A monthly column by CEF’s very own:

Mike Wood

Mike recognizing Olivia for her commitment to Opportunity Class

I thought it might be a good time to speak on something that I really should know a little something about. That would be the Opportunity Class, for which it has been my supreme good fortune to be involved with right from its very inception. The goal for the class then as it is now is to give our members the information we think helpful in the transitioning out of poverty and homelessness.

Any successful endeavor requires a vision of how you wish for things to turn out. Mine was to use the principals set forth in the 12 step programs and adapt them in a way that might achieve our goal of transitioning our members from the fringes of society and back into the mainstream. In other words to help them to acquire the knowledge and the motivation to seek a more meaningful and abundant life. Financial independence, self-reliance and enhanced self esteem being chief among the many goals I had established for the group.

Having overcome poverty and homelessness in my own life I have always been keenly aware of the need to keep the topics and curriculum relevant to the members and where they are collectively in their personal lives. Though my results have all been positive I am mindful that others may require a different strategy for their own recovery. I would like to think that the results for the majority of our members have all been positive.

As in the 12 step model we place great emphasis on honesty and personal responsibility because I believe that only by confronting the mistakes of our past can we hope to take full advantage of the present. There is great power that is unleashed when a group of people get together to try to help one another. I have also come to believe that no one can help a homeless person as much as another homeless or formerly homeless individual. But having said that, the real secret to the success of the class lies in the many advocates that give of their time to support and encourage the members through what can be very discouraging and challenging times. To that end I am always trying combine what we do in the class with the efforts of the advocates.

I can report that we have gone from averaging about 5 members a class to now when the average is better than 15. I would like to presume that this growth is indicative of the fact that my vision was correct. I know that we have helped an awful lot of people but none more than me. If all our members get as much out of the class as I have then I guess that we soon will become famous. But before I prepare for my interview with 60 Minutes I will continue to be open minded about ways that we can improve the effectiveness of the curriculum and how I deliver the message of optimism and empowerment.

Lately I have placed a greater emphasis on discussion and hearing the members share their experience strength and hope for the future. I am confident that the class will continue to evolve and become even more relevant to the needs of our members. It has certainly been the greatest privilege ever bestowed upon me to take part in helping to develop this program.

As always I will continue to suggest to our members that they consider making changes as opposed to excuses. And although there is no way that we can hope to carry the message to all that need to hear it, it sure has been fun trying. We can’t hope to get to every member that attends but maybe we can plant a seed that will bare fruit later on down the road for them.

OpportunityClass

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by Quinn Holmquist

CEF-Durham Co-Coordinator

Ricky, a CEF-Durham Member and Drew, an Advocate, hanging out at our end-of-year celebration last spring

Of all the weather-related metaphors I could make about my work with CEF this year, a rainstorm seems most pertinent – sometimes heavy, always reminding me that life is neither fair nor comfortable, and refreshing for precisely those reasons.

In August, Anne Yeung (Duke ’14) and I became the Co-Coordinators for CEF-Durham. Since then, we’ve settled into something of a rhythm: weekly meetings with community partners and various members of our Admin Team, outreach into the Duke community, fielding calls to the CEF-Durham phone line, hanging out with Members and with one another. I’ve never really had a “job” before, but my position right now is as close as I’ve gotten. How fortunate am I, to have my first job experience doing work that I actually want to do with my life!

Wait, what? you might be asking. There’s two different CEF’s? How is CEF in Durham different from CEF in Chapel Hill?

            Good questions. Let me catch you up on what’s been going down at CEF-Durham.

CEF: A Short History

• 2009 – CEF launches in Chapel Hill
• Spring 2011 – Janet Xiao (Duke ’12) takes class with UNC CEF-ers. Wants to know how they became friends with people who are homeless.
• Summer 2011 – Janet meets with CEF-Chapel Hill Admin Team. CEF begins expanding to Durham.
• Fall 2011- Spring 2012 – Janet and a team of about 10 Duke students begin working in Durham transitional houses.
• Fall 2012- Spring 2013 – Under the guidance of Janet and Priyang Shah (Duke ’15), CEF expands to around 25 student Advocates and 40 Members.
• Summer 2013 – Six summer interns work for CEF-Durham (three from DukeEngage, one Pathways Intern, and two veteran CEF Advocates)
• Fall 2013 – CEF-Durham has grown to 45 active Advocates and nearly 90 Members

…which brings us to today.

Where We’re Going

Outsiders think we’re kidding, but you all know that I’m not when I say that the coolest people in town hang out with CEF. CEF-Durham is composed of Members, Advocates, Board Members, an Admin Team, and community partners, all of whom both push CEF-Durham forward and encourage us to step back and reflect.

A few examples:

• Shreyas Bharadwaj (Duke ’16) and Simar Nagyal (Duke ’15), the Opportunity Class Coordinators, have worked with Gary, a graduated CEF-Durham Member, to revamp our Opportunity Classes. Inspired by Chapel Hill’s successful Train-the-Trainer model, they have created a program that better meets our Members’ needs.
• Matt Hamilton (Duke ’16), our ever-professional Development Coordinator, has applied for at least four grants (and is already preparing more!).
• Parit Burintrathikul (Duke ’16), a dedicated CEF-Durham summer intern who enjoyed walking from meeting to meeting in downtown Durham this past summer, recently revised the curriculum for Laptop Classes, reflecting Members’ desires and his own experience.
• Apart from the four transitional homes where we already work, we’ve expanded to a fifth site for Members who’ve graduated (yay!) from the homes. Beyú Caffé has partnered with us, generously opening their space up for our weekly “Open Office Hours.”

