Seasons pass, changing from spring to summer, from summer to fall, and from fall to winter. As with all things, time marches on, and the yearly cycles repeat. Summertime is rapidly passing, bringing fall hot on its heels - and with that, the start of a new school year, and the need to gear up with school supplies. Dr Erich Bloodaxe, RN wrote the inaugural diary for the Okiciyap School Supplies Drive, and betson08 kicked it into high gear with her follow-up. Now, let's build on that with some basic reading and 'rithmetic...
Any idiot knows that 1 and 1 is 2, right? Except, of course, when it's not.
Synergy is a term applied in situations where "the whole is more than the sum of its parts" - in essence, the value of the whole is more than simply the value of each separate component part. In essence, an oversimplification is sometimes given as "when one and one equals three."
That's the strength of community; that's why people, together, can accomplish more. That's why "divide and conquer" is a strategy for tackling large problems...because where one person may be silenced or ignored more easily than two, three people or more can be an increasing challenge or potent voice.
We are stronger together.
Remember this?
Particularly this last bit:
It goes on one at a time,
it starts when you care
to act, it starts when you do
it again and they said no,
it starts when you say We
and know you who you mean, and each
day you mean one more.1
We. Us. The Daily Kos community. We have an opportunity to make a difference, and to help reinforce a lasting foundation for a small community to build upon. We've come together on more than one occasion, building our collective skills and helping others build their communities, help their families and let others know the importance of empathy, of sharing, of caring and of voice.
On top of that, riding the wave of reality-based community awareness, has been an unending thirst for knowledge - sharing, learning, self-educating, fact-checking and validating of people, places, events, news and information that has contributed to our various topics, causes and fights.
Knowledge sharing. In a very real sense, education.
Education is what happens when we share knowledge & experiences with one another. Whether through spoken tradition, social gatherings, spiritual meetings, daily encounters or more formalized settings, we are always educating ourselves and others.
Infants and children are effectively hard-wired to learn; they can learn, adapt, grow and incorporate knowledge of the world around them at faster rates and with more bandwidth than we can as adults. Our younger generations learn from the world around them as well as from the older generations who preceded them - their strengths, weaknesses, successes and failures.
We are informed by our own experiences, as well as the experiences told to us by others. We can record this information - be it in a book or video, or on a rock or wall, or simply within our memories or etched upon our hearts - and draw upon it to share with others.
The more we learn, the more we "know" - regardless of how we learn it. And the more we know, the more information we have at our disposal to call upon for problem solving, community building, living, loving or fighting to protect our friends, families and community. As we learn how to gauge the quality of the information we receive, and take advantage of opportunities to learn new, different and changing perspectives, our minds grow exponentially: socially, morally, emotionally and more.
In many modern societies, there are formalized methods & procedures in place to help create a standardized, common core of knowledge to transfer to younger generations in order to help prepare them with the information, skills and base experiences that they'll need to have for the start of their adult lives. Such organized methodologies often include aspects of history, science, math and literature, in addition to building skills in writing and communication. At the very least, an understanding of reading, writing and arithmetic is provided, along with a smattering of some aspect of history.
Education is important to building, maintaining and reinforcing a free society; it helps ensure that people are capable of thinking for themselves, as well as provides a patch of common ground for the exchange of ideas.
Knowledge is power, and education not only conveys knowledge - it provides an impetus for applying that knowledge: understanding what one learns, seeing it in and out of context, exposure to new & different ideas, the capacity to develop and utilize critical thinking skills.
All that, and more.
It's far more difficult to control a population if that population is well educated, consisting of free critical thinkers.
And well educated communities and societies tend to survive and thrive, sometimes in spite of their rulers' interest and intent.
In the U.S. today, we're seeing an assault on public education across the board, impacting and weakening the foundations upon which the next generations will need to build upon. It's something that we should all be concerned about.
But much of that battle is one for the voting booth, at the local, state and federal levels. We can wax eloquently on the policies and approach, but it will take significant numbers of voters and determination to put people in place who will strive to repair the damages being inflicted upon our education system across the nation.
We do have an opportunity to directly have a significant, positive impact on at least one community. We've helped them before, and are building upon that success - won't you join us below the fold, and see what you can do to help?
Thanks to your generous support, Okiciyap is a really successful project. There have been so many donations that earlier this year they got a small grant from the tribe to build a storage room onto the pantry. The pantry now receives regular shipments of food from Feeding South Dakota, and some food and but mostly other items such as shampoo, soap, and toothpaste, from National Relief Charities. On the third Friday and Saturday of each month they have "pantry day," when people can come and pick up the food they need. People in need of emergency food supplies can also call the pantry and the volunteers will open it for them.
Who are we helping?
