Robert Paterson's Weblog

There is still hope - On the Bus to Washington #KETC

 

Many here feel as I did - that they are alone - how wonderful to see them!

What an indictment of the media as it is!

More at KETC here

Making Regular TV New By Using Digital #ketc

While KETC works to develop a way of creating a local cloud for our community, we are also making our regular TV offering more distinct. We have used our digital channels to break up our content into the equivalent of specialty channels for public TV.

This is what it looks like in practice

 

What do you think of this separation?

Jon Stewart - NPR says no KETC says Yes!

Homeland team members have spent a lot of time in the St. Louis community asking people about immigration—people in Forest Park, people in the skate park, people at work, people out of work, immigrants themselves, and immigration experts. Most have enlightened us, many have corrected us, some have yelled at us, while others have praised the work we’re doing.

But no matter how many people we talk to or how much the Homeland initiative has changed since the beginning, we still believe that our work is not simply about immigration, but about creating dialogue around an important issue in a way that is difficult to find in media today. And even some of the people who have yelled at us will agree—the media is often polarizing and divisive on the issue of immigration.

A recent online poll by TIME magazine found Jon Stewart to be America’s “most trusted newscaster” in the wake of Walter Cronkite’s death. What is especially interesting is that Stewart was able to pull at least second place in every state except for one…Vermont. Some critics believe this is because Stewart was the lone comic relief, as the other choices were all network news anchors.

I have my own theory based on what my Homeland colleagues and I have been hearing. Many members of the community are sick and tired of clashing sound bites, constant vitriol, and the acknowledgment of only two sides. Shows like The Colbert Report and The Daily Show exist because there was a need for a source that could counteract the way news is being covered today.

Although we’re using community engagement rather than humor, ultimately we, like The Daily Show, are hoping to accomplish a thoughtful dialogue around important issues in our community, like immigration.

So, naturally, when we heard that there was a bus-full of St. Louisans attending Colbert and Stewart’s ‘ ‘Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear’, An opportunity to travel 847 miles each way and spend a total of 30 hours in close quarters with 52 other people, when no one has had an opportunity to sleep or shower? Yes, but…

For us this is an opportunity to document and explore why everyone else on the bus is willing to take on this grueling trip. To me it seems that they feel it’s important to stand behind the men who not only make them laugh, but stand up for the people’s right to be informed and engaged. Using immigration as our key issue, we will be there for every step of the journey and I expect, as usual, there will be enlightenment, excitement…and of course yelling (from me, mostly because I truly love my sleep).

The plan for now is for Kate Shaw, our online producer, and me to make the journey while sending back video, Facebook, Twitter, and blog content along the way in real time. But we’re wondering exactly how you think we should cover the bus ride and the actual event. What do you want to hear about? Do you think we’re a little bit crazy for going? I know I do…but we want to hear from you!

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via explorehomeland.org

We have been debating going to the Jon Stewart/Stephen Colbert rally - some media organizations have banned their staff.

Here is how we are talking about this.

 

Putting the Public into Public TV

 

Most of us have video camera's now. Few of us can tell a good story on Video. If we are to have a great source of community, we have to help people get really good at video story telling. Hence The Nine Academy. 

Will education follow the same path as media? I think so!

 

After many years of thinking and talking, here Sir Ken I think nails the problem and gets the direction for the right new path correct. Helped a lot by the guys at RSA.

So what can we do with this insight?

My experience in public radio and TV - which also is at a crossroads from one culture to another - is that we must not under estimate the power of the entrenched culture. Most people inside pub radio/TV and in education are so invested in the old that they can only fight an alternative.  This is not because they are bad or stupid - it is because they are human and their identity is the system as it is. So to change it means that they have no place. So they cannot go to the new. 

If you long for a better education system - you are also worried about how to breakthrough all these barriers. You don't know how to change the system. I think that we can look at what is happening in media and find a way. 

So where is the change happening in media that we might use to help us in education. As I write them I can see how these factors apply to education - can't you?

• The long term effects of the poor economy is pressing the system
  • The school system is under huge funding pressure too
  • In higher ed - the degree also costs too much now and drives loans that canot be repaid
  • Kids will seek out new ways - they have to
  • In the next 10 years the pressure to find a new way for the money will become unbearable - thus creating the same kind of context for change that we see in media

• There are organizations like Craigslist that are killing the economics of the old and forcing economic pressure - the old way leads to economic starvation and sets a context for change
  • There are new online schools such as the Khan Academy that offer kids a wonderful alternative to school
  • Great Schools like MIT have put a lot of superlative content online
  • Kids are voting with their feet - better content will be available online for next to free as with Craigslist and personals that will ad to the economic pressure

