. We are working to expand financial access by crowdfunding loans and unlocking capital for the underserved, improving the quality and cost of financial services, and addressing the underlying barriers to financial access around the world. Since its founding, Kiva has raised a combined $1.4B for loans for more than 3.6M entrepreneurs in 94 countries.

About the W-GDP Initiative:

In February 2019, the White House established the Womens Global Development and Prosperity (W-GDP) Initiative, the first whole-of-government approach to womens economic empowerment. W-GDP seeks to reach 50 million women in the developing world by 2025 by focusing on three pillars Women Prospering in the Workforce, Women Succeeding as Entrepreneurs and Women Enabled in the Economy. W-GDP leverages a new innovative fund, scaling private-public partnerships which address the three pillars. In its first year alone, W-GDP programs reached 12 million women across the globe.

About USAID:

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is the worlds premier international development agency and a catalytic actor driving development results. USAIDs work advances U.S. national security and economic prosperity, demonstrates American generosity, and promotes a path to recipient self-reliance and resilience.

Read more from the original source:
Kiva Receives USAID Design Funding to Structure Innovative $100M Fund to Support 1 Million Women Globally - Business Wire

Amanda Maitland worked for WE Charity until June 2019. She says a personal speech she was supposed to deliver during an anti-racism tour was largely rewritten by a mostly white team of staff.

A former employee of WE Charity says a speech she wrote for a WE Schools tour about her experiences as a Black woman was changedwithout her consent by a mostly white group of staff members.

Amanda Maitland told CBC News that the speech was supposed to be delivered on an anti-racism tour of schools in Alberta in February and March 2019. She said WE staff initially made minor changesbut later told her to deliver a different speech altogether, largely written by them.

"I felt like I was sinking in sand. I felt anger," said Maitland.

"They took my story, and they wanted me to elaborate on things that were just, I guess, more socially accepted."

Maitland told CBC News that when she tried to speak up about some of the problems within the organization at a WE town hall a few months after her tour, she was "aggressively" shut down by WE co-founder Marc Kielburger in front of a room full of her peers.

WE is an international organization that operates educational and social justice programs in Canada and internationally. WE Charity is the non-profit arm of the organization, with programs like WE Schools. Me to We isits for-profit social enterprise. Last week, WE Charity stepped back from a $19.5-million contract to administer a $900-million federal government student grant program amid criticism of the sole-source nature of the contract and WE's ability to carry it out.

WE said in a statement to CBC News, it "stands firmly for inclusion, diversity and the equitable, open treatment of all."

"We have directly and publicly apologizedto Amanda and to all current and former BIPOC [Black, Indigenous, people of colour] employees for past instances involving unconscious bias," the statement said.

But Maitland's story which she first shared on Instagram has sparked widespread discussion on social media about WE. Some have begun sharing their own experiences while working at the organization, and a petition signed by 150 current and former employees is circulating, calling on WE to take specific anti-racist measures.

CBC News has spoken to 15 former WE employees, some of whom confirm Maitland's speech was changed, and some who were at the town hall where Maitland spoke out publicly. Most described a "culture of fear" within the charity when it came to challenging or criticizing decisions.

Maitland said she was hired by WE as a motivational speaker and leadership facilitator in the fall of 2018. She was asked to deliver a speech about her personal experience with racism on an anti-racism tour in Alberta in early 2019.

"I have a lot of experiences when it comes to racial injustice. So, I was excited I was over the moon," said Maitland.

Shebegan writing thespeech, initially going back and forth with a WE Charity team who made minor edits, she said.

She said she delivered her speech several times on the tour, but on a brief return trip to Toronto, WE Charity staff gave her a different speech to deliver.

"I was literally ... told that there had to be changes made," said Maitland, who said it was the first she'd heard of any issues with her speech.

"I had no emails while travelling. I had no phone calls. No messages of anything within, like, an update that a speech may have to get changed."

Maitland claims her personal experiences with racism as a Black woman were largely erased and watered down with subjects she hadn't written about.

"It wanted me to talk about cornrows, and it wanted me to talk about the Oscars, and the language was just completely different. I pride myself on being someone who's very raw with how I speak. So, they completely shredded that."

