Connect Ferndale, a program of Ferndale Community Services, launched the production of the Juneteenth Video Project, to be used for educational purposes for K-12 schools in Whatcom County as well as a community resource in deepening our understanding of this celebratory holiday.

Providing creative direction on the project, community activist and Bellingham City Councilmember, Kristina Michele Martens states, “We are providing an educational experience that will elevate the voices of local Black students and Black community leaders in sharing the significance of Juneteenth.”

Remy Styrk, a young, Black filmmaker from New York with family ties to Ferndale will be directing and editing the video. He’s excited to assist in telling a memorable story for students and community members alike.

The goal is to have the video played in as many Whatcom County Schools as possible before Juneteenth and before they break for the summer. Whatcom County Library Systems will help partner in promoting the video at all their branches.

For more information and to see the full video click HERE.

Happening November 18th, 2021 from 5:30 pm- 7 pm.  

A great way to learn together is to read!  CF has chosen the book So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo.  We are putting the group together in September 2020 and plan to start in October.  if you'd like to join, please email connectferndale@gmail.com to sign up!

CF wants to take the pulse of how Ferndale feels about things like safety, policing, governance, and more.  We also want to learn where people stand on social justice issues and their comfort level.  So we created the Community Survey to help us learn!  The survey results will be available in report form in late fall, and will be shared broadly.  Please take the survey and share it with your neighbors!

The Community Story Project will give us a glimpse into life in Ferndale.  This long term project will be a repository for memories, experiences, and anecdotes about life here, but also a way for us to learn from each other and connect.  To begin, CF is focusing on stories of people's experience with racism in Ferndale.  Do you have a story to share?  It could be a personal experience, an observation, a realization- anything related to your experience of race and racism in Ferndale- both positive and negative.  We value story submissions, and will treat each story with respect and care.  The survey outlines all the ways we intend to use or share stories, and lets writers opt into or out of whatever they feel comfortable with.

Our Facebook page is way for us to stay in touch with the community and share about what we do, but we are also using it as a place to highlight and explore deeper concepts in social justice.  Weekly, we post about a specific topic and ask for conversation.  We hope that neighbors can learn from each other, see new perspectives, and also feel challenged. We want to dig in together!  Check out the page, and if you are interested in contributing,  please email us at connectferndale@gmail.com