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We’re halfway through the cohort year

April 10, 2023

We're already halfway through the DEAL 7 Racial Equity Fellowship! We walked into the Annex of the Arab American National Museum on the second Thursday of September 2022, most of us as strangers, with an underlying passion for racial equity and liberation.

Though the DEAL Design Team have facilitated this program together for the past few years, this year we felt grounded and cohesion in the development of the curriculum and process as the DEAL 7 Racial Equity Fellows came into the cohort with their own clear intentions.

The goal of the first half of the fellowship is to really root the work in the understanding that the ‘Personal is Political’. We've explored two of the three themes in our curriculum arc and given fellows tools to disrupt structural racism.

So let's take a look back at DEAL 7's journey together so far!

Where are we in the curriculum?

So far, we've explored the first two themes in our curriculum arc.

What's in the DEAL 7 tool kit so far?

Our job is to equip fellows with tools to disrupt structural racism and create equitable alternatives.

Personal Ancestor

Personal Artifact

Touchstone for Grounding

Land Acknowledgement

World Cafe Model (used for establishing Community Agreements)

Ethnoautobiography

Personal Narrative Timeline & Co-created Interactive KnightLab Timeline

Identity Deep Dive

Identity Wheel

Caucusing: As Noun & Verb

Resilience Practices

Resilience Playlist

Pillars of White Supremacy Culture

Narrative as a Tool

Knowledge Power Chart & Flipping the Chart

Delights from the Team

"The fellows! They are cool ass human beings with fascinating stories and interesting personalities; funny, brilliant, and humbled. The cohort’s artistic talent." — Asandi

"Finally seeing all the restructuring pay-off. We’ve transitioned from Evite to using the DEAL email and Submittable for sending and receiving information. The application and orientation processes have been streamlined and we’ve created more structure with the selection process and attendance policy." — Derrielle

"Probably the biggest delight is seeing how open folx are in sharing their culture and ancestral gifts with us. It’s been a pleasure witnessing their sense of power, autonomy, and creativity when it’s accompanied by an acute sense of self shaped by cultural and political history. I’m excited to see how they apply this approach to racial justice work within the City." — Shane

Design Team Reflections on the Fellows

"This cohort is so artistic, creative, and intuitive. Their cohort agreement to 'be harsh on systems and gentle with people' has been such a gem. From the moment they started picking buddies and co-creating their agreements together, they have demonstrated intentionality, care, and wisdom in how they show up." — Namira

"While the cohort lacks the full diversity we hoped for, I am grateful for the different backgrounds, thoughts, and experiences that are present in DEAL 7. I have witnessed folks being respectfully and lovingly challenged and called in, magical moments of deep connection across religion, race, gender, culture, and geography, and instances of clarity and awakening. In addition, Buddies have become friends. We heard about different personal and familial intersections along journeys and learned a lot about one another and our ancestors. I feel like fellows have shown up as themselves and with vulnerability since day one which I did not imagine. Overall, the cohort has remained engaged with some fellows being more vocal than others. I’ve also been pleasantly surprised by the optional session attendance numbers." — Asandi

Design Team Reflections on the Hybrid Model

"I really enjoyed the process of shifting to the hybrid model with the longer program. I felt that it gave the fellows and us a break from Zoom fatigue with all those remote meetings these last two years. Also, I think having both in-person and virtual sessions gave the fellows a better chance at balancing work/personal/fellowship time, as they might have missed the session if it wasn’t virtual. With each year since DEAL 4, I have noticed that with the changes we make to the program curriculum and application, the attendance and fellows get better." — Derrielle

"I am glad we decided to go hybrid for this cohort. After being virtual for nearly two years, this has been a welcomed transition and ease into some programmatic normalcy. It’s also been interesting to deliver the new curriculum in this format and think critically about sessions that may be better suited for in person. I am curious how the fellows feel about the hybrid format based on if they are back in the office full-time, have Zoom fatigue, length of the full-day sessions, or are uncomfortable meeting in person. I am happy I finally get to experience the fellowship live and in color. Along with witnessing the program rituals of the opening circle, ancestor altar, and ancestor chair. Plus, it was cool to physically be together as a team and with the cohort. For me, it was like a new first day of work and an experience I had been longing for." — Asandi

Design Team Reflections on the Challenges We See

"There's a balance that I believe all of us — Staff, Design Team, and Fellows — are doing our best to ease into as we re-emerge in a world that is very different from how most of us have grown accustomed to living. As the Fellowship Manager, it is my role and responsibility to walk a line of fairness and humanity as all of us navigate the challenges of health, our personal energy and capacity, and showing up fully in fellowship space. This means developing policies for the fellowship that take 'real life' into consideration while simultaneously challenging us all to commit and show up as ourselves. This cohort year, like the last two cohorts, has been different and challenging as we navigate a world with COVID. I have to be ready to pivot at a moment's notice, adapt throughout the year, and maintain the integrity of the experience. Previous cohorts have commented on how hard it is to feel connected via Zoom, so I am grateful that we are able to do some in-person sessions with the intention to increase that type of experience next cohort year, but I think that we will always have the challenge of finding a balance." — Rhi

What Surprised Us

"Better attendance. Self-organizing!" — Derrielle

"My greatest surprise and deepest wish coming true is the level of self-organizing that's happening within DEAL 7. Every year we bring together brilliant people doing all kinds of work with the hope that they will see the intersections in each other's work, develop a plan for collective action, and take over the world a.k.a. dismantle structural racism in Detroit. That's my mad scientist plan, but I know that there needs to be trust and connection developed before there can be a commitment to new work, so I'm deeply pleased and surprised by how this cohort took to building those relationships as early on as the in-person orientation." — Rhi

"The artistic gifts, especially musical and design!" — Namira

Looking Forward!

DEAL 7 has given us so much to look forward to with their gifted storytelling and varying schools of thought. From a curriculum standpoint, we will be using the second half of the cohort year to further explore our curriculum arc.

Our program focuses on racial equity from a personal to structural lens. Through our Racial Equity Fellowship, we develop a shared analysis of structural racism and white supremacy and build a tool kit for creating equitable alternatives.

Here's what we're focusing on the rest of the cohort year:

Co-Liberation
Using Your Gifts to Impact Change
The Social Change Ecosystem and Your Role
Visioning an Equitable Detroit
Organizational Development and Structural Change

"I am looking forward to getting to know the fellows better and spending more time with them. I want to hear about their caucus experiences and see what they co-create. Also, sharing the feedback that we’ve gathered from them and how we’ve incorporated it into the sessions. I anticipate the last session being emotional for us and them as they reflect on their experience over the past year, relationships they’ve built, and what they’ve learned." — Asandi

"We have such richness and depth in storytelling in the first half of the cohort year, especially with bringing in ancestors, lineage, communities, and place. I am really looking forward to diving into caucus work and visioning for each cohort participant." — Namira

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