• The web has a bunch of new tools such as Twitter, YouTube, Netflix, iTunes, Apple TV etc that are empowering new sources and new ways of finding, producing and using content
  • Same for Ed - iTunes, YouTube are already there
  • Why take Math with Miss Jones when you can get the world's best math teachers on your time at your pace?
  • Parents will buy into this too

• There are entirely new organizations - Huffington Post, Daily Beast, Politico - Greenfield that go through no transition but start with the new model - they are forcing competitive pressure
• There are a few old leaders who get it and have enough critical mass inside to go for it now - The Guardian in the UK and NPR - they are forcing change on their system
  • Athabaska and Phoenix come to mind in higher ed - they are moving to the mainstream
  • Soon there will be Grade Schools that have the same features

• There are  few local small organizations that have the leadership to go for it too and are making enough progress to show the rest - KETC is the one I know the best.

So what to do?

Don't think about changing the whole system!!!!! It's too big and powerful.

Instead take advantage of these powerful forces.

If you are a learner - Explore the new world of resources - do not feel trapped in school as it is or feel that you have to wait - enough change is here for you to take full advantage now

If you are a parent - see the whole picture for you child - help line them up into that is now available that is more fitted to them and at a cost you can all afford. Vote with your feet.

If you are a school board - Learn how to make the shift from the old to the new - Do a KETC - pick a school with the right leadership and try the new in ONE place - learn from this - use this test bed to expose others to the new from their peers.

If you are a teacher - Learn how to be the new - participate in the new world - be a citizen teacher - offer content or coaching - learn how to be an entrepreneurial teacher who can hang up their shingle on the web or locally. Be the math coach or the history coach in your place or globally!

If you are a social entrepreneur - Build the new a place together so that you are the convener of the a place where kids can be together and yet be part of the a larger universe of resources that fits them! 

It's coming folks - you can win now if you play now.

Can Public TV help our schools and your kids?

Harrison: Beyond the wonderful, perhaps unmeasurable cultural and arts programming from this station, KETC, it helped people save their homes with its focus on the mortgage crisis (Read the Beacon's stories on the effort.) They did it by collaborating with organizations in this area, and not caring who got the credit, and by bringing in people who may not watch public TV or listen to public radio but were so frightened when they got a foreclosure slip, they came to a town meeting. The end result was a fulfillment of the mission of public media -- serving unserved, underserved audiences with information that makes a difference in their lives. We have to do more of that.

Next, we'll be concentrating on dropouts. We have to make a connection in people's minds. This is a crisis beyond your own son or daughter. It does impact you. Your children might be doing well, staying in school, but we are living in a world where so many millions of young people are not even able to pass a basic reading test they need to enter the military or get a job. Each community can make a difference, and we're going to look at how public media throughout the country can address this.

via stlbeacon.org

Pat Harrison (CEO of CPB) was in St Louis this week. Here she talks about an issue that she shares with many of us. What to do about the alienation that is part of our schools? How to get our kids back into being interested and motivated?

What I have learned at KETC, when we looked at the Mortgage Crisis, is that by having a focus and using your public TV station as a facilitator, those who care can get both diagnosis and action.

If CPB go ahead, there is a good chance that finally we can have a legitimate process where the community can define the problems and where the community can work on what would make things better.

This was how America built itself. This process is what impressed de Tocqueville who was used to the norm then in Europe of people waiting helpless for the government to act. He was stunned by the American norm of a community coming together and working it out themselves. Something that we have lost I think.

My hope is that your community based TV or radio station can be the legitimate convenor for this old process to become new again.

Posted via email from Rob's posterous

Reinventing Public TV?

 

Nearly all in public TV and Radio know that we still have to do a lot more to find out what will be a more vital model. There are all sorts of experiments going on. Such as at KCET that is stepping aside from PBS - Here is a post by Doc Searls on this and a good series of comments that follow.

This promo is about what KETC in St Louis is trying. 

But it is no flash in the pan but the result of 4 years of hard slogging by Jack Galmiche, his team and his trusty "get it done", Amy Shaw. They have crawled, tottered, and now are walking toward a model for public TV that has both the old - great content as TV and also the new - a trusted space where the community can work together to do important things.

Crawling - It all started in 2006 with a simple enough test - we used the showing of the then new series The War by Ken Burns - to see if we could use this show as a Social Object that would teach us how to attract people in the community to tell their stories. Here Bill Ives tells the story of this first chapter of our story. 

Tottering - Our next project was to see if we could find a way to create a safe enough space for the community to get together to help each other get through the Mortgage Crisis. We first tried this at home in St Louis and then were given the chance by CPB to include 60 other stations across the nation. Here Bill tell the story.