The school supply drive will aid the student population from Isabel and neighboring schools, consisting of
50 middle and high school students and 90 K-6 students
Supplies needed:
From the Okiciyap website, they need:
5 and 3 subject notebooks
Backpacks or Messenger bag
Markers
Crayons
Scissors
Pens & Pencils
Folders
Binders/Trapper Keepers
Calculators/Scientific & Regular
Glue Sticks and Regular Glue
Pencil Boxes or bags
Erasers
Pencil sharpeners
colored pencils
Rulers
Compass & Protractors
Boys and girls socks & undies (all sizes)
Pledged so far:
For some Kossacks, this has been an opportunity to clean out drawers of collected school & office supplies, resulting in a giant box of stuff containing:
- notebooks and notepads
- pens, pencils, and markers
- colored pencils and those little water paint sets
- folders and notebooks
- rulers, erasers and scissors
- a protractor
And from another, lots of colored pencils, markers, crayons and paint, along with some notebooks.
Some have picked up supplies from a variety of sources (see section below for ideas) and that's resulted in:
- 12 packs of 24 Crayons
- 48 scientific calculators
- 1000 assorted colorful advertising and school #2 pencils with erasers
- 48 5-subject wired notebooks - 150 pages, college rule, assorted colors
- 96 solar&battery-powered regular calculators in assorted colors
- 2 of: Dixon Ticonderoga My First Tri-Write Triangular #2 Pencils, Primary Size, Wood-Cased, Black Writing, 36-Count 72 primary school pencils
- 2 of: Dixon Ticonderoga Woodcase Pencils, HB #2, Yellow Barrel, 96 per Pack 192 standard pencils kids of all ages always need pencils, and this are just plain yellow pencils so if you see bright colorful pencils on sale, grab some!
- 2 of: Bazic 3-Ring Pencil Pouch with Mesh Window, 24 Assorted colors (Case of 24) 48 pencil pouches there's 4 different colors packed in each case.
- 6 of: TOPS 3-Subject Spiral Notebooks, College Rule, 10.5 x 8 Inches, 120 Sheets/Book, Covers May Vary, 6-Pack 36 3-subject notebooks
- a pledge for some socks & undies (tho more, for all ages & sizes of boys & girls, are always appreciated!)
- 18 pink erasers
- 24 bright colored 12" rulers
- 25 pocket folders with brads
- 6 packs of 24 ct. Crayons
There's even been matching challenge: Bugsby has offered
a matching challenge for the next 2 people who send a book of Forever Stamps. We're 50% of the way there. Just one more, and the match kicks in to provide 2 more, ensuring a total of four books of Forever Stamps.
Some folks have suggested that the folks at Okiciyap might be better able to fill gaps with money instead of relying solely on donations, so there have been some monetary contributions of over $200 so far. If you feel that you could best help out this way, just click here:
Donate
Sources for school supplies
Need an idea for possible sources? Here's a list, starting with online sources:
Amazon
Overstock.com
eBags
Discount School Supply
Costco
BagsinBulk (backpacks)
Made-in-America by Union Workers source for school supplies
ebay Why ebay? Asam has donated a large quantity of calculators and other items because they are cheap and easy to get on ebay. Thanks for both the donation and the suggestion!
And if you prefer to shop in person, remember -
your local big box stores are rolling out their back-to-school bargains now:
J.C. Penney
Target
Walmart
Kohls
Staples
Shipping
The Okiciyap address is:
Okiciyap
PO Box 172
Isabel SD 57633
If you are using a shipping service that requires a street address, use this one:
Okiciyap, c/o Cindy Taylor
506 N. Madison Ave
Isabel, S.D. 57633
(This is Cindy's house. I don't know why, but sometimes this address comes up as "not found" for some shippers. She does receive packages here, so keep trying. The packages will definitely get lost if they are delivered to the pantry because there are no full time staff there).
If you have any questions, you can call or email the pantry director, Emily Penick Taylor:
505-328-4357
emilytaylor.penick@yahoo.com
Want to just get out your credit card and donate something without shopping?
Click here: Donate
Isabel's Annual Wacipi (Pow wow)
Okiciyap is organizing Isabel's pow wow this year in honor of Georgia Little Shield, founder of Okiciyap as well as the Isabel pow wow, and founding director of Pretty Bird Woman House. Navajo and Betson08 are going and will report back to this awesome community. They will present the Daily Kos Quilt Guild's quilt along with a plaque honoring Georgia Little Shield while there. (You can read more about it here.)
P.S. We need people to do diaries for this drive. If you have time, we'd really appreciate a diary as a contribution. I know many are tapped out right now, so a diary is a great way to help in lieu of buying something. Thank you.
________________
Footnotes
1 The quote is from
The Low Road by Marge Piercy; I came across the video of Staceyann Chin performing her reading of it in the
comments of another Okiciyap diary,
Okiciyap Quilt Auction: Strength in Numbers, Synergy and Symbols, that I'd posted during the Okiciyap Quilt Auction. The comment was by
ZenTrainer.
9:44 PM PT: More new stuff!
12 1" blue vinyl ring binders
12 1" red vinyl ring binders
10 boxes of 16 crayons
60 school glue sticks, Elmer's disappearing purple
36 compasses
36 protractors
24 kids scissors, 5" blunt, assorted colors