A Summary of the Test Phase
The taproot of community experience is the ability of members to know each other and to share a commonality of mission, purpose, and opportunity. This project is an attempt to capture and present a place-based living moment that is as rich and nuanced as the minds of those who constitute its membership.
Using digital audio and visual technologies, the time-honored practices of the oral historian, and the collaborative potential of new media, I hope to examine and accurately portray the experience and concerns of a critical mass of locals, beginning with families who present themselves as participants (the project will not attempt to define what a family is or is not, and hopes to branch out into other demographics in another phase).
The resulting interviews–consisting of audio recordings, sense of place photography, and semantic, visual representations of meaning–are posted to a website, www.whyherewhynow.org, so that community members and local leadership can encounter members of local families on a meaningful level which has perhaps heretofore been unrealized.
The Why Here/Why Now Project is not a branding initiative and holds no potential for becoming one; it is an exploration of dynamic human systems and an invitation to develop a deeper understanding of the needs and concerns of local families willing to share their stories.
Local History and Current Obstacles
Various organizations of Yellow Springs have engaged in a sustained effort to create opportunities for community visioning exercises and commissioned studies, the stated purpose being to acquire a body of information which will help guide the activities of local government in developing policy, to help the populace in navigating potentially contentious decisions we must face in the coming years, and to guide the direction and outreach efforts of local community organizations.
In December of 2007, the Yellow Springs Men’s Group released the final report1 of the Community Information Project, a three-year, comprehensive community initiative which resulted in our community signature (or logo), now in use successfully on brochures and banners (available for download and use by all) which hope to leverage the collective experience of visiting, shopping, and residing in Yellow Springs.
The Community Information Project (CIP) included assessment of past research, survey of public opinion, community visioning exercises and economic forums, and web analysis. The final report sites information from the Cost of Living Report, previously completed with Wright State’s Center for Urban and Public Affairs in November of 2002, which stated our challenges thus:
• “a trend toward an aging, less diverse and smaller population set against a large and ever growing tax burden for our citizens”
• that “in order to grow and maintain a functioning, vital community it is important to attract young people who will stay in the community and raise a family”
• that “young respondents (those under 35) identify quality of schools and job opportunities as the two most important qualities when choosing where to purchase a home”
• a 38% reduction in attendance numbers for Yellow Springs Schools since 1970
• a significant reduction in Yellow Spring’s overall population since 1970 (variously figured)
While the organizations of Yellow Springs have continued their leadership, more obstacles have surfaced with economic and cultural ramifications: reactionary politics regarding the tension between affordable housing and development (as well as regarding public monies reserved for economic development), a further reduction in the employment base (including the closing of Antioch College), a general decline in the national housing and finance market, and a still-unrealized Business and Education Park.
During these often intense periods of decision-making, the “letter to the editor” section of the Yellow Springs News often reveals a community divided into factions, each with a position that allows for little nuance (and even less collaboration) between familiar names who are involved in (sometimes numerous) local organizations. Where are the voices of the demographic that has been identified as essential to the vibrancy and success of the Village of Yellow Springs?
My experience illustrates that the families of Yellow Springs are doing what families always have done: when the Village Council convenes in the small space at the Bryan Center, most Yellow Springs families are busy fixing dinner, attending after-school functions and extracurricular activities, and bathing and putting their youth to bed. While some families are able to manage a trade-off of responsibilities that allows for one member to be involved in community efforts, others are working double or offset shifts, attending school, or otherwise striving to fulfill the obligations that life presents.
The real value of our community visioning efforts remain unrealized when participation is hardly greater than those who plan the events, as the reports from the Men’s Group efforts reveal2. A community rich with cultural and organizational talent should attempt to reach out to other members of the community using whatever means promise potential. The face-to-face community meeting, convened in a designated location at a particular time, may not engage those who have much to contribute. The very circumstances that prevent participation (i.e. children and the reality of family routines) are the very circumstances that we seek to maintain and grow in order to maintain (renew?) our Village balance.
A Summary of the Pilot Project
Essentially, this project seeks to document and portray the lived experience of the families of Yellow Springs- their individual struggles and accomplishments, their relationship to others in the community, and to the place of Yellow Springs. It can (and should) be considered a rough draft–the product of one quarter of study by one individual who seeks to flesh out this project into a viable method of looking into what makes a modern community tick. Suggestions would be gladly received at brooke@whyherewhynow.org.
