How we created AFIE, made friends, and rallied our community for better schools

This is more narrative than advice and if you want to do something like this, you’ll need to tailor all of this to your place, your talents, your issues. But in case anyone wants to look over our shoulder and see how it went, for what it’s worth, here it is.

1. We met. Just the two of us. Someone we respect had a sense that we would want to talk to each other and **Kaboom!** instant energy and harmony.

   Takeaway: don’t try to do this work without help and don’t try to work with someone with whom you have big creative differences. You need a coherent vision, even if you can’t articulate it. You’ll be able to sense it and it will guide you in all your efforts.

2. We drew support from others in our area who were on the same page. It was clear to all of us that the two of us could do the research, writing, organizing, and setting of priorities, but we needed their brains and spirits and love to give us courage.

   Takeaway: keep your core group small. This will prevent a lot of arguing and wasted energy. It will keep you light on your feet and coherent in your message.

   Takeaway: no advocacy group is an island. You need to know how you’re different from any other group—no point in competition or duplicating efforts—but also how you harmonize with the others who are working on your issues.

3. We began going to school board meetings. This might for you be township meetings or Parks and Rec meetings or whatever, but the point is that you have to start knowing what they’re planning and whether they support your issues or not.

   Takeaway: a lot of decisions that affect our lives and our kids’ lives happen at public meetings that nobody/hardly anybody attends. You can’t stop a catastrophe that you didn’t bother to see coming and you can’t make a difference if you don’t show up.

4. We learn more and more about the issues. We talk to people who are living the consequences of bad policy and we write about them, amplifying their voices. We find articles and publications that support our views through actual statistics and research. We write letters to our school board and give speeches during public comment to educate fellow residents why they ought to join with us.

5. We asked for support from established and high profile local and national professional orgs. They helped us unpack opaque policy and mandates so we could share that information with our community in terms everyone will understand.

   Takeaway: National orgs are very willing to review policy and write letters to your school board. Their support adds credibility to your advocacy, helps with coalition building, and gets the media’s attention.

6. We crafted a persuasive message: You can too, here’s how:
   1. Lead with shared values and a vision for outstanding education.

   2. Next explain the roadblock to the vision and name the villain (don’t name specific people but groups of people: extremists, billionaires)

   3. Then empower people to turn away from the roadblock with a call to action that will help your shared values being realized.

7. We created a website and a newsletter so others can know what we now know.

   Takeaway: people are busy and they aren’t all going to go to the meetings, but you can be their eyes and ears. Grow your readership. Tell them what you’re seeing and how they can get involved.

   Takeaway: many times, those in public office don’t know as much about the policies they’re voting on as they should. They’re busy, too. You can educate them and the voting public on why policy should go the way you say it should.

8. We keep up a relentless focus, remained patient, and non-reactive. Only once we reached a thorough understanding of the issues, we let those in power know we will never quit, never sit silent, never shrug and accept what they’re doing.

   Takeaway: a lot of people will tell you, oh what’s the point, they’re just going to do what they’re going to do because they have the power. Yes! Make them do it, in public, in defiance of public protest, over the loud, fact-based objections of those who know more than they do. Make clear that they treat their constituents with contempt, that they think they will always have the power, that they are irrational and on an ideological tear, that they don’t understand the issue or the likely consequences of the policy, or whatever pertains to your issues. Give voice to those they have not considered... Put it out in the open. Make them own it.

9. Communicate often, meet people where they are, and give people something achievable they can do. A sampling of how we reached people: Newsletters/email/blog/socials/Book club/ Banned books parade/Petition/Fairs/Festivals/Tabling at farmers market/Postcards & flyers/Facebook live/Town halls/Press conference/Op/Ed/Press engagements.

10. We make some public presentations: at our library for a local political group, at a local church, for local chapters of service organizations—basically anyone who wanted to hear what we were doing, we would go and talk to their meeting and tell them.

    Takeaway: put the word out wherever you can and make friends wherever you go.

11. We remind everyone all the time and everywhere that elections are not won merely on election day, but in the years, months, weeks, and days before. Kick up a fuss and invite others to kick with you.

    Takeaway: We are where we are because many of us trusted things would always be rational, fact-based, and mindful of everyone’s civil liberties. We felt safe looking away, believing that most people know fact from fear and believe in expertise. We need to reclaim the public discourse and respectfully, relentlessly show what’s best for our communities according to real experts in their fields.

12. We hold some fun events, open to everyone. We had an ice cream truck at a local park to celebrate the end of a school year. We held book group meetings, where we all read and discussed a book that someone wanted to remove from the library. We had a candle-making holiday party. We made valentines.

    Takeaway: Dr. Seuss: “These things are fun and fun is good.”

The principles or circumstances that guided and informed our work and which we credit for our success:

• We made no personal attacks, we attacked bad policy. We called out people’s actions, not their inherent worth as human beings. When we were attacked, we ignored it. We wanted to support the inherent worth of ALL students and we needed to model that by speaking respectfully of ALL our opponents.

• We kept the focus on our main concern: schools and kids, + teachers and librarians. It was never about us. We didn’t want to get rich (ha!) or famous. We just wanted to make our kids’ educations all that they could be.

• We always and every time led with The Vision. What are you FOR? Put that up front, always. As a wise person once said, “You can’t fight something with nothing.”* When you fear constant, demoralizing, looming disaster, you can motivate and unite people on behalf of something great.

• We had a clear sense of how we were different from other groups. We weren’t affiliated with any party, we did no electioneering, and we had no designs on going national. Nobody else in our area focused exclusively on school policy issues. We filled a gap.

• We drew our credibility from our local roots. As a former teacher and a current parent of students, we had an undeniable stake in the decisions our school board made. These issues mattered to us and our families. No one could question our standing or commitment.

• Our skills harmonized. One of us did all the graphic design. Another did most (not all) of the writing, with the indispensable help of the keen editing eye of the other. We trusted each other, balanced each other, calmed fears, sparked ideas—it was a partnership in every way, based on different skills and abiding respect.

• We always kept our eye on the positives: what we wanted for our kids, our schools, our teachers and librarians, what good things were happening, what people could do. And we had as much fun as we possibly could.

May this help a thousand groups in a thousand communities across our country to be a thousand points of light for ALL Americans.

 *that wise person was the dad of one of us and he didn’t say it just once. He said it all the darn time. And while he wasn’t wise about everything, he was 100% wise about that.