Author: 14-oh

Peace of Mind: Shelby Douglas ’25 at the Antioch College Wellness Center

Speaking Their Language: Christopher Thompson ‘24 at Buen Dia Family School in San Francisco, California

Buen Dia Family School is a Spanish-English bilingual preschool with an arts-based curriculum in the Mission District of San Francisco, California. This is where I’m doing my second co-op. And what a place it is! There are few things as simultaneously tumultuous and gratifying as working with young children. Every day, it feels like I am discovering a new way to make a tremendous mess. Just yesterday, I caught a kid attempting to pour sand into my back pocket. And yet, I feel so pleased with the growth I’ve seen in just a small amount of time.

A birthday present made for me by a student

I’ve always thought it was cliche when a teacher says their students teach them just as much as they do the reverse, but in just a few weeks I’ve come to realize that it really is the truth. As an undergrad with a focus on foreign languages, I feel especially enlightened by the process of language acquisition that I’ve observed in my time at Buen Dia. More than half of the children are from multilingual households, most of which are Spanish-speaking (though some speak Japanese, Farsi, Italian, etc.). It’s both amusing and illuminating observing three- to five-year-olds juggle multiple languages as they learn to express themselves and their ideas. For example, one younger child calls the moon “la moona,” and to request help, he often says “I want ayuda.” It honestly reminds me of the English-Arabic combination my older cousins speak to each other. Their father is Syrian and their mother is American, and they grew up in Saudi Arabia and Lebanon, frequently visiting family in both Safita and Indiana. They’re all grown men now in their thirties, but when they speak to each other they still have a very unique sort of personal pidgin that they share.  

Japanese learning materials I made for group time

Even monolingual children have their own unique language. Not just in terms of verbal communication, but with body language and recurrent behaviors, too. It’s so important to recognize and understand the ways in which each individual child expresses their feelings and needs because every single one is different. So far, this co-op has really driven that lesson home, and I’ve been building meaningful relationships with each of the 29 kids at Buen Dia. Some slower than others, but none less important. It makes me wish I had more than just eleven weeks to spend with them, but even if I stayed, many of them are heading off to kindergarten next fall. I guess that’s part of being a teacher — every year there’s a new class and it’s up to you to make your time together meaningful. Well, so far so good. 

Community Coffee : Ryn McCall ’21 at Mount Totumas, Panama

What lingers as the most dominant element of my time at Mount Totumas is air.

      Centered between the great oceans of the east and the west and playing host to the fickle winds that shift overhead, the skies peel back from themselves again and again, ever revealing new patterns, new indecipherable secrets, new passing fascinations that dance day and night, lit by the sun and the moon alike. The clouds billow into tufted  tapestries of blinding white before thinning to a gauzy whisper or falling in the finest mists while the sun, ever constant, beams on and on as it marches its reliable path up and over. In this shifting air, everything dances. The flowers stand solemnly bobbing, the trees in their shimmering glitter twist tantrically, the tall grasses sway as though in an unheard rhythm and the butterflies, often in duo, perform a ballet so organic no choreographer could hope to repeat it. 

      The immense quiet from the external, the significant altitude of 6,500ft, and the ever changing light and expressions of life give Mount Totumas an inherent dream-like quality.  Its secluded footprint borders Amistad National Forest and is nearly an hour and a half from town, giving a sense that you could likely be the last person on earth and not know it for some time. As with most farm job sites, the work is new every day, and adds to the excitement of the place. Some days may be filled to the brim with coffee processing tasks, from washing and drying to sorting and roasting while other days might be planting and weeding or even making fresh bread for the guests. The downtime here primarily revolves around the captivating nature that surrounds me. With 400 acres of explorable cloud forest, I often find myself pulled deeper and deeper down a sendero, hoping to see a white faced capuchin or a resplendent quetzal. I encounter many creatures in my days, both big and small, though the recurring ones have a special foothold in my heart. Two farm dogs, Jacky and Canela (which translates to “cinnamon” in Spanish) have developed a certain affinity for me, no doubt because of the affection and snacks I shower them with that is absent in their other relationships with the humans here on the mountain. They have taken to following me around as I move about the farm, resting in the shade while I complete a task and standing once more when I move onto the next. 

