Northspan’s Welcoming Community program collaborates with Urban Rural Action and Lead for America to host the event series Uniting for Democracy in the Northland, a nonpartisan program dedicated to broadening civic participation.
The goal of U4D is to build new community relationships across divides and tackle democracy challenges in the Northland. It brings together residents in Northeast Minnesota to explore different perspectives on local issues and work together toward collaborative solutions.
In 2022, during a day-long workshop at Lake Superior College, participants chose a problem statement: “There is low civic engagement of underrepresented community members in the Northland.” The group then engaged in action planning to launch a community project to address the problem. Stay tuned for future updates!
Previous Updates
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May 2022 Update
Uniting for Democracy in the Northland Kick-Off
On April 30th, 2022, the Uniting for Democracy in the Northland program kicked off with an in-person workshop in Duluth, MN. Participants for the workshop came together from across the region, representing a diversity of generational, racial, and cultural backgrounds along with diverse lived experiences.
The interactive workshop saw participants learning and practicing constructive dialogue skills, and completing a problem tree analysis of a democracy related problem in the Northland. The problem statement crafted by participants was, “There is low civic engagement of marginalized communities in the Northland.”
Participants analyzed the causes and effects related to the problem statement, and discussed potential positive outcomes that could occur by addressing one of those causes. A core team, led by Lead for Minnesota fellow Amber Lewis, will continue to meet over the next twelve months to initiate a project in the Northland to address the selected cause.
“I see the work of addressing democracy-related challenges on a local level as one way that we can begin to create spaces of belonging and inclusion in our region amid the differences that we have, be they cultural, racial, ideological, generational, or a myriad of others,” said Lewis. “At a local and regional level we are best equipped to understand and address the challenges we see in the Northland. By working together on common goals, we can be a catalyst to strengthen the foundations of our communities.”
Please contact Welcoming Community Program Manager Amber Lewis at alewis@northspan.org for more information about Uniting for Democracy and how to get involved.