Thursday, July 29, 2010
New York 2 New Orleans Group 6
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Learning and Growing with Escuela Tlatelolco

As we do with most groups, the first day of their stay began with Our Levee Tour, exploring the compounding challenges facing residents in both pre- and post- Katrina New Orleans, throughout the gulf coast, and thier relationships to the rest of the country - starting at the place where, following Katrina, a barge came the Lower 9th Ward Levee (below).

Understanding the interconnectedness, of global problems, and developing ways to consider upstream problem solving is always an important take-away from the tour that we discuss when asking ourselves and each other, "what destroyed the bayou?" (below)

Students and teachers together participated in workshops facilitated by OSBG staff and interns, and NY2NO youth organizers. Participants learned about the challenges New Orleans, and particularly the Lower 9th Ward faces to food security, the devestating social and ecological impacts of the BP oil spill on the gulf coast region, and explored the power of youth to make change through urban farming and sustainable community development.



One day of thier visit was spent learning about an supporting the further development of our regional partnerships in Tangipahoa Parish. We all put in a lot of hard work, and made a lot of progress towards preparing the land for fall planting!!!
Monday, July 12, 2010
Local, Regional, and National networking

In the 9th Ward, volunteers have been working closely with our students at OSBG to further develop the various sites of our growing urban farm. They have also run a number of educational workshops to raise consciousness about food justice, environmental justice, social justice, and the deeply rooted connections between these various forms of oppression.
Our students have also begun to develop an outreach plan in order to involve more residents of the community in the various components of our project.

Friday, June 18, 2010
70206 Tarpley



Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Oil, Land Loss and Life in Terrebonne Parish

Our School at Blair Grocery and young people from the national Youth Coalition for Community Action took a trip to Southern Louisiana to explore these questions in a series of conversations and experiences with members of the community and scientists doing work in the area. Our goals for the trip were to (1) establish mutually beneficial relationships between OSBG and organizations people and organizations in southern Louisiana; (2) to identify opportunities for service in in southern Louisiana that address significant community needs; and (3) to begin research into the development of a curriculum unit that addresses the ecological and social impacts of the oil spill and continued wetlands depletion.
At the Dulac Community Center we joined by Bayou Grace, an organization working to provide relief to those being impacted by the oil spill, learned about issues of land loss associated with continued wetlands depletion. We discussed the communities relationship to the oil industry and the impact of the oil spill on those working in the fishing industry - the two primary industries providing employment to those living in Terrebonne Parish - however, now much of the fishing has stopped.

We had the incredible opportunity to meet with members of the United Houma Nation and discuss both the history and current status of the community, relationships to the fishing and oil industry and challenges that lie ahead. We learned of thier plans to develop a Cajun French emersion school for native Houma children and plans to start a garden. We are excited to continue to explore opportunities to work together to support the unique and similar needs we each face in our communities.

We ended the day with a crawfish boil on the bayou, continuing to think about what we heard and learned over the day, and eager to figure out how we can support these communities in this time of need.
LUMCON provides coastal laboratory facilities to Louisiana universities, and conducts research and educational programs in the marine sciences. We had the opportunity to speak to one of the lead researchers, who gave us a tour and answered questions.
We hope to continue building our relationships with everyone we had the opportunity to meet with in Terrebonne Parish and at LUMCON.
Monday, June 7, 2010
Seeding Change

Thursday, June 3, 2010
Community Building, Young Folk Style