        While my Spanish has vastly improved during my time here, sometimes having a friendly face that requires no conversation offers some comfort of its own. I have enjoyed the opportunity to practice my Spanish more, as there are very few people here that speak English, and only one person who can speak broken spanglish in the homestead where I live with the other trabajadores. One of the most striking improvements in my linguistics has been the shift from needing to mentally pre-translate each word or sentence before speaking and being able to respond more rapidly with the vocabulary readily present in my conscious mind. Beyond this, conversations with alumni, host, and owner Jeffrey Deitrich are some of my favorite moments here on the mountain. Ranging from topics such as endemic species to cultural shifts to the death of the cottage industry in America, our meandering and engaging chats open opportunities for wonder and a deeper dissection of concepts and topics not often navigated in polite small talk. 

       Beyond the farm work, tasks that interact with the constantly rotating guests offer an ephemeral quality to the cultural atmosphere. German, Russian, French, Locals and beyond exchange themselves in and out on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis. From scientists collecting data to avid bird enthusiasts to those simply seeking an escape from the bustling metropolises of their respective homes, even the reasons that bring guests to Totumas vary greatly. 

       My time spent here will certainly be remembered fondly and with vivid delight. At the intersection of personal interest and a need for further growth, Mount Totumas has been a splendid melding of that which interests me and that which I still wish to learn and explore. 

Being Social with Media: Paynter ’24 at Antioch College

Multimedia arts have been a passion of my for years. It first started when I was younger, drawing my own characters and designs, and it’s slowly evolved into a collection of different mediums such as music and video editing. I have gotten better and better from that point on, and had a lot of fun doing so. When I first started my co-op position with the Communications department at Antioch College, I was worried these skills wouldn’t come in handy. Social media isn’t just about posting images and videos everyday, it’s about keeping follower engagement and getting something interesting out there, isn’t it? That’s what I initially thought.

Starting my position, I met Mary Evans, the current Events & Social Media Manager. If you know me personally, you’d know I suffer from a lot of social anxiety, so it felt like a challenge to meet someone in person—especially after so long durning the pandemic in which much of our work became virtual and, admittedly, I am a bit homebound. But the day I did meet her, it was really nice! We talked and had a few good chuckles. Mary is a social justice activist, and uses her platform to provide space for underrepresented communities, most notably incarcerated individuals. As a trans woman who came out early last year, and a social justice advocate myself, I have a lot of respect for her and her work. Overall I think this is an aspect about Antioch in general: how accepting the community we have truly is. It’s made me feel a lot more comfortable to be myself. While it’s far from conquering social anxiety, opening up to at least one person in close proximity to me instead of just online folks is a pretty good start. I’m proud of my progress.

When it comes to this work, I’ve been going back and forth between old and new. What I mean by this is that the work I’ve been doing has been letting my use my skills in video and photo editing, while still giving me new things to keep me on my toes, which I enjoy. One new tool I’ve been learning to use is Canva, an Australian graphic design platform, used to create social media graphics and other visual content. Mary introduced me to this tool a while back, and it’s been really nice to use for what I’m doing, considering my initial idea was to do everything in my animation program of choice. Using Canva has definitely helped me structure things better in my own personal projects too, which has been a huge plus.

One video project I worked on this co-op that I think is the most notable is titled Reunion 2021 Alumni Association Awards: J.D. Dawson Award Recipient Peter Townsend. It is the first video project I’ve worked on that features subtitles, and it was a really interesting a new experience. The link to the video can be found HERE.

Overall this co-op position has slowly been helping me both get out of my shell, and learn to just be and feel comfortable with myself. It’s definitely gonna be a journey that probably stretches out past co-op. But for sure, this term has given me a huge boost in motivation and inspiration. I would humbly like to thank Mary Evans, as well as Luisa Bieri for giving me this opportunity, and helping me find a co-op option that both makes me feel comfortable, and let’s me step out of my bubble. To me at least, it seems like an impossible task, but she managed to pull through and find something I could do.

Photo credit: Antioch College Community Day winter 2022 from Antioch’s Twitter feed – https://twitter.com/AntiochCollege/status/1493669549522100226/photo/1

Perspective: Coleman ’23 at Sharp Productions in Los Angeles

Behind The Counter: Hainzer ’22 at the Olive Kettering Library in Yellow Springs, Ohio

Hope Through Housing: Harris ’24 at Home, Inc. in Yellow Springs, Ohio

Memory Book for The Senior Youth: Fortino ’17 with Uplift Williams Preparatory, Dallas TX

Final cover…well almost.

Though we still have a bit to do before the memory book is final, here is a sliver of what I have learned to do with these past few weeks..

Captured Moments in Time: Johnson ’24 at Shutterbug Photography in Monroe, Louisiana

When I thought of working for my aunt with her photography business, I thought it was a perfect idea. I liked taking pictures of nature and I believed it would be a perfect first co-op. My aunt owns Shutterbug Photography in Monroe, Louisiana. Her main clients are typically families with young children to infants.