Walking - We are now about half way through the next project on Immigration that the promo describes above. Here we have taken a topic that few can agree on and we are trying to find out if we can create a space where people can hear each other and so we hope find a way forward. This is not just about using new media - it is about using new media to have a better social outcome. Bill tells more about us here.  He adds more about how I am using a novel search engine, Darwin Awareness, to find a way though the noise of the web and here about how I hope to use it to see what impact we finally make ourselves. 

When we started we knew that while we had to master the new tools - this was not really about the tools - but about if we could shift our culture. This has been more challenging and painful than I ever imagined. Change is easy on paper and when it involves some one else. But I and the the folks at KETC have found that the work demands that we all have to give up a lot of whom we were and that hardly a day passes when we are not wracked by doubt.

We have a lot still to do. A metaphor that we use is Columbus. We know that land lies to the west. We know that it should be close. We have seen the odd gull and floating logs. But we have not seen land yet and have no idea what it will be like when we get there. Will it be the Indies? Will there be a pot of gold there? Meanwhile, we keep sailing on our course and have to put our hope in the big idea.

Of course when we get to land, that is only the beginning! Then we have to find out how to live there.

Like Columbus, even if we get there and it is fine, we can't stay there alone. We need people who are up for a New World to join us.

Do you want to find a better future of Public TV? If you do, you can help us by joining in and being part of this.

 

Good Listening vs Talking well

This Fast Company article from 1995 describes how a native American wisdom council gets taken into the corporate world. Interesting stuff. I read it with some anxiety as I fear the real wisdom behind the practice could easily be lost by corporations co-opting the ritual.

So the best bit for me were the principles underlying the process, described at the end. I'll highlight a couple of them. The first is:

Good decisions begin with listening. The Western give-and-take meeting emphasizes talking rather than listening. Businesspeople come into a meeting prepared to give their presentations -- not to listen to the contributions of others. And the debate format encourages people to begin formulating their responses while the other side is speaking, rather than listening and reserving judgment. The first element of a council ceremony, on the other hand, is careful listening.

When I've worked with "no interruption" rules, I'm often amazed at the difference this simple intervention makes. Something special can happen about the way people give attention - a quality that I think is evoked, not taught by "active listening" courses. By stopping interruption, I think we help participants to develop the capacity to suspend judgement and enquire more deeply.

The second principle I wanted to pick up is this:

A slower process yields better decisions. Rather than looking for the fastest answer to a pressing problem, the council process accepts the need for careful, in-depth reflection. With the understanding that implementation is faster, easier, and more successful if it comes after all implications of an issue have been thrashed out, the process doesn't address the question of action until the latter stages of the discussion. "By the time you get around to talking about action," notes Eric Vogt, "the whole council has had a chance to speak and feels engaged in the results."

I've written a lot in the past about the danger of "action theatre" and about the power games that get played out about demanding action. If we force action on a group we risk shallow commitment, passive aggression and end up with little real engagement. Taking time to reflect offers the chance of something more substantial. Chris Corrigan calls it "wise action" which is a succinct way of putting it.

via johnniemoore.com

Many of the comments on KETC"s site on Immigration have made the point that we should, have less conversation and have more action items. "Tell us what to do" seems to be the main thrust.

But isn't the "Do" the problem? If I come from one POV and you another then if I tell you what to do - you will tell be to take a hike. No one is listening. We all seem so captured by what we want to say that we cannot hear what some one else is talking.

How can we make progress if we cannot listen?

Posted via email from Rob's posterous

How many arrests at the U.S./Mexico Border?

Arrests at the U.S./Mexico Border? – Your Voice

Lauren Schwarze | October 11, 2010 | Comments (0)

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Do you know how many people were arrested trying to cross the U.S./Mexico border last year? Our intern, Charlie Dunlap, took this question to the streets of St. Louis to see what the community had to say…and their answers ranged from 500 people to 100,000 people. That’s a pretty wide range of responses. What do you think the answer is? Take a guess and watch the video to find out.

Featured are: Dan Kastner, Stephanie Nahm, Alex Magrath, Kathy Higgins, Vicki Bedwell, Lannie Rossi, Marcus Prophete and Torri Lewis

via explorehomeland.org

The punchline comes at the end of the video - I was with all the folks here with my guess being in the thousand - and the real number is staggering!

The deeper point for me is that the message that is being sent out is that the border is a leaking tap and there is next to no enforcement.

As you will see the truth is anything but.

So how do we make any progress when none of us knows what is going on?

Posted via email from Rob's posterous

This what America is all about - what we are doing tonight!

via explorehomeland.org

We are hosting groups of people talking about what is going on - This is what America was all about and surely can and must be again. I love the comment about politicians here - Time to grow up!

I was in tears at the end - we can do this!

Posted via email from Rob's posterous