Cultivating Communities Summit

In this episode, we hear from Dawn Espe and Hannah Smith as they share more details about the Cultivating Communities | A North Central MN Welcoming Summit that R5DC is hosting September 19-20. Visit regionfive.org/events or sowingroom.org to learn more. We hope to see you at the summit!

Transcript

Angela Anderson 00;00;00;00 - 00;00;51;04
Hello. My name is Angela Anderson and I'm the host of Deep Dive with Region Five. Welcome and thank you for joining us today in Deep Dove with Region five, we will share more about Region five Development Commission and North Central Economic Development Association programs and the work that we're doing in Region five, which covers casts growing Morrison, Todd and Wadena counties in central Minnesota. In this episode, we share more about an exciting learning opportunity for a community building event that we are hosting in September. Listen, as my colleagues Dawn and Hannah share more details. And visit region five dot org backslash events to learn more.

Angela Anderson 00;00;51;25 - 00;01;05;25
Well, first of all, I wanted to welcome Dawn and Hannah to the Deep Dive with Region Five podcast. And if we could just have introductions, Don, if you could introduce yourself and tell us a little bit more about you and then also Hannah, if you could share an introduction as well, that would be great.

Dawn Espe 00;01;06;04 - 00;01;26;12
Absolutely. We're excited to be here. My name is Dawn Espe. I'm the equitable development specialist at Region five Development Commission, and I've been here for almost eight years now. About last year went really fast and serving in a variety of roles, but most recently in this role, really thinking about creating those equitable spaces throughout the region.

Angela Anderson 00;01;27;07 - 00;01;30;11
Awesome. Thank you so much. And Hannah, welcome.

Hannah Smith 00;01;30;11 -00;01;44;09
Thank you, Boozhoo. Hello. My name is Hannah Smith and I am the brand new Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Fellow with Region five. I think I'm on month three officially. Yay, yay.

Angela Anderson 00;01;45;22 - 00;02;18;22
Welcome not only to Region five Development Commission and to the region, but also to your first podcast. We will be doing another recording with Hannah to talk more about her in a separate episode. But today we're going to talk about an event we have coming up that is cultivating communities in north central Minnesota welcoming summit.First, if you could start us off, Dawn, and tell us more about the summit that is taking place in September. Yeah, so we have been working on this summit now for several months. We will be hosting Cultivating Communities Summit.

Dawn Espe 00;02;42;11 - 00;03;12;28
It's a two day summit Monday and Tuesday, September 19th and 20th, 2022. It will be held at the Arrowhead Lodge in Baxter, Minnesota. It's meant for everyone, but we do have four focus areas. We're looking at education, environment, justice system and economics, our economy, and how we can create more equitable spaces within those four areas.

And just kind of general topics as well. We also have that that Monday night, we're also going to be hosting a more of a community gathering. So if you are unable to attend the summit during those two days, you still do have an opportunity to connect and be a part of the summit by coming out to that community event. The details are still being worked out, but we're hoping for some entertainment, some new foods, some artists will be there and things. So yeah, it'll be a party of sorts.

Angela Anderson 00;03;12;28 -00;03;26;06
That sounds wonderful. And then also, was there something I know we did specific track for some educators because we know that they might be in school on those days. And so we did some special times for them, I think.

Dawn Espe 00;03;26;06 - 00;03;59;25
Yes. Thank you for mentioning that, Angela. Yes. On that Monday, the 19th, we have a 430 to 530 and a 530 to 630 session. Again, all of these sessions could be of interest to anyone, but of course, we're we're doing more of a focus. So anyone's welcome to come to those two sessions. But we did target them towards educators knowing that they would be in school at that time of the year, maybe a little bit hard for them to get away. So those two sessions will be in-person, but they'll also be virtual. So folks will be able to just zoom in on those if they aren't able to make that drive as well.

Angela Anderson 00;03;59;25 - 00;04;20;07
Wonderful. Thank you. I think that covers most of what the summit is about. Do you want to add anything, Hannah? No. Okay, good. I just want to give you a chance, just in case. So then the next thing we want to talk about a little bit more is why Region five Development Commission. Why are we hosting this event? And if Hannah, do you want to elaborate on that for us a little bit?