Most of the former WE employees whoCBC News spoke with asked not to be identified over fear of backlash from the organization. Most have signed a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) that precludes them from speaking.

Four former employees told CBC News they were aware of the speech change, including Brianna Polden, who was in Alberta at the same time as Maitland, on a parallel but separate speaking tour for WE Schools.

"It became really obvious to me that this was done without her consent and also without her knowledge, and that it had kind of been forced on her," said Polden.

She said Maitland told her about the changes to her speech made by the leadership team, "who I knew to be primarily white."

Raia Carey, who was on a different speaking tour in Alberta at the same time as Maitland, was also aware of the speech change.

"I said, 'Do not read that speech,'" said Carey, who resigned from the organization a few months later.

"That was the final straw for me. Especially because it goes against our standard protocol that our speeches are supposed to be collaborative."

Maitland said she tried to amalgamate the WE team's version and her version, but ultimately decided to deliver the speech she'd written.

"I wasn't willing to shut down my story for anybody definitely not WE," she said.

Maitland also resigned, a few months after the anti-racism speaking tour, but not before attending a staff town hall with Kielburger to talk about issues related to workplace culture. Maitland said she was one of the first to speak.

"I began to speak about the culture of fear. I began to share that what is happening in this organization is that employees are having siloed conversations," said Maitland.

"There were a lot of people nodding their heads, and Marc Kielburger immediately kind of stepped forward and shut me down."

CBC News spoke to four former WE employees who were at that town hall. They all confirmed Maitland spoke up, and that Kielberger tried to quickly end the conversation.

"The automatic response was her being shut down by Marc Kielberger, and him being visibly angry," said one former employee.

"Sitting in that room during the town hall, you could feel it," she said.

"Most staff at least my group of peers have talked about the things that we're uncomfortable with and don't feel we can bring up, or have brought up and have felt silenced."

Maitland said she decided to post a video account of her experience on social media more than one year later because of the discussions about race following the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis. She said she wanted to highlight that Canada is not immune to racism.

"[Racism] happens within the charitable spaces. I felt like I need to share, as a Black woman that was hired to go on an anti-racism speech, why it is not OK for a panel of white women and men to rewrite a Black woman's story."

"I didn't want to just be another person that was OK with being silenced."

Most of the former employees CBC News spoke to said there was a "culture of fear" within the organization.

Carey said she was felt she was penalized when she tried to speak up and push back on decisions by management.

"Never in my life before had I felt unsure about my opinion,my values and where I stand because of how they made it seem like I was negative or bad," said Carey.

A former manager of the WE Schools team told CBC News: "People were afraid to speak out because they didn't want to lose their jobs."

Another former employee of colour on the WE Day team said: "I was so scared to speak up. If you ever said anything that's out of line, or questioned anything [which they didn't like], you would end up not being in [my former supervisor's] good books. She would find any way to get you kicked off her team or fired.

"The explanation to the wider team would always be: They weren't a 'good culture fit,' a 'positive team player,' or 'It just didn't work out.'" WE Day is a recurring celebration of youth empowerment, hosted by the organization.

In response to such allegations, WE Charity said in a statement to CBC News: "WE members can anonymously submit on a 'feedback portal' any concerns or issues they have. They can also request a phone call or in-person meeting with any of the human resources or leadership team."

WE Charity did not respond to a request for an interview from CBC News.However, about12 hours after CBC News submitted its request, Kielburger and his brother,Craig, the founders of the WE organization, apologized publicly on their personal Instagram pages.

"We want to start by unreservedly apologizing to you," the apology said in part.

"You shared in your video that the words of your speech were altered. It simply should not have happened."

An apology was also posted on the WE website.

In the statement to CBC News, WE Charity said it has publicly released a list of actions on how it can "do better" and has launched what it described as a listening tour to hear the experiences of its current and former BIPOC employees.

Maitland confirmed WE also reached out to her personally last week prior to CBC News contacting the organizationand said she's taking time to process the apology.

"I need to know that it's coming from a genuine place," she said. "I need to understand that it's not coming because there's havoc on social media."

