• Why did COVID-19 Disproportionately Hurt Communities of Color?
• Price Month ends; Allyship Doesn't
• Cruella Hits the Big Screens
• Meeting Jane Kleeb
• Dr. Sharonica Hardin-Bartley: Humanize, Personalize, Problematize
• Switching Places
• The Political Side of In the Heights
• Meeting Tracey McCreery
• The Commoditization of Pride Month
• Challenging the Powerful, in an Ongoing Battle to De-stigmatize Mental Health

Meeting Jane Kleeb

On June 24th, Jane Kleeb, Chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party, zoomed in as a guest speaker with the Civitas summer interns. In addition to her position as Chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party, Jane Kleeb is the founder and president of Bold Alliance, serves as a board member of Our Revolution, and formerly held the position of Executive Director of Young Democrats of America. Her career not only consists of work with large organizations and nonprofits, but also includes working directly with the people she serves. One of her most notable accomplishments has been organizing to end the Keystone XL Pipeline that would impact the Native Americans and farmers near the pipeline.
 

During the Zoom call, Civitas interns took turns asking Kleeb different questions about her career, life, activism, issues she’s passionate about, and more. Kleeb gave insight on the life of a rural Democrat and community organizing. Ways that Kleeb believes that rural communities can turn to progressive candidates is through building trust with the people, telling the truth, and remaining consistent. Kleeb has also authored a book,“Harvest the Vote”, that provides information on how to push for change in rural America.

Although there are issues--climate change, racial equality, and women’s health care--that Kleeb believes there is no room to compromise on, she also believes that compromise in certain areas is crucial to making the changes that serve American people. Kleeb said that finding common ground is easier than we think and that we don’t need to agree on everything to make progress: “Sometimes we need to work with the other side, but we can’t give up our values. We gain the trust of voters by telling the truth and being authentic. We don’t need to agree on everything to get things done. We don’t need to agree on abortion to get clean water into our communities.”

Dr. Sharonica L. Hardin-Bartley: Humanize, Personalize, Problematize

Serving as superintendent of the University City School District for five years now, Dr. Sharonica L. Hardin-Bartley has worked hard to bring change to education, advocating for equity, managing trauma, and uplifting voices, especially of students. She overseas almost 3000 students and over 400 faculty and staff and ensures all needs are met. Dr. Hardin-Bartley grew up in St. Louis, attending higher education here as well and getting degrees in education. Her experience with this city has allowed her to sit on the boards of Big Brothers Big Sisters of Eastern Missouri, the University City Children’s Center, the Magic House, and the United Way of Greater St. Louis. Additionally, Dr. Hardin-Bartley served on the Ferguson Commission to help promote well-being and equity for children. She also has worked to implement restorative justice in her work, reducing suspensions in schools. Dr. Hardin-Bartley is wise, bold, innovative, and unafraid.

As a community leader, Dr. Hardin-Bartley detects problems, listens to concerns, and solves issues. She understands the forces that cause division, inequity, and injustice, especially the poverty level and wealth gap in St. Louis. She seeks to be aware of all sides, value humans first, acknowledge different experiences, and find common ground in inclusivity, truth, and respect. She identifies herself as a status quo disruptor, which is significant for a superintendent to change what is needed and push for reforms despite pushback and limitations.

After 2020, with the intensity of the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2020 presidential election, Dr. Hardin-Bartley had to navigate many high-stress situations. However, she continued to impact her community positively, including learning about the virus to keep people sharing, starting a meal distribution program along with other supplies, advocating for mental health, and making hard but necessary decisions to educate virtually. She also supports critical race theory and the teaching of it because “America wouldn’t have been founded in 1776 without what happened in 1619.” There is a lot of misinformation, fear, and controversy that clouds education, but Dr. Hardin-Bartley pushes for awareness and truth against hatred and ignorance. She sees how school systems are still segregated because of how separated Black and white communities still are because of the racism in housing, education, workplaces, and more. Dr. Hardin-Bartley leads with the plan “humanize, personalize and problematize,” which helps her, her colleagues, and students thrive in education. She also continually asks herself, “Are the children well?” This question guides Dr. Hardin-Bartley in her work because her goal and commitment is to care for the children she serves and do everything in her power to provide for them a valuable education. She has even reimagined learning to allow for a better way to teach a new generation during this time.

Dr. Hardin-Bartley is a change-maker, ready to take on challenges and improve her school district. University City is fortunate to have her as superintendent because of the short-term and long-term changes she is implementing to benefit all people part of the University City community.
 

At the time of writing this, a couple of days ago I learned of a mother in El Paso, TX who posed as her daughter at the middle school she attended. The story initially caught me pretty off guard to say the least, because before listening further, I couldn’t imagine why a random mother would want to impersonate a middle schooler, and I originally thought that it was some sort of stunt for views or internet points. However, after I listened further, I found myself seeing the point of the mother on why she did this. 
 
On June 1st, a mother by the name of Casey Garcia posed as her 13-year-old daughter and attended her school for the day. She was able to attend all her classes, work on assignments, and even eat in the school cafeteria with the other students. She was only caught when the seventh period teacher asked her to stay after class and noticed that she wasn’t her daughter. Garcia then revealed her true identity and told the teacher about the experiment. On June 5th she was charged with criminal trespass and tampering with government records and booked on both charges(along with an unrelated traffic charge) and was later released on a bond of $7,908.
 
 She said that she didn’t do this for clout, views, likes, nor as some stunt to promote a social media platform like an unrelated, similar incident just two weeks prior, as a 28-year-old did in order to promote her Instagram page. Although, you could argue that the attention she DID get contributes to the awareness of the problem she was trying to bring to light. She did this as a social experiment to prove a very important point. The point being: “We need better security at our schools,” as stated in her second YouTube video discussing the event. 
 