Hannah Smith 00;04;20;07 - 00;04;52;19
Yeah, definitely. So we believe that the successful economy is having a healthy community and a likable community. So the summit, hopefully, and I think it will looking at the schedule, will create spaces for people to come as themselves, to be themselves and then learn with each other. So looking at the community, looking at the community, looking at the economy as a whole place with whole people, with various interests, and we can all participate. Awesome.

Angela Anderson 00;04;52;19 - 00;05;03;08
Thank you. I think that's just kind of piggybacks on what you've already talked about a little bit, Hannah. But why is this work and and this event important for us, for our region and for our people in the region?

Hannah Smith 00;05;03;08 - 00;06;09;08
Yeah, I think the last few years I've really missed connecting with people, networking with people in person. This is going to be the Arrowhead Lodge again, and we're going to take a look at a few different themes. Our breakout session will have three breakout sessions over the two days with education, environment, justice, system and economics.

Again, trying to promote that wholeness of our community and just creating spaces that we can come together, we can share with each other. We can learn and we can plan. So part of what we hope to do is create spaces that people are learning and then also hopefully coming away with action items with new relationships and new ideas that they can bring back to whatever sector of our community that they're coming from. The summit is going to do that through those regular sessions again, but then facilitated dialogs performances, small group discussions and hopefully sharing and going to that Monday night community event as well.

Dawn Espe 00;06;09;18 - 00;06;55;18
I guess to I'd also just like to add, you know, I think a summit like this was important pre-pandemic but post-pandemic. You know, we're living in a little bit of a different economy right now to the way that we're coming out of the pandemic is different, you know, with worker shortage being even more apparent now than itwas before we went into it. Changing demographics within our community is being even more amplified and just the inequities that maybe have occurred over the pandemic as well and in terms of our various cultural communities. And so not only is this kind of a some an important just when thinking about economic development and community development, but then doubly in part because of the effects the pandemic had on. And how can we move together as a region with our new realities?

Angela Anderson 00;06;55;18 - 00;07;31;19
Great. Thank you, Dawn It makes me also think of those of you listening who maybe don't know. Region five Development Commission has a nonprofit lending arm called North Central Economic Development Association. And in that we do a lot of business lending. We also do a little bit of homeowner lending. And so some of that is obviously touching on on the work that we do in economic development.

And I think you really touched on a lot of the community development aspects, so thank you for that. Could we talk a little bit more about how this project was driven by local decision making? Dawn, if you want to I know you kind of did talk about that a little bit already, but anything you want to add?

Dawn Espe 00;07;32;054 -00;08;42;10
I can add more. So, yeah, you know, this isn't something that Region five just thought, hey, we should do this. But, you know, this summit is really a culmination of the last five plus years of work that we've been doing around building likable places, more equitable places, more inclusive places. And, you know, that really did start out back in 2018 when we were working with Sprout and we had the place making the our place grant. And that grant allowed us to bring connect our cultures within the region in ways through food and art and music.

And, you know, that sort of evolved. And after the third place grant was done, then we moved into creating a different welcoming community advocacy groups around the region, and we worked with the intercultural development inventory. And, you know, just the more learning, the more workshops and things. And now just feels like this summit is been informed by the last five plus years of that work and what we're hearing from the community and what those needs are. And now here's the summit. Here's a chance for us to gather together and like Hannah had mentioned, really bring that call to action.

Like, here's our learnings, but what are we going to do when we walk out this door today? Now, we've been learning as a region together for over five years. What can we be doing now? What are the steps we can be taking?

Angela Anderson 00;08;52;17 - 00;09;07;15
Thank you, Dawn Could we talk a little bit more about the money, actually? So who is funding this program and who are our partners? I think that's kind of an important thing to talk about as well, just so that we can thank those people for helping us, but also just letting everyone know where that money is coming from.