What Guides Us

We naïve, visionary idealists (some call us college students) at CEF have a tendency to move forward with lots of ideas, lots of enthusiasm and only a little bit of a plan. As such, at CEF-Durham, we’re engaged in continued conversation with the whole CEF community, reflecting on what we do well already and how it can be made even better.  From these conversations have sprung our overarching goals:

• Emphasizing a “culture of savings” – one Advocate at each home site (the Resident Savings Expert) receives specific training on CEF savings programming. We’re also streamlining our deposits and withdrawals, and plan on setting every Member up with a Self Help bank account the moment they join.
• Consistent Member-Advocate pairings – we want CEF to be a place where friendship just makes sense. So, having the same Advocate and Member work together every week just makes sense. This is why we created the Member-Advocate Coordinator position, filled by Anna Qiu (Duke ’15) and Nick Martin (Duke ’16).
• Thinking about the bigger picture – why do we do what we do? Is it even working? Who gives us permission to do our work? We come together twice a month to think through these questions (over home-made snickerdoodles, of course) at our Philosophy Times.
• More intentional times for Advocates to be together – we just had a wonderful first Philosophy Time and there are some fun CEF hangouts in the works. We just can’t get enough of each other!

It’s with these goals in our minds and in our hearts that we at CEF-Durham find direction.

It’s from these friendships, in community, that we derive our strength.

It’s from one another that we learn

And it is the rainstorm of CEF-Durham – the sometimes-overwhelming struggles we take on with our Members, the frustrating delays, the hard-fought successes – that puts our existences in the Duke bubble into (or blows them out of) perspective.

It’s from the rainstorm of CEF that we grow.

The Declaration of Financial Independence
By: The Community Empowerment Fund

We the PEOPLE of the Community Empowerment Fund declare our independence from the oppression and tyranny of the unjust financial system, whose banks are built on the backs of the poor. This system has turned us against ourselves, our brethren and our sistren, putting individual property ahead of community well-being.

We declare today, on this day the second of July, two thousand and eleven, in union, our independence from this System and our firmly held belief in a Financial System built on a different set of values, a System that upholds justice, equality and its People. We hold these truths to be self-evident:

We furthermore hold this truth to be self-evident, That whenever any form of Power becomes destructive and ceases to support the Common Wealth, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a new System, laying its foundations on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Systems long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce the People under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Powers, and to provide new Guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of these People; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Financial Systems.

The history of the present Financial Crisis is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute and corporate Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world:

We, therefore, the People of the Community Empowerment Fund, do solemnly publish and declare, that these People united are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent; that they are absolved from all allegiance to Oppressive Debt; and that as Free and Independent Members, they have full and collective Power that has been heretofore unrealized to promote Peace, build Community, establish Fairness, and to conclude together upon the proverbial Mountaintop. And for the support of this Declaration, we mutually pledge to each other our Support, our Trust, and our Beloved Community.

Master of ceremonies at 2013 Box-Out!

A monthly column by CEF’s very own:
Mike Wood

There was a phrase I learned in prison. It was in a class designed to teach me and my fellow inmates how not to re-offend. “If nothing changes then nothing changes.” One of my fellow inmates would express that thought cast in a slightly different way. “If you keep on doing what you always done, you’ll keep on getting what you always got.” Makes a lot of sense don’t it ?

But as is the case in all the little catch phrases we learn along the journey. It’s easy to change, the difficulty lies in staying changed. By lunchtime on the day of my release I was right back to doing the very same thing that had always gotten me locked up in the past. You see I am an addict and my addiction follows me even when I am not actively using. The whole time I was in prison, staying sober but gorging myself on Honey Buns and Reese Cups, my addiction was on the weight pile and running laps in preparation for my release.

While I readily accept that not all the members of our class took the same road to homelessness as I did. I have come to believe that we share more in common with one another than the relatively small ways in which we may differ. It would seem to some that it’s simple, if something is not working for you, just change it. My confounded non addicted friends would often tell me, “all you need is more willpower.” Fair enough; but towards the end of my addiction I always felt like someone that had taken a whole bottle of laxatives and was now trying not to go to the bathroom.

I know full well that my willingness to change was the key to my recovery. But how do I get others to come to that same conclusion? There are times when I feel totally inadequate for the task. But I don’t spend too much time lamenting the complexity of my goals. That would not be good for my own vulnerabilities. I don’t spend a lot of time telling them what they should do. But I am never reluctant to tell them what I did.

I think that the best thing that I can do for them is create an environment in which they will choose to do the right thing. If I want them to think a certain way I know it best if I leave the book open to the chapter that I want them to read. But I also know that there is great therapy in a good example. And I make every effort to be that good example. Because as much as I must accept my powerlessness over them. I can and I do have power over my own behavior.

I’m sure they must think me boastful when I talk about how well my life is going. But it’s not the house nor the possessions that I most cherish. It is my self respect that gives me the most pleasure and of course the respect of my family and friends. What I want for them is just that. That thing that till now was not there for me. Because I have had the housing and the money before. But today I have learned that the best things in life are not things at all.

Don’t get me wrong, housing and money are precious commodities and what I want for all our members. But character is destiny. Had I taken my same bad habits into the house that I currently reside I would not have been one bit better off. If all I do all day is sit around the house and stay sober, pretty soon I’ll be drunk. So thanks CEF for giving me the fantastic opportunity to try to help others. It keeps me grounded. It is in my self interest to do just exactly what it is that I try to do.