PEACE
JUSTICE
YOUTH ACTIVISM
FOOD SECURITY
NATIONAL FOCUS
The Growing Peace Project is a peacemaking, social justice, and youth activism initiative that works with kids from diverse communities across the US. We empower youth to become the bridge between a range of interests, with the goal of strengthening community and growing peace. All of our programs are entirely free.
During the school year students learn about each others’ cultures, collaborate in cross-school teams to identify and tackle community issues they care about, and engage in activism. At the end of the year we hold our capstone event, a summer leadership retreat where selected students from the participating schools meet in Vermont. The retreat is an opportunity to deepen their understanding of activism and to further develop the social justice actions they have been working on throughout the year. Further, each retreat revolves around the following four strengths:
Developing leadership and peacemaking skills
Building relationships
Becoming “citizens of conscience'“
Cultivating personal empowerment
While every year looks different based on kids’ interests, common themes that the students often choose to address include: bullying, the environment, racial inequity, police brutality, girls/womxn’s rights, LGBTQIA+ concerns, immigrant rights, hunger, and homelessness.
LOCAL FOCUS
Can there be peace in the world if people are hungry?
This driving question informs much of our work. While our youth activists determine the issues they care about, one theme that we often explore collectively is food insecurity. During our summer retreat our NATIONAL and LOCAL programs come together to provide an activism model for youth as they help maintain and harvest the garden, deliver produce, prepare meals for those in need, or work on food security in their respective neighborhoods. All of these activities provide rich “food for thought,” as we explore the effect of food insecurity on people and communities.
Our local food programs directly serve our neighbors in need, with:
a half-acre free food teaching garden and orchard
gleaning and plant-a-row pickups
food cultivation workshops
donations of organic garden produce, homemade meals and personal care items for food shelves and organizations serving low income households
STEAM and earth stewardship activities for kids and their families
family cooking classes revolving around garden harvests and delicious, healthy, affordable meals prepared and enjoyed together
Untitled
by TréAllen (pictured center)
TGPP Youth Activist, Minneapolis MN, 14yo c
. 2014
It starts with racist rednecks in the streets
Them coming at us is what I call black boy defeats
Harming us and marking the world with racist streaks
And I don’t get how we let it right the highest of peaks
All I’m saying is we could end this
Cause if not, we could make hatred endless
I got Drizzy backing me up, it go zero to a hundred real quick
You seen the four little girls and Trayvon Martin that racist people kill quick
And mama said be proud of my skin
Maybe they’ll be proud of my skin too, but I’m wondering when
They making kids wish they skin would lighten like Mike Jackson
Got me stinging – they tighten they purse when they see my black skin
And, G, they think we be skull cracking
See, now little black kids stuck hiding and masking
Ya’ know I don’t like it at all, G
They say King’s dream is done, but we far from free
I know this all seems fine
But this I can’t stand dealing with these problems in my mind
Let’s quit this before we get bullets in the air
Turning this anger into national warfare
Find our land of liberty into a warzone nation
And change this ‘cuz we don’t need no land of discrimination