***Suggested donation***
$20 - $200 
or equivalent in donations of the following: 
shoes, warm-weather clothing, digital cameras/laptops (used or even broken is fine)

Please RSVP HERE or by e-mailing PodcastsForPeace@gmail.com
Hope to see you there!

Happy Holidays,
Mika and James

Highlights from this month include a visit to a local radio station called La Primerísima, a day of painting with SIT study abroad students from the US and their Academic Directors, Aynn and Guillermo, a new English language teacher, Douglass Sánchez, and a whole day devoted to producing jewelry from recycled materials which Mika and James will be selling in the US when they return next week. The ten Podcasts for Peace participants who visited the radio station got a glimpse into possible future careers as announcers or sound technicians and were even interviewed live on the air about the video projects they had produced in Podcasts.

Right now we’re gearing up for a final celebration with the participants and their families before flying back to the US on December 9th. When we return to Alemania Democrática in January, we’ll start up the second round of classes with new and old participants, including a small group for advanced students. Mayquelin Pérez, a member of the Community Support Team, will be living in the Podcasts for Peace house while we are away, and in when we return we will begin training two new Program Coordinators and Digital Arts Instructors.

Thank you for all your support and for keeping up with us through the blog! And again, if you understand Spanish and know how to add subtitles to short video projects (or know someone who does), please send us an e-mail at PodcastsForPeace@gmail.com.

Abrazos,

James and Mika

On the PARTICIPANTS page, you can now listen to many of their personal introductions; the younger participants recorded a typical sound from their neighborhood and described how it related to them, and the older participants discussed how they wanted to make change in their neighborhood and recorded appropriate sounds to match their narrations. Both groups mixed the sounds into their narrations using the program Audacity.

We need help translating these introductions and other Podcasts and then applying subtitles to the video projects. If you would like to help out, please send us an e-mail at PodcastsForPeace@gmail.com.

Speaking of help, we held a meeting with the parents of the Radio and Digital Arts participants to give the community a better idea of the sort of work the youth do in Podcasts for Peace and how it will benefit them, as well as to solicit support. Since that meeting, parents have contributed to the program by supervising the Homework and Reading hours, buying food and supplies at the market, and juicing fruit for the frescos we serve before each class. We held a similar meeting with the parents of the children who attend the Homework and Reading hour, and now have a parent who comes every night to supervise and facilitate activities for the younger group while Mika and I work with the older youth.

Local volunteers—mostly friends of Yamileth—continue to contribute to Podcasts for Peace. Elvin Murillo repainted the logo, this time in color and with crisper lettering, and Juan Carlos Rojas paved the space around it to prevent mud from splattering the wall when it rains. Madeline Mendoza joined Zamir Rivera to team-teach the English classes. Juinmar Hernandez, Elvin Murillo, and Lester Rodriguez paved a section of the main activity space, the entryway, and the whole side room, allowing us to separate young children from adolescents during the Homework and Reading Hours. Juinmar also installed three additional fluorescent lamps in the two main rooms, a much needed improvement to the two main activity spaces.

Our next goals with the Radio and Digital Arts classes are to start digital storytelling projects with the younger group and to finish the Message to Enacal project with the older group. We would also love to have someone help us with the translation and subtitling of the participants’ work, so please send us an e-mail if you are interested!

Saludos,

James and Mika

The weekly movie screenings continue to be a hit.  Jamileth Chavarria, who worked at a feminist radio station, gave two workshops on gender roles and left us with a wealth of resources for making radio programs, and Guissel, one of Yamileth's daughters, has started hip hop dance classes three times a week.  Last week, a local university student named Zamir started English classes that will take place three days a week, and Luis Carlo began teaching the Radio and Digital Arts students basic computer skills, which will allow them to edit their projects themselves in the future.

At the all-day recycled material artisanship workshop last Sunday, about 50 people, mainly youth, learned how to make wallets out of milk and juice cartons, purses and coin bags out of soda can openers, and earrings out of potato chip bags and soda bottles, thanks to the expert instruction of several members of Cooperative El Parche Giftshop in Granada.  To make the workshop possible, members of the Podcasts for Peace Community Support Team (Equipo de Apoyo) spent hours in the market (Mercado Oriental) under torential rain buying more than 250 pounds of food, chairs, and other su pplies for the workshop and the program in general.  Mayquelin went to meet the instructors, Yamileth rented more chairs and tables, we set up the space, and in Adelina's house next door, a group worked for several hours to prepare the lunch for the attendees.

This is only one example of how vital the community Support Team is.  Every Sunday afternoon we meet to discuss the successes, challenges, and to plan upcoming events.  Members of the Team supervise during reading and homework hour, accompany us during field trips, and help us resolve conflicts among the participants.

But it hasn't all been easy. The challenge Podcasts for Peace currently faces is that despite the tremendous efforts from the Support Team, there is still not enough community support to make the project sustainable. James and I currently serve as the program coordinators, media class instructors, supervisors, tutors, and librarians for homework and reading hour, program treasurers, grant writers, and housekeepers, and are also in charge of publicity and outreach efforts. This means late nights, a stressful workload, and the frustrating deferral of many important tasks (such as publishing student work and keeping the website up to date for our supporters and collaborators) in favor of more urgent tasks (lesson planning, catching students up on classes they miss, and preparation for weekend workshops). Expanded community involvement—especially from the parents of participants—is currently the most critical objective for Podcasts for Peace, but it is also one of the most challenging, as community and Support Team members have full-time jobs and other responsibilities that prevent them from volunteering as much as they would like.  To address these issues, we are going to hold a meeting tomorrow for parents and adults in the community to explain what the program is about and to ask for more support.  We will also continue to take time for critical reflection and strategic planning with the Community Support Team.

Another goal, which you can help us with, is to get some more books for the kids. Please take a look at the Podcasts for Peace wish list here (remember, used copies are fine).

Thank you for keeping up with our work here in Nicaragua!

Abrazos,

James and Mika


P.S.  Check out our updated gallery and participants pages!