Thursday P. M. ~ 1:30 - 3:00

Location: Durham Community Church

Coordinator: Carol Selsberg at bcsels@gmail.com or (207) 439-7957

Vilmarie Sanchez is a Durham resident, instructor in the Department of Education at UNH, now in her final year of coursework as a PhD student, and most proud mother of her 7 year old son, Aidan. Vilmarie co-teaches an Education course with Dr. Bruce Mallory, called Be the Change: Active Citizenship in a Multicultural World. The course is designed for students as learners to actively engage with content about democracy, civic engagement, and deliberative dialogue. Students learn and practice the skill of facilitated dialogue to discuss and act on real social issues in their community. A fundamental message for students in the course is to never stop learning and use their education to leave the community and world better than how they found it. Students realize how their passions and work inspire future generations and that this is an important message they carry forward in taking the next steps to define how they want to live their lives as individuals and as members of communities.

Amy Cunningham is Administrative Director of the UNH Discovery Program, the undergraduate core curriculum program. This semester she is co-leading the Discovery Fellows course where students are given the opportunity to learn, develop, then practice skills in small group facilitation, deliberative dialogue, and expand their civic engagement. Working with NH Listens, the Carsey Institute civic engagement initiative, she has served as a facilitator of community conversations in New Hampshire on both local and state-wide issues. Amy recently received her Master of Arts in Development Policy and Practice from UNH with a focus on connecting student civic engagement to academics. A resident of Durham, she has raised her children here, is an active volunteer in the community serving on town committees, and often on Saturdays can be found perusing the treasures at the Swap Shop.

Discovery Student Fellows are an engaging, active group of students who participate in a theory-to-practice seminar that explores democratic theory from a deliberative perspective, dialogue and small group facilitation, civic engagement, and social justice. As the academic year progresses, the students are given the opportunity to take on increased responsibility as planners and facilitators of campus conversations, and to experience real problem solving and public engagement in NH communities.

For this wonderful occasion in working with ARA, Vilmarie looks forward to collaborating with UNH Discovery Student Fellows to facilitate the examination of social matters the ARA community wishes to discuss and undertake. Be The Change We Want To See Series will be an exciting opportunity for two exceptional communities to meet, to jointly think out loud, to reflect on the complexities of the world, and to discover new possibilities for change.

A not-just-for-kids “active citizenship” series based on a unique and very popular UNH course study on personal and group activism essential for today’s issues and world.

February 21 – An Overview. Presenter: Vilmarie Sanchez, Ph.D. candidate in Education, UNH. Facilitator for UNH Social Justice Educators working with social justice issues in the workplace and in the classroom.

February 28 – Group Dialogue and Action. Presenter: Vilmarie Sanchez.

March 7 – Deliberative Democracy. Inter-group Dialogue. Conflict Resolution. Public Reasoning. Presenter: Vilmarie Sanchez and student panelists.

March 14 – What Difference Can We Make Together? Presenter: Vilmarie Sanchez and student panelists.