A collective project such as this has the potential for sharing stories of personal experience with many people, perhaps with the power to nuance our perceptions of each other or to inform our own worldview. Participation in a collective project can increase a feeling of membership between participants, and can catalyze a feeling of collective responsibility.
A story collective (with an audience) might give rise to new leadership, if not for the feeling of membership arising in participants, then because new faces with certain interests, experiences, and skills will present themselves (with a name and a face) to viewers, enabling the recruitment efforts of those already in leadership positions seeking to involve others.
As many individual stories are collected, it is expected that a few collective themes will arise. A compilation of the concerns and needs of Yellow Springs families, presented in audio-visual format for public access, might have the potential to impact decision-making in local policy or to help shape the direction of local organizations to better serve (and attract) those with young children in (or to) the Yellow Springs area.
Finally, a formal report including a demographic breakdown of participants and concerns raised could allow the information gleaned from the interview series to be better accessible to other organizations. This is a lofty goal for the developer herself, but if participation is broad the results could be valuable. This will be assessed as the project develops.
Presentation
The content of each participating family will be showcased individually on the website under the heading “People” in the top right corner of the homepage. [The actual content will be gathered by an audio-recorded interview which is loosely based off of topics listed on a form on the website entitled “Participate.” First, this audio file will be transcribed and entered into an algorithm program called “Wordle” (www.wordle.net). Wordle creates a typographical picture that gives more visual prominence to words spoken frequently. This graphic, and the pictures of the family in their home space, will be viewable while the audio interview plays.]
In addition to this content, sense of place photography (of Yellow Springs) will be maintained on the “Home” page where a visitor will also be able to read the “Documenting the Process” blog.
It is expected that common themes will arise which could be represented collectively on the home page. This option will be explored and developed as the major themes are revealed through participant interviews, but would likely culminate in a full-screen movie on the homepage.
A third and final aspect of the content curated and hosted at the website will be found under the heading “Tributes and Laments.” This space is for community submissions of individual creative content such as poetry, images, and essays on the topic of one’s relationship to the people and place of Yellow Springs.
Depth, Breadth, and Duration
An arbitrary goal of interviewing twenty local families has been established for the pilot phase of the Why Here/Why Now project. This number would be sufficient to ensure a wide demographic swath of participants, who will likely bring a wide variety of experience and viewpoints into the conversation. A potential goal would be twenty families in four months, which could be marketed in an interesting and energetic manner. The time frame of four months ensures that the project does not linger about, moving too slowly, but it also allows a comfortable working time frame of five interviews per month.
The depth of the project can be ascertained through two different avenues. The depth of the concerns and accomplishments shared by individual participants–their stories–will convey a wealth of information that could be of great value to those concerned with having a strong social fabric from an academic or theoretical perspective.
The other area of depth in the study will be in its attempt to locate the collective wishes of a certain demographic (“families”) who live in or otherwise consider Yellow Springs their home. This can be assessed quantitatively or interpretively in the narrative report, and is discussed in greater detail in below, under Obstacles.
It is hoped that a great diversity of ages, socio-economic classes, ethnicities, cultural inclinations, and orientations will constitute the breadth of the project, and that this will ensure a diverse array of perspectives and opinions. A wide assortment of experience, and resulting perspective, will contribute to a nuanced understanding of community, and a larger inclusion of membership.
Obstacles
The test phase of the project revealed a few key obstacles that must be addressed for the project to come to full fruition. The difficulties were largely due to limitations of recording technology and the perceived hesitation of potential participants. Limitations of the website template beg further consideration, as does the potential concerns inherent in creating an accurate and comprehensive final report.
Issues with Recording
The test phase included the completion of two interviews in their entirety. The interviews were recorded using the onboard microphone of the MacBook Pro, which was open and set upon a table between interviewee(s) and interviewer (myself). The audio was directly recorded into GarageBand, Apple’s preloaded audio editing software.
