Programs doing many goods

Was fortunate to meet with Norbert from Table to Table on Monday and able to see the organization in action today at the Iowa City Free Lunch Program.  The Free Lunch Program received a large donation of yogurt and cottage cheese courtesy of Table to Table volunteer delivery.  The yogurt was added as a dip for the fresh fruit we cut up for today's lunch (the cottage cheese gets frozen for later lasagna).

I really enjoyed my time fixing, serving, and cleaning up for the Free Lunch Program today.  Lunch offerings were amazing and included a deluxe fresh fruit salad, tossed salad, several vegetable trays, brats/hot dogs with kraut, macaroni and cheese, two different warm vegetable sides, sweet corn with butter, and several types of brownies/breads/cookies for dessert.

The Free Lunch Program is about to have a dedication ceremony for the new location at 1105 S. Gilbert Court in Iowa City.  The facility is fantastic and the other volunteers were a pleasure as well.  I'm excited to return for future shifts (the program serves Monday through Saturday lunches).

Zero emissions discovery of place

I've decided to increase my zero-emission activities, which resulted in kayaking the Mississippi (courtesy of Mines of Spain Catfish Creek and Massey Station access points).  After 40 years of seeing the Mississippi from a bird's eye view, it was very interesting to see the barges at river level.

We also hiked the Horseshoe Trail at Mines of Spain.  How I lived my whole life without knowledge of the Mines of Spain in Dubuque County is a mystery.  Word to the wise: check this area out when in Dubuque.

I'm planning to ride a bike more in preparation for hopeful travel through Hawaii without a car.  I think it will be challenging, but hopefully not impossible, to make my way around the Big Island using foot, bike, and bus only.

I spent this morning wrist deep (!) in vegan cooking.  Loathe to buy another gadget designed to be obsolete in 60 seconds or less (only a slight hyperbole), I'm borrowing my mother's circa 1970 blender.  The motor sounds stronger than any I've heard and did a fabulous job blending my 'Forks Over Knives' no-cheese sauce this morning.  Melanie now has acorn squash lined with no-cheese sauce and stuffed with wheat berry veggie mix (spinach, veggie burger, sweetcorn, tomato, wheat berry, green onion, etc.) for lunch the next few days.

The mother in "The Hundred Foot Journey" says that "to cook, something must die" and hence "cooking creates ghosts."  I'm hoping to create as few ghosts as possible in the coming years (except for the requisite plant deaths) and as many no-bake peanut butter bars* as possible.

* Recipe: 4 packets flavored but vegan oatmeal (I've been using Glutenfreeda's banana) or 2 cups plain oatmeal, 1.5 cups flax seed (flavored or plain), .5 cups oat bran, .5 cups coconut, 1 cup vegan dark chocolate chips or chopped bars, .5-1 cup chopped additional nuts of your choice (Spanish peanuts or pecans are yummy), cinnamon or other spices to taste, 1 cup peanut butter, and .5 cups Agave nectar (or honey if not opposed).  Mix all ingredients together, press into container, refrigerate, and eat!

Mindfulness in education

I see the benefits of both mediation (focusing on interests and not positions; problems rather than people) and meditation these days.  Mindfulness, the exercise of being present with what is in any moment, is one of the goals of meditation.

During professional development, I've been participating in the new mindfulness for educators group forming through the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics.  I would like to think that the core of my teaching already asks students (and me as well) to constantly be mindful of the implications of behaviors and then to often substitute new behaviors that are more socially responsible.  I am curious, however, about introducing 'mindfulness' more formally in future curricula.  Colleagues in the group, for instance, said that they observed voluntary changes in student behavior with respect to cell phone use as a result of mindfulness.  I can see the utility in questioning who benefits (and who loses) from the seeming social imperative to upgrade cell phones to the 'latest and greatest.'  I can also see the utility for questioning food consumption.  The Sunday food advertisements, for example, included the following:

The advertisement was actually for three of the above packaged in cardboard.  So...if we're not mindful of the environmental implications of our consumption, we've just bought product that is not only barely 'food,' but that's been packaged in all sorts of plastic, foil, and cardboard.

If there's one thing I hate more than wasteful packaging, it's food waste itself.  I'm planning to have Melanie and I join a CSA this year in hopes we will reduce grocery store dependence and increase access to local and affordable food.  Likewise, I'd like to help reduce food waste, by seeing how I can volunteer to help Table to Table.  I would also like to inquire about the new program started by Drake University law school volunteers to eliminate restaurant industry waste, which apparently saved $5000 in potential waste during the Drake Relays alone.  I wonder if my Social Problems or Sociology of the Environment students could partner with the University of Iowa Law School on a similar initiative in future?!  Peace out, B.

Mediation

I realized that pursuing a 15 year interest in mediation might be another worthy goal for my professional development year.  To that end, I'm likely participating in a mediation training by Christine Crilley in September and have had very helpful conversations with both Steve Sovern and Laura Tucker (of Peacewise Mediation).  Special thanks to Steve for putting me in touch with Laura and to Laura for the very generous time spent meeting and sharing resources!

Mediation seems a natural complement to my teaching of controversial topics.  Too often students (and I) get lost in battles of "positions" rather than generating solutions based on the "interests" at stake.  Getting to YES provides an excellent explication of the difference between positions and interests.

I hope that mediation training will help implement the new pedagogical/curricular approaches I blogged about earlier whereby we focus on how to achieve common, interest-based solutions to various social problems.