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Community Impact Our society often focuses on doomsday scenarios, but in order to imagine <br />something new, we have to hold and maintain hope. There is significant <br />impact in providing space to talk about the climate crisis in the context of a <br />larger society that functions as if there is not a problem. It not only allows <br />for a way to alleviate anxiety by not keeping thoughts and feelings silent, <br />but it also encourages ideas, solutions and hope within the community. <br />Through this project, youth will be encouraged to dialogue about hope in <br />relation to the climate crisis and to write about their feelings while also <br />holding hope. At a poetry reading a week or two after the youth workshop, <br />the youth will read their poetry to an audience. Community members who <br />attend the final reading will also be encouraged to ask questions of the <br />students and to talk about hope and the climate crisis. This will be an <br />opportunity for youth to use their voices through poetry and in community <br />to express their concerns, hopes, and ideas. <br />Fifteen to twenty youth poets will be involved in the project. They will be <br />directly involved in both parts of the projects, the 3-hour workshop of <br />conversations and writing, as well as the reading of their work and <br />discussion in front of an audience on a different day. Each youth <br />participant will be given $40 for their full participation in the project. <br />Community members who attend the reading will listen to the poems, <br />support the poets, and may have questions or feedback for them. I imagine <br />this attendance will be one to two family members for each poet <br />(approximately 15- 40 people), a few friends who weren’t involved or other <br />high school students who want to come to the final show (approximately 5- <br />10), a couple of teachers (2-5) and community members who have seen <br />the event advertised in town mailings or on handbill posters (maybe 5-10 <br />people). Audience members will total 27 to 65 people. Zines will be <br />available for all participants, for some audience members, and there will be <br />1-2 available for reading at the new library so that people who were unable <br />to attend are able to read the poems later. <br />That reading will be widely advertised on social media and with handbills <br />and community announcements. This will be an opportunity for the youth to <br />express themselves to the larger community and to have their voices <br />heard, not only about their concerns about the climate crisis, but also about <br />hope. The concerns of the larger community will also be echoed in the <br />words of all of the poets and hope will be built using the poems. Building <br />hope within the climate crisis is important for all of the community and <br />anyone who attends, so that mental-emotional responses are regulated <br />and the belief that we can speak up, take action, and move forward in a <br />positive direction for the future is uplifted. <br />Docusign Envelope ID: 9AFB14FC-4173-463B-85A6-C5C5356764BD