Dawn Espe 00;09;07;15 - 00;10;51;04
Northwest Area Foundation has been very generous in their assistance for this type of programing within our region. You know, they were our main source of funding for the first two years of this welcoming work. They were very instrumental along with Blandin Foundation and Sourcewell and helping us become idea qualified assessors and really starting to work through that. The Northwest Area foundation helped with the funding of all of the community advocacy groups, and now they are our main funder for the next two years of work that we're doing, including this summit. But because this summit is something that has been needed, desired by the region, we had a lot of other sponsors and partners that came forward as we were preparing this. And so we had received a couple of grants to help support some of the performances and some of the artists that will be in place at the summit through Arts Midwest, through the Bush Foundation and through the Five Wings Arts Council.

And then we had other supporters and sponsors such as Source World, the Initiative Foundation, the Minnesota Humanities Center, the Minnesota Department of Commerce, the Minnesota Department of AG McKnight. So you can see it isn't just arts organizations, it's economic development organizations, it's community organization, it's local food organizations, it's government. I mean, it's so many organizations, entities. And so I don't want to say silos, but, you know, we're all in our silos and it's all of these silos kind of coming together for this because we see the importance and we see how there's intersections through all of these different ways of thinking about our community. And so just very grateful to our sponsors and showing us that support and being there alongside us to to continue this journey.

Angela Anderson 00;10;51;04 - 00;11;06;01
Thank you, Dawn. If we could talk a little bit more, too, about the collaborations. We talked about the partnerships a little bit that Dawn just mentioned with some of those organizations that are helping sponsor, but also others are participating actually in the summit. So if you could share a little bit more about that, that must be wonderful.

Dawn Espe 00;11;06;01 - 00;12;27;14
Not only do we have funders, sponsors who are helping provide dollars to be able to support the work. When I'm looking at the presenters and who is all coming to the table to be a part of this and who just community organizations and things that have said, Hey, how can we help those four areas of focus the justice system, economics, education and environment.

We have folks from law enforcement. We have mental health practitioners. We have farmers, we have economic development professionals, we have culture bearers. I mean, there are so many different partners and collaborators that have come to the table. We have Buddy King. We'll be closing out day one with his bongo and his inspiration, you know, I mean, but then we have Melissa from start talking about equity and energy and how can we think about equity and energy. So they're just like two completely different.

Things coming together in the same place. And that's where the partnerships and the collaborations have been really cool because the last thing I want to do personally is plan a boring event. And I'm hoping that with just those different partners and collaborators coming together that there's going to be enough of the learning. But then also understanding how heavy some of this learning can be and adding some of that play element into it as well.

Angela Anderson 00;12;27;14 - 00;12;28;04
Thank you.

Hannah Smith 00;12;28;04 -00;12;49;10
I just thought of a question to ask both of you guys and I don't have an answer for it. Do you have one one particular thing on the agenda that you're super excited for? Like you're not going to miss it. You're going to make sure that you're there 5 minutes beforehand. Do you have a do you have one part of the agenda that you're looking forward to?

Dawn Espe 00;12;49;10 -00;12;51;14
Angela, do you want me to go or you want to go first?

Angela Anderson 00;12;51;14 - 00;12;57;07
You can go first. I'm going to look, I have one thing that came to my mind, but I'll actually I'll let you go.

Dawn Espe 00;12;57;07 - 00;14;01;24
I am going to. Obviously, I can't be in every single breakout session at the same time. I'm excited. I wish I could go to all of it. But my biggest, most exciting part is cultivating courageous conversations with breaking ice. I had the pleasure of seeing Breaking Ice at a Bush creative community cohort session that I was at and. Their little mini skits, get you thinking about how you show up in places, how others show up in places. And not only is it, you know, you have some of those. Oh, I didn't think about that or oh, whoa, what about that?

But it's also entertaining at the same time. So it's this learning journey that's done in a very entertaining kind of way. And then to be able to have those deeper conversations around what you just saw. It's like a live case study, right? And then you get to talk about it afterwards. And I'm just really excited to see what they'll do in our rural place because I had experienced them in an urban setting, and so that was what their focus was. So I'm just very excited to see what they'll do here for us in our region.

Hannah Smith 00;14;01;24 - 00;14;56;04
That was definitely on my list of like top five. But now I'm maybe that's my answer. Maybe I'm really excited for that one. Do you know, it's hard to choose because, you know, it's a full it's a full schedule. I looked at I don't have kids, but the educators track the second one and the educators track No More Next time in quotes.