When I take pictures, I prefer nature not people. It was quite an adjustment to make. Being here makes me see photography in a different light. It was an amazing feeling to capture a two year old’s cake smash or a sixteen year old’s birthday. I see why my aunt dedicates herself to photography. She captures people and emotion in her pictures. I capture nature’s beauty in mine.

Learning: Fortino ’17 at Glasrai Farms in Lehinch, Ireland

I’m working on glasraí farms in Lehinch Ireland as a WWOOFer (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms). Aoife and Joe are the owners of a start up farm with the ideal that their practices will be better for the environment than standard organic practices. At the moment, they are growing potatoes, tomatoes, spinach, kale, zucchini, cucumber, beans, and a variety of leafy greens with the hopes that next season – with another polytunnel and shed being built – they will double their crops by this time next year. Their practices are holistic, and ideas about how to save the humans on this world are realistic. While raising their small child, Aoife and Joe are doing their best to contribute to the image of the world they want to see for their child and children like her.

After only being here a short while, I have eaten amazing food, and worked to the point of exhaustion. I have come to the conclusion that I, as a filmmaker, have no right to have opinions about farmers and the methods they practice. In class, especially during global seminar food, we have created ideas and opinions in our heads about food and what it would take to feed the world. I had made opinions and judgements about traditional farmers without even realizing it. Before I came here, I would condemn traditional farmers and wonder why they farmed the way they did without any care for the environment or the chemicals that the consumer would eat. I would wonder why anyone would farm traditionally, for it wouldn’t take much to all of a sudden switch to collectively farm organically.

What do I – a 20 year old film student – have anything productive to say about farming to a 75 year old dairy farmer who has been milking cows since they were sixteen? I visited Joe’s father’s conventional dairy farm and helped Joe milk some of the cows while his father was away. This is their life, he will stand in what looks a bit like a large cement trough and connect automatic milkers to over sixty cows twice a day. This will take him at least five hours, and that is a fairly small operation. The farm is only able to keep going being of its 100 plus cows kept for meat. The cows have much room to graze, and seem to be happy. I have heard of much worse operations, but after helping for just a bit, I have realized I have no grounds to judge. A way of life cannot be judged by someone who knows nothing about it. I don’t agree with drinking milk, in-fact I’m lactose intolerant, but milk is Joe’s father’s life. It is what makes him him. When people ask what he does, he will answer, I milk cows.

My opinions about how to farm sustainably should not be used to judge those who have built their lives upon conventional farming. The world has changed around them, and perhaps Joe’s father started with only 15 cows and that suited him fine. The world grew larger and he had to change his methods to meet the demands. Before my generation, he was farming just fine, the world was alright. But things change, and who am I to blame him for changing?

As a filmmaker, you may be wondering what I’m doing on any type of farm. Along with gathering footage for a film I plan to submit to 30(ish) Frames Per Second: A Yellow Springs Film Festival a film and video festival that I am organizing and hosting for my senior project, I am also learning to live the way that I want to when I leave Antioch. I am building polytunnels to grow things throughout the winter. I spend an entire morning spraying crops with a tea made from horsetail that keeps the nightshades from getting blight. I am helping roof a barn, and make a stone wall without cement. I am living in a house that gets all of its water from the rain, and heat its water with solar panels. If I want to be the generation that makes a difference in the world, I cannot wonder why people like Joe’s father does not become organic. I can not try to change the people who have established their lives mono-cropping corn in Ohio. I can only learn from their children who wish to farm differently because their lives are not wholly connected to conventional farming the way their parents are.

This experience has not only given me insight into how I want to live my life, but how I frame my thoughts. It is up to me to do what I think is right, and then when I miscalculate and mess up, it will be up to my children to learn from my mistakes. There are many things at play with farming, and it would unfair not consider the farmer in the equation when we think about feeding the world as we often do. The farmer is pushed to the corner of our minds and left to bend to the wants and wills of the consumer. I will do my best to grow my own food, and live sustainably. I will do my best to incorporate these thoughts and ideologies into my filmmaking. I will do my best to live the life I want to see in the world. But I know that I will not be farming for the consumer. I will not have to answer to the constantly growing demands, and wonder if what I’m doing is what I want to do. I will do my best not to judge those before me, but instead learn from them, and perhaps respectfully disagree, while still understanding what they do is their life. I want to open my mind, and I want to do what I can to fix the humans living on this world. That is what this co-op has taught me.

Visit glasraí’s facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/glasrai/?fref=ts