See more here:
Former WE Charity employee says staff tried to silence her by rewriting anti-racism speech - CBC.ca

An open mind is said by some to be a virtue that corrects errors in judgment. Others find an open mind a signal of indecisiveness, being wishy-washy, or an inability to think for oneself. Either way, its likely very few, if any, of us would want to admit to having a closed mind. In truth, it is likely we all are, at any given time, somewhere on the continuum between having an open and a closed mind and it varies by day and challenge.

By and large, identity groups tend to consume media that reifies their position. It was Alan Watts who, in The Way of Zen, wrote, Men who have dehumanized themselves by becoming the blind worshipers of an idea or an ideal are fanatics whose devotion to abstractions makes them the enemies of life. So not wanting to be an enemy of life, I looked into what leads to an open mind. Turns out, it is a characteristic known as intellectual humility, which is to say, understanding the limits of ones knowledge. And within that, allowing the admission of being wrong.

Cultivating intellectual humility begins with acknowledging that my mind is not perfect, that I have blind spots. We all do. Given this universal condition, there is permission to safely admit, I was wrong. Sounds simple, but there was a time when admitting I was wrong was difficult, as my self-worth was tied up in being right. Today I see it more as freeing my intellect from its limited perspective. But it takes practice. And it was with practice in mind that I listened to our Presidents 4th of July address.

While standing on Black Hills land, stolen against treaty agreements, our President spoke of equal opportunity, equal justice, and equal treatment for citizens of every race, background, religion, and creed. He stated how we embrace tolerance, not prejudice while speaking from the foot of the desecration that is Mount Rushmore. Its intellectual humility that enables one to absorb this jarring cognitive dissonance, hold two opposing ideas in their mind, and still function. Cultivating this ability is powerful, it enables frustration, anger, and helplessness to be side-stepped.

What if we were to do this, not merely as individuals, but as an entire nation? Can we both love America while at the same time admit that slavery, white supremacy, and Manifest Destiny were wrong? And if we have an open mind that corrects our errors in judgment, are we ready to make reparations now? As the Black Lives Matter Movement propels one of the largest societal changes ever in the 200+ years of our collective history, laws of our land will be reshaped to ensure diversity, equity, and inclusion.

The good news is intellectual humility and an open mind can be cultivated. Some practices include regularly interacting with a wide circle of diverse friends, being open to new ideas and experiences, and adopting an attitude of live and let live and goodwill toward others. Why do this? Well, its not a new concept living in relation to others with compassion and understanding has been embraced by myriad cultures and religions to their great benefit. And, too, because, in this increasingly interconnected and complicated world, curiosity and intellectual humility have become more crucial to our success than ever before. This is why I explore the illusion of separateness in my book.

Cultivating intellectual humility and an open mind unleashes creativity and brings us hope. You may say Im a dreamer, but Im not the only one. I hope someday youll join us and the world will live as one. Imagine. By John Lennon.

[Ed.s Note: Carolyn L. Baker, M.Ed. grew up in a segregated (white) suburb in Southern California but came of age in the counterculture of the 1960s. And so she went on to a 30-year career in nonprofits that helped the less-fortunate (the coded-container of, mostly, young blacks, older blacks, the in-between blacks, and fatherless black families). Wrapped in her mantle, helping them up, she had little reason to believe she had had a role in their lack of good fortune.

Her book,An Unintentional Accomplice: A Personal Perspective on White Responsibilityfollows Bakers painful awakening to the realities of her own complicity in racism.It is a very personal narrative that explores the complexities of race in America, suggests ways to navigate the guilt that can arise in the face of these realities, and offers relevant methods to build a more humane society.

This book is more than timely, it is a revelation of todays magical metamorphosis. And, literally, you, me, all of us can follow her path to where our personal transformation can take place and, finally, become both creator and participant in a better society.

eBook and paperback editions @https://bit.ly/2At1tee

More info about Carolyn, including her upcoming radio interviews @www.anunintentionalaccomplice.com]

Read the original post:
The Results of an Open Mind - Los Angeles Free Press