The audio was edited–clips were rearranged, clips were cut–and much of the editing was to eliminate sections that could not be used due to either extreme amounts of background noise or the failure to audibly register the furthest participant’s voice. Many important topics were lost from the audio file because of these issues, somewhat denigrating the value of the interview in terms of its representation of a participant’s real experience and stated perspective, and certainly challenging the ethics of the oral historian (who demands for archival purposes an original, untainted, authentic recording).
My greatest concern, given the community focus of the project, is that sub-prime recordings (and the associated loss of content) carry a great cost in terms of the level of trust and ownership participants feel in the project. For someone to commit to sharing their personal story–and the sometimes more difficult sharing of concerns and criticisms–the chances of faulty or spotty recordings must be eliminated almost entirely. Otherwise, accurate portrayal of an interview becomes very difficult, if not impossible.
One way to address the strain of sub-prime audio recordings is to include a full transcript below the photographs, either as full text or as a document for download. This, in fact, is a goal of the project–notwithstanding the quality of recordings.
Professional digital audio recorders have built-in features which allow for slowed playback (which aids in transcribing), and a “limiter” feature which actually records two tracks of sound simultaneously, one at a lower decibel level than normal. This technology is able to splice the two tracks together seamlessly when there is an erratic jump in decibel level–whether an unexpected background noise such as children shouting or a change in the interviewees recorded voice–so that the recording is a streamlined volume or decibel level throughout. My experience suggests these features are necessary for a project such as this, and efforts are underway to secure funding for this equipment.
Issues with Participation
Every local individual I spoke with over the course of the test run expressed enthusiasm for the project. This enthusiasm seemed to fall within three categories. The first category could be considered an artistic enthusiasm for the visual/multimedia design elements involved, and the potential of a visually interesting final product that represents the people and place of Yellow Springs. This enthusiasm seemed to equate with an interest in participation, although one person who would fall under this category has been unable to find time frame for an interview.
The second category of motivation seemed to lie in the potential for marketing and ad sales associated with visual representation of the people and place of Yellow Springs. Connections were made between the need of certain business professionals (real estate agents, for instance) to have access to a well-designed gallery of images, and the potential for gaining income and sponsorships to support the project as a business model. No one who vocalized the potential of this angle has yet inquired about participating.
The third angle, and the angle I have capitalized upon in my introduction and survey of local history, is a conception of the project as an exploration of community as a complex human system that is realized as a community with tangible qualities. The two participants who completed interview and photography sessions seemed most interested in this aspect, although perhaps for different reasons.
Upon first glance, the interviewees seem to almost represent polar extremes: one family new to the area who speaks of the wealth of the cultural institutions of Yellow Springs, and the ability to “be yourself” without being judged when in a community of liberal thinkers that is heavily influenced by the arts. The interview has a thankful and light-hearted energy that conveys the reality of four years spent planning, saving, working, and watching the real estate market finally coming to fruition.
The other interviewee has lived locally for nearly ten years, and expresses great concern about gentrification and the loss of the “old ways” that happens when a small community loses its generational families to more idealistic transplants. The energy of the interview is somewhat restless, and conveys the potential for hypocrisy when a community identifies with being “progressive” and “liberal” yet finds itself becoming less diverse and more expensive.
Yet, beyond these circumstances, both interviewees (or, rather, both interviewee parties) reveal much more than this. In the interviews is also great insight into the tensions between affordable housing and development, perceptions about “the military” and the implications of categorical thinking, and a great reverence for small town dynamics where a jaunt to the grocery is usually a social occasion for friends to catch up with each other. Importantly, I think, both interviewees cite numerous community organizations (by name) as playing an important role in the quality of Yellow Spring’s life.
While these two test interviews show the modality has great potential for revealing insight into what matters most to members of the community, three additional prospective participants motivated by this angle on human systems expressed interest (even great interest) in participating, yet have not been able to commit to a time frame. While fall and early winter is a busy time of the season, it is wise to assume that participation in this project could cause hesitancy because of its personal, and potentially controversial, nature. Essentially, this project asks people to open up their ideas and feelings and homes to the world at large, and–even worse–to a community whose local letter to the editor section can be quite cutting.
For the project to come to fruition as an agent of community change (or simply as a reflection of community), this potential hesitancy of participants should be addressed and dealt with honestly and openly. It is asking something quite uncomfortable for many. It is asking for a level of sharing and openness that is uncommon. The question becomes whether or not building strong and balanced communities should be expected to be uncomfortable at times, a question posed quite eloquently by my second interviewee. How will we, as a community, answer? Are we willing to be a little uncomfortable as we examine our lives and our ideals?
