Facilitation Lab!
Spring/Summer 2021
The Homegrown Grant and Facilitation Lab is a space for young people interested in building unique learning environments around topics, projects, and points of interest they care about.
The program seeks to build a collective of young leaders in San Diego and Tijuana who want to develop facilitation skills that challenge conventional ways of learning.
The program seeks to build a collective of young leaders in San Diego and Tijuana who want to develop facilitation skills that challenge conventional ways of learning.
Program Overview
The Homegrown Facilitation Lab is a virtual, 4-month long intensive program that provides each youth-created project with community, support, tools, and resources—including access to a network of peers, facilitation training, and micro funding.
The Facilitation Lab offers one-on-one mentorship as well as visits from guest artists, educators, and/or organizers that will host workshops around skills needed for crafting your own learning program. We also will provide ongoing support from Homegrown staff throughout the Lab.
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At the end of the Lab, you will gain a variety of skills for facilitating your own learning program (i.e., a workshop, discussion, book club, teach-in, or whatever else you can dream up!). Each group will also be asked to share their experiences from the Lab, as well as lead their own projects for our larger SD/TJ community during Homegrown’s Fall 2021 programming.
The Homegrown Grant and Facilitation Lab will provide grants of up to $700 to five youth-led projects based in San Diego and Tijuana.
Who Can Apply?
If you are between the ages of 13-25, are excited about building creative community learning spaces, and live in the San Diego/Tijuana region, you are welcome to apply to our youth cohort!
We especially encourage applications from youth interested in sharing knowledge & building skills around pressing social issues in their communities.
Our Lab prioritizes young people from historically marginalized neighborhoods of San Diego and Tijuana, as well as Black, Indigenous, disabled, LGB, and trans/gender non-conforming youth.
Please note, participants can take part in the program as individuals or as part of a team (2-4 people). If you are applying as an individual and would like support in building a team, our program team will do our best to connect you with other applicants who share similar project interests.
Mentorship
Throughout the program, we make space for you to build relationships with a mentor from the community who aligns with your project’s goals, visions, and values.
In the first week of the program, you will be able to select a mentor for your project, with support from the Facilitation Lab program team. Mentors will help guide you in your learning practice, explore with you, develop your topics of interest, and help you build and design the learning spaces of your dreams.
Mentors and participants should anticipate meeting bi-weekly throughout the Lab at dates/times that feel most comfortable for you.
We hope the Facilitation Lab’s mentorship system will adapt to student interests and foster a space for genuine experimentation, investigation, and discussion. Our mentor group will grow as we do! ︎
Important Dates!
Applications Open
March 1st - April 10th
March 1st - April 10th
Welcome Weeks
〰 April 24th: Meet your team!
〰 May 1st: Welcome!
Introduction Meeting
〰 May 8th: Mentor/Youth Pairing Session
〰 April 24th: Meet your team!
〰 May 1st: Welcome!
Introduction Meeting
〰 May 8th: Mentor/Youth Pairing Session
Mentor Pairings Confirmed
May 14th
May 14th
Workshops
︎ What is Facilitation: A Collective Definition
Saturday, May 22nd | 9am - 12pm
with Rebecca María Goldschmidt
Calling on youth leaders with an affinity towards conversation! Join us as we collectively explore various approaches to facilitating group interactions. Whether you're participating in group meetings, classrooms or art projects, we will offer suggestions from our combined experience in social justice organizing and DIY art spaces on how to bring people together for meaningful interactions.
︎ Experimental Learning
Saturday, June 5th | 9am - 12pm
with Stacey Uy + Luisa Martínez
We will inspect what learning models do not serve us, and explore ways to foster and lean into community-centered practices, guided by our own intuitions. Through experimentation and play we can together begin to remember, re-imagine, and embody new ways of being that expand our relationship to knowledge, community, and self. Let’s work together to comprehend the importance of honoring our worth, exploring and redefining our identities, and committing to relationships with neighbors and kin.
︎ Community Building
Saturday, June 19th | 9am - 12pm
with Kaya Bautista, Kayden Mims, Dinah Poellnitz, + Lani Bautista Cabanilla
This intergenerational workshop is co-facilitated by youth and adult organizers, educators, and organizers, and will be an introduction and conversation about community engagement through the lens of arts and culture, social justice, and entrepreneurship. We will provide four, unique perspectives on community organizing and inform participants on identity in community building and cultivating trust-based relationships, and self-care as a form of advocacy.
︎ Disrupting + Making Space (Access and Anti-Oppression)
Saturday, July 3rd | 9am - 12pm
with Kelsey O. Daniels
We will be exploring challenging questions, including: How do intersecting forms of oppression inform our lives? How can we use creative storytelling as tools for challenging and engaging others? How can facilitators support the creation of a safe, accessible, and nurturing learning space? How do facilitators relinquish, honor, and share power?
︎ Courageous Conversations (Transformative Conflict Resolution)
Saturday, July 17th | 9am - 12pm
with Precious Letchaw + Macedonio Arteaga
The conversation will be facilitated by another powerhouse intergenerational team where we will skill-share strategies for mediation and transformative conflict resolution. We will explore community-based interventions to interpersonal conflict and harm, non-violent communication skills, facilitation tools to help identify and support different conflict styles. We will also look at ways to address immediate needs and reimagine safety to prevent future harm and strategies for creative solutions and healing.
︎ Social Media as Advocacy
Saturday, August 7th | 9am - 12pm
with Kayla Burner + Endiya Griffin
In this conversation, we will look at social media’s role in facilitating community conversations/critical dialogue about issues important to them, as a way to outreach for their own or other projects happening in their communities, as well as some of its strengths and limitations and how to navigate those. We will talk about how to document/share work, how to make our work transparent and accessible to outsiders + community members, and how to use social media to sustain our work and grow relationships in our communities and beyond.
Reflection Circle + Share Out
Early August / TBD
Our group will be meeting one final time to reflect on our experiences throughout the lab, offer feedback, and celebrate our work by sharing the projects youth designed as a result of the program. Mentors and facilitators are welcome to attend.
Fall 2021 Programs Begin!
September 2021
Youth Facilitators will have a chance to share their Lab programs as part of Homegrown’s 2021 Fall programming season! ︎
Applications Are Now Closed!
Stay tuned for more programs in 2022!
Stay tuned for more programs in 2022!