Click here to download June Minutes (pdf)

TCC Meeting Notes: Thursday, June 11, 2009
9:30 AM, meeting at BCNC, 4th floor conference room.

Attendees: Amy Koo, Barbara Rubel, Carolina Garcia, Chin-Wen Lee, Chutze Chou, Dennis Lui, Elaine Ng, Kerry McGowan, Kun Chang, Lian Yu, Lisette Le, Micky Lee, Nancy Wilson, Nilushka Nethisinghe, Rachel Szyman, Richard Goldberg, Samuel Tsoi, Sherry Dong, Shirley Mark, Suzanne Hinton

Agenda Items

I.    Refreshments, Welcome, Introductions

II.    Issues Facing Chinatown Youth: Follow-Up. A-WAY, presented by Elaine Ng and Lisette Le

–    A-WAY meets at 11AM after TCC meetings for youth worker leadership / professional development. A-WAY is a method to create a nexus of youth workers and related organizations.

III.    Chinatown Storefront Library Project, presentation by Marrikka Trotter, member of the Friends of Chinatown Library

–    The proposed storefront library project is contemplated as a three-month installation, ideally to be sited in several storefront settings around Chinatown. Friends of the Chinatown Library members have been or will be in contact and discussion with local property owners with potential space for the storefront library.

–    The Harvard Graduate School of Design has designed and is assembling the storefront library, intended to be portable, in the form of three component pods that contain all the necessary elements for the library. One pod is designed for select books and periodicals, another for children, and a third for computing, such as web access. The pods contain the furniture necessary to function within them, and intended to be readily able to be assembled and disassembled. The Boston Public Library is lending support to the Friends of Chinatown Library in the form of two advisors and the Friends are presently fundraising. The Friends of Chinatown Library are presently carefully collecting materials for the storefront library, since available space for such is at a premium. More information can be found at http://www.storefrontlibrary.org.

IV.    Tapping Into College Students for your Organizations, presentation & discussion facilitated by TCC’s Chinatown Intercollegiate Partnership (CIP). How can you tap into the college student population and engage them in your work for mutual benefit?

–    Carolina Garcia and Micky Lee of Suffolk University presented the university’s S.O.U.L.S. Center that connects community needs and education of the students. The school offers a community service track with service learning courses; students also have the opportunity to volunteer in one-time volunteer opportunities. There is direct application for example in the media arts, like when students created a documentary on life in East Boston. There will be an Asian studies major / minor available starting in the fall of 2009.

–    Suzanne Hinton from Emerson College presented the offerings available for students that pertain to community service, including 30 courses that delve into subjects such as community media and writing for marketing. Soon, Emerson will be posting projects on their website. 300 hours of service is required for AmeriCorps volunteers.

–    Kerry McGowan presented for Phillips Brooks House Association of Harvard University. It is a student-run non-profit managed by students. It has 77 programs and comprised of ~1,200 undergrads. There are 7 programs in Chinatown including a 6-week summer program that serves ~70 kids, including teenage counselors, an afterschool program, a teen mentoring program, and adult programs in ESL/Citizenship.

–    Shirley Mark presented for Tufts University. She focused on three particular websites that Tufts uses to link with the community. http://activecitizen.tufts.edu/ is the website for the Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service. http://outreach.tufts.edu/ contains information about how organizations can work with Tufts and has information on projects in each community, including Boston Chinatown. http://tuftstoolkit.pbworks.com/ is a wiki for engaging students in the community. In addition, the TuftsLife.com website can have postings for organizations to put up volunteer opportunities. All medical students are required to perform 50 hours of community service in health services over the course of 4 years. Opportunities may also include engaging faculty or employees in community-based participatory research or other community activities.

V.    Announcements, Updates, and Kaffeeklatsch

A.    Chinatown Events Calendar online at Chinatown Main Street’s website.
–    Contact Courtney at (617) 350-6303 to list organizations and/or events. http://www.chinatownmainstreet.org/events.php.
B.    Safety Committee (via Barbara Rubel)
C.    Chinatown Educational Pathway Chart by Richard Goldberg
–    Richard Goldberg presented a preliminary pathway chart that will be refined that consists of different pathways for people to achieve jobs and voting rights. It was created in cooperation with English for New Bostonians. For feedback, contact Richard Goldberg at Richard@aaca-boston.org. Also, on June 19th, 9 AM at the Wolff Auditorium, Tufts Medical Center, 800 Washington Street, is the annual graduation for the AACA workforce development programs. Governor, Deval Patrick, may be in attendance (updated 6/16/09, the governor will be in attendance according to Richard Goldberg).

–    In additional announcements, Barbara Rubel announced that soon, the green space between the Jaharis and Posner buildings will be open to the public from 8 a.m. to dusk. It is still undergoing some finalization in the construction before opening. Request to open the space earlier in the day, 7 a.m. perhaps, to accommodate potential community activities such as Tai Chi.

Next Meeting: Thursday, July 9, 2009 @ BCNC 4th floor Conference Room.