That said, general precautions have been taken to ensure that the least amount of personal information is presented on the website. To date, these decisions have been made:
• participants will be on a first name basis only
• the names of children will not be listed in the title/heading
• pictures revealing information such as address or last name will not be included
As the project progresses, consideration to this issue will remain high. Participants retain the right to veto any content, and will sign permissions for release of content once they see the final edited form. While expression of concerns and priorities is encouraged by the structure of the project, care will be taken to avoid creating controversy; for instance, no content will be arranged to make inferences of meaning not explicitly stated by the interviewee.
Further Applications
While our moment in history suggests that Yellow Springs is at a particularly opportune moment to utilize the results of a project such as this (and our history of community visioning and planning suggests that there will be organizations interested in the content), the collection of local stories and the resulting report can be conceived as the pilot phase of a much broader initiative with potential to carry the energy of Yellow Springs community-building forward. But you will have to return another day to hear about this.
Personal Experience
The project has its roots in the Non-Stop Liberal Arts Institute class entitled, “Community Journalism: Photography and Oral History” with Antioch College photography professor Dennie Eagleson and author, professor, and oral historian Don Wallis. The class explores photographic social documentary and the practice of oral history. This class is taken as an independent study for credit towards an Antioch University McGregor bachelor’s degree, where I am enrolled in the Humanities department with a potential second degree in Communications.
After growing up in the local suburbs of Kettering and Beavercreek, I moved to Yellow Springs in 1998 to attend Antioch College. After one year, I withdrew from my academic program and moved into town with my partner (now husband) with the intention of nurturing a livlihood as a fiber artisan/quiltmaker. We began to raise a family, moving into a family home in Beavercreek during the year 2000 with the intention of saving money towards a down payment, while working full-time in Yellow Springs: myself at the Organic Grocery (toting a baby), and he with Electric Service Company.
We moved back into town upon the purchase of our first dwelling, an uninhabitable house that had been vacant for a year and was now bank owned. We financed with an FHA 203K loan, a special program that allows homebuyers to finance the cost of repairs into the home loan. The repairs must be planned, finished, and approved by an inspector before funds are released from escrow. With a local contractor as our sponsor and the help of a neighbor’s hose, we lived in a trailer in our side yard for three months while performing the demolition and repairs ourselves. Our first daughter (who is now a second grader at Mills Lawn) learned how to walk on sheets of plywood resting on bare beams, and our story continues from there in much the same way.
Because of the high prices of the local real estate market, our struggle to set roots in this town has required bold moves such as these. In many ways this conscious struggle to achieve a place for our family in Yellow Springs is at work in this project–as a drive to understand exactly what is so compelling about Yellow Springs that we would undertake such wild commitments to realize our goal.
But guiding the methodology is another set of experiences entirely, beginning with my participation in the 2005-2006 cohort of the Leadership Institute of Yellow Springs. This program opened my eyes to the vital issues the community faces, and served as a thorough introduction to all aspects of non-profit and community based leadership practices. It largely failed, however, to steer participants into specific leadership roles in the community, which was a core mission of the program.
From time to time, I read in the Yellow Springs News a quote from an individual who is in a position of leadership in one or more local organizations that speaks of the “leadership gap.” I see that there is a gap, but I feel it can be rectified by greater outreach from existing boards, for the talent needed to diversify our leadership base is present, willing, and able. This understanding also guides this project.
Most recently, I have been the director of online communications for the Creative Region Initiative, the community empowerment/economic development effort trained in the area by Richard Florida’s Creative Class Group. This initiative, known as DaytonCREATE, led me (very specifically) to the ideas encompassed in this project. One of the five teams decided to tackle the problem of negative perceptions of the Dayton region– calling themselves “This Is Dayton” with hopes of launching a community pride campaign with the mission to re-present area residents and attractions to the larger public. They hope, as I do, to collect the stories of the people to find the essence of the place, though perhaps for different reasons.
My greatest hope for this project is that it will come to fruition as a listening campaign; a simple but widely accessed forum of perspectives otherwise in danger of being unheard.