Grant Awarded: November 2005

Type of Grant: We the People Grant

Sponsor: Michigan 4-H Foundation

Contact: LuAnne Kozma, 517-353-5526, kozma@msu.edu

Website: www.mi4hfdtn.org

Award: $11,600

The Michigan 4-H Foundation (East Lansing) has been awarded $11,600 for “Telling Our Story: A Model for Youth Engagement & Skill Building in Community Organizations.” This project will provide materials, training, and mentoring for community-based organizations to help record and tell their own histories, strengthen youth engagement in their organizations, and build youth skills in leadership, historical research, communication, multi-media technology, and community service. The project will involve 50 youth and adults in a “Telling Our Story” workshop in spring 2006. Eight multi-generational and community-based organizations will be recruited for the project.

Telling Our Story Workshop

(link here for program details in pdf format)

Organizations learn how to document their history, programs, community
service

As organizations grow and develop over time, they often generate a
remarkable record of community service. While leadership, members and
programs change over the years, an upcoming statewide workshop is designed to help groups document and preserve their organizational history.

"'Telling Our Story' will engage community organizations from around the
state as we explore the role of community service in the lives of young
people and adults and its impact on community life," notes LuAnne Kozma,
4-H Specialist and assistant curator of folk arts at the MSU Museum.
Workshop attendees will receive materials, training, and mentoring for
community-based and youth-serving organizations to help record and tell
their own histories, strengthen youth engagement and leadership, and use
historical research, communication, and multimedia technology methods.
Participants will also explore and learn oral history research and
documentary methods, using the "Folkpatterns" curriculum materials
pioneered by Michigan 4-H Youth Development and Michigan State University Museum.

Learn about the history of community service and service-learning

After the workshop, participants will conduct interviews with members or
former members of their respective organizations about the role of
community service projects in the lives of individuals, as well as in
organizations and communities. All participants will contribute brief
written reports based on their interviews in a "Telling Our Story" online
journal.

"Telling Our Story" Instructors are:

• Jim Cameron, teacher, Saline High School, Saline, Michigan, Michigan Oral History Association and Center for Teaching Michigan History
• Don Jost, former executive director, Michigan 4-H Foundation
• LuAnne Kozma, 4-H specialist, Michigan State University Museum
• Betsy Knox, 4-H program leader, Michigan 4-H Youth Development
• Cyndi Mark, 4-H program leader, Michigan 4-H Youth Development
• Lou Ann Morgan, Western Michigan University Library Digitization Center
• Kathy Mutch, Michigan Oral History Association, Oakland County Historical Commission, Novi Historical Society and Commission
• Yvonne Lockwood, curator of Folklife, Michigan State University Museum

"Telling Our Story" is funded in part by a We the People grant from Michigan Humanities Council, an affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities, and by the Michigan 4-H Foundation. The program is sponsored by Michigan 4-H Youth Development, Michigan State University Extension, Michigan 4-H Foundation, Michigan State University Museum, University Outreach and Engagement.
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