It was a full week even before Wednesday with all of our MIRC meetings – and on Wednesday we met with folks from the Main Street Project. We met with Kat Vann, Director of Communications and Development, Steven Renderos, Media Justice Organizer and Niel Ritchie, Treasurer for Main Street Board of Directors and Executive Director, League of Rural Voters.
Main Street Project promotes and supports civic participation especially among new Americans using new technologies. Their Justice 2.0 project provides hands-on training for organizations and communities of color on media justice, digital storytelling, and how to effectively use social media tools to combat anti-immigrant and racist voices. They work with communities of color to help get their voices heard; they also encourage leaders in rural areas to reach out to other underrepresented voices.
They had some good advice for us in terms of making sure that MIRC efforts are as inclusive as possible. They emphasized the importance of reaching deep enough into non-majority communities to ensure that we’re not just dealing only with those individuals who are comfortable volunteering to speak on behalf of others. Self appointed “representatives” aren’t always so representative.
We realized that one step we could take would be to explicitly articulate project values, including importantly inclusivity, in print,at our initial launch meeting, and throughout the entire project. And we hope to continue to learn from Main Street Project about working effectively with vulnerable and historically marginalized populations to ensure that the benefits of MIRC are widely shared.