For me, this isn’t a discussion of whether or not the method she used for this experiment was right or wrong, or if this truly her intention. Nor is it if puting more security and/or metal detectors would make the school feel like a high-security prison. We could always have those discussions later. The discussion is that the security in our schools is currently not up to an adequate standard, whether it be elementary, public, college or otherwise. Even if you do take a major issue with what she has done, wouldn’t you also agree to increased security to prevent stunts like this from happening again? If the mother of a current student who just-so-happens to be of a similar height of the average middle schooler could easily not even sneak into a middle school for an entire day, what would stop someone of a more malicious intent from doing the same? Garcia states in her video, “Are you more concerned that I, a parent, was sitting next to your child or do we really wanna wait for the next person taking their second amendment right to the extreme?”

The ground-breaking, upbeat, heartfelt, sensational musical, In The Heights, was recently adapted into a blockbuster film, becoming the word around town this summer. Written by Lin-Manuel Miranda, the film follows Usnavi, a bodega owner whose family immigrated from the Dominican Republic when he was a child. Other characters include Benny, Nina, Abuela Claudia, Vanessa, and Sonny. I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of In The Heights; my body filled with excitement and joy, my limbs itching to get up and dance with everyone else in the movie theater to celebrate culture and family. Its colors were exuberant and the costumes were designed with precision so that each character could be defined solely by them. As appropriate to a musical, the dancing and music were phenomenal; each voice lifting me up and ringing clearly through the whole theater, carrying me through the blocks of Washington Heights (where it was appropriately filmed) and taking me along with every character. Before I knew it I was strolling down the street with Nina or dancing with Usnavi. The choreography reached a high level of professionalism and each body moved in synchronization with one another, painting a beautiful picture of Washington Heights that gives glimpses into the culture. My favorite number, in terms of its choreography, is 96,000, a song that captures the character’s ambitions in life as they marvel over whether they would win the $96,000  lottery ticket that Usnavi’s bodega sold. The number features glorious synchronous swimming in the community pool of Washington Heights. 

As much as I loved the bright colors, beautiful choreography, wonderful music, and themes of family, love, dreams, and community; in my opinion, the most relevant aspect of In The Heights, and what sets it apart, is the politics of it, and how it directly reflects the stories of so many people in the Latinx community. Usnavi, Nina, Vanessa, Benny, Abuela Claudia, Sonny, and Daniela, each has a little dream, or el sueñito, that is universally shared among minorities.  They represent stories that haven’t been widely told enough. It enables people who have wanted to be seen to finally be seen. As well as representation of the Lantinx community and their stories, Lin-Manuel Miranda’s creation also deals with social justice issues such as gentrification, immigration, and racism, which are all prevalent issues that are facing the U.S. today. In college, Nina experiences racism, such as being searched and being mistaken for a waitress at Stanford University. Vanessa gets rejected from a job opportunity because of her race and socioeconomic status. Usnavi’s cousin, Sonny, fights to go to college, but the odds are against him because of his status as an undocumented immigrant. 

In The Heights is just a step in the right direction in terms of representation for the Latinx community and for all minorities. There is hope for Broadway and Hollywood to continue telling stories that show facets of everyone’s lives.

From the 2nd amendment Preservation Act to education reform, Rep. Tracy McCreery can talk about it all. Recently summer interns had the honor of speaking with Democratic representative Tracy McCreery of the 88^th MO House District- also known as the Olivette, Creve Coeur, and Ladue area. Rep. McCreery was first elected as an independent into office in 2011 through a special election, replacing Rep. Jake Zimmerman who was elected to the St. Louis County assessor position. After trying to run again, Tracy unfortunately suffered defeat in the Democratic primary. She described it as being embarrassing because, “Usually when you don’t get a job nobody knows, but everyone knows if you lose as a politician because it goes in the newspaper.” She did not take this loss as a defeat, though, and spent the next years working with different organizations such as PROMO, a statewide LGBTQ organization. She eventually jumped back onto the campaign trail and successfully was elected in November of 2014.  

When first speaking with us, Rep. McCreery told us about one of her many jobs: report writing. Essentially, she writes reports on bills in layman’s terms. When doing this she usually throws in some pop culture reference to both keep people's attention and ensure that people read the report. Besides this she is a ranking member of many committees like Utilities, Agriculture Policy, Emerging Issues, and Legislative Review. 

One new bill Rep. McCreery spoke about was the 2nd Amendment Preservation Act- a recently signed law that prohibits police from enforcing any federal rules that violate the Second Amendment. As described by her, this bill will basically make it Missouri police officers vs. Federal police officers. McCreery is positive that this bill will eventually be declared unconstitutional due to this very reason. Some may ask why she and other democrats could not overturn the bill before it became law, but to this McCreery would probably say it is because they are in the super minority. This means that the number of Democratic members is so low that the other party can have automatic veto over all democrat’s bills. McCreery has not let this discourage her, though, and came up with some creative ways to work around it. One being having someone else do your work. This may sound unideal for other jobs, but something that works in her favor as a member of the super minority. She essentially hops in on other member’s bills and tries to throw in suggestions that she believes will benefit the greater good. This has helped her get many items passed such as an initiative that will provide women in prison with menstrual hygiene products.    

Rep. McCreery also spoke on a several other topics ranging from trying to get MONA passed and compromising with republicans. One element that is clear when hearing Rep. McCreery speak is that she is passionate about what she does. You can catch her in the upcoming 2022 Missouri State Senate election, which she recently announced her campaign for.