I'm really looking forward to that. But also, I think that I really, really want to see the closing. How do we re-imagine north central Minnesota for everyone? And then generally just talking to people about what their feedback or what their aha moments are or what people thought through for the two day summit. I'm really excited to talk with coworkers and new friends at the end of Tuesday about what they thought about which sessions they were involved in.

Dawn Espe 00;14;56;04 -00;15;44;20
Agreed. Something else that I would like to mention, that I'm also excited about then I'll let Angela give her answer is that Maria Ervasti is a local artist. She's also an art teacher at Verndale Public School. But we have hired her to be our artist in residency over the two days and she is going to have a hands on our project that all attendees will be able to participate in and create their own little piece of it. And then she's going to put the whole piece together and then it will be displayed publicly at a location to be determined. We have to see how big it's going to get first, but that's something I'm also excited about. It's just having those times where you just got done with a really intense learning session and then you can go hang out with Maria and paint a little bit. So yeah, that's exciting too. Angela, what about you? What do you do?

Angela Anderson 00;15;45;06 - 00;16;38;12
Well Dawn. I'm glad you mentioned that because I feel like I really like to be creative. And so just even having either the music or the art stuff is a really cool way for, I think, a lot of people to experience things. And so I'm looking forward most to that part. But there's another there's a couple of sessions on here that I think look really fascinating, but there's one called Overcoming Political Divide, and I think that sounds very interesting. So there's just really a lot of different topics that I think, you know, like you said, you could you don't have to be an educator. You don't have to be a parent, Hannah, to go to the educators track or whatever. So it's very it's very open and it's very dynamic and you can choose whatever you want. And I think that's part of the big draw to attending is that there's a lot of options, I think, that answers that question. Hannah, any more questions or no? No. Okay. Well, here's the last piece we want to make sure. Is this how listeners can get involved? So it's how can they attend and who should they where should they go for information?

Hannah Smith 00;16;38;16 - 00;17;20;00
Well, I was going to say the R Five website events page on our website, you could also go to the sowing room to see more detailed information about the summit agenda. If you have any questions that you want to ask us directly. You can email at any time. H Smith at Region five dot org or Dawn Espe D Espe at Region five dot org as well. And we do have we do have scholarships. So if you're concerned about getting there or the cost, we do have scholarships available. And to find out more about that, please email us at any time.

Angela Anderson 00;17;20;00 - 00;17;21;04
How much is the summit?

Dawn Espe 00;17;21;04 - 00;18;19;19
It's $50 to attend both full days. That includes breakfast. That includes lunch both days. So it's to me, it's a pretty good bargain. And then if you are one of those educators or folks that just can't get there during the day but are still interested in that 430 to 630 track on Monday evening, that's ten bucks. And it's you know, it's not bad. It's just more to cover the speaker driving all that way more than anything else. And so, yeah, it's pretty affordable. But like I said, you know, we know that, that not everybody has that extra 50 bucks to be able to do something.

Or like Hannah said, if you don't have the gas to get there because gas is 450 a gallon right now, give me a call or send me a text and email and we can work through. We have some scholarship dollars to help at various levels. So happy to happy to be able to support that way. We'd rather have folks be able to come and not have money, be a barrier. So, yeah, please reach out some. Thank you very much. I think that covers everything.

Angela Anderson 00;18;19;19 - 00;18;21;08
Do you guys have anything else to add?

Dawn Espe 00;18;21;08 - 00;18;41;18
I don't think so. I'm just really I'm so excited about this. I'm hoping that this feels like a community building event. I hope that a lot of people come with curiosity, open mind, keep the judgment at home. We're here to learn and here to experience each other. And I'm hopeful that we can do that here.

Angela Anderson 00;18;41;18 - 00;18;42;23
Thank you. Thank you.

Hannah Smith 00;18;42;23 - 00;18;50;28
Thanks a lot, Angela.

Angela Anderson 00;18;50;28 - 00;19;02;10
Thank you for joining us today. We encourage you to visit our Web site at region five dot org, where you can learn more about our programs. Sign up for our newsletter and follow us on social media.