Since my last blog post the workload at Kheprw for me has increased. Since we last talked I’ve been assigned to a couple of projects, one of those tasks is reaching out to partnered organizations to assist with business and guest speaking for the Alkemy space, which is an entrepreneur incubator space that builds community wealth in under-resourced communities of color by supporting entrepreneurs. One of the many reasons for this space to exist is, because of the racial wealth gap that exists between people of color and caucasians, for example in 2015 in Indianapolis: 10% of white people lived in poverty, compared to 26.3% of people of color; Unemployment was 5.3% for white people and 10% for people of color; the median hourly wage for white people was $22/hour and $16/hour for people of color. A way in which Alkhemy is planning to address this is by investing in under-resourced entrepreneurs. They are raising $1 million to launch the entrepreneurship hub at 38th and Illinois which will support 40 entrepreneurs over two years, providing 12 months of training, mentorship, technical assistance and financial resources. Through opening this space and existing, it’s going to allow individuals to stop working for those larger conglomerate companies and afford them the opportunity to accumulate wealth both fiscally and through community.
Another task they have tasked me with is coming up with a plan to reach out to cooperative communities which is “an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly owned and democratically-controlled enterprise”. Cooperatives are democratically owned by their members, with each member having one vote in electing the board of directors. I’m tasked with reaching out across the greater Indianapolis area and as well as across the country, and having them teach us how there’s specifically works and coming up with a blueprint along with other members of Kheprw to see how we could possibly develop our own.
To say that my workload has increased I feel would be the understatement of the century, but I’m enjoying being able to put on a new hat every day, as someone who aspires to one day own his own business and open a school to address the pressing concerns plaguing the educational system it’s a great learning experience to have all these different task, because I’m not thinking the same in each different role and they’re challenging me to think critically as well as creatively with each different project assignment.
As my experience with Kheprw is winding down and coming to a close I‘ve been able to do a lot of reflecting. In particular how coming down to the porch has had such a positive effect on me. This setting or “coming on down to the porch ” as we like to call it in our communication cohort as I mentioned in my last blog post is my favorite part of my internship, because you learn so many new things about people everyday. You also learn how individuals think as well, for instance the other day we were talking about Fear of Black Consciousness which is a book we’ve recently been reading and in the book we talked about chapter 11 titled the Blues and one of my colleagues said the chapter made him think less about how black music is consumed and more about how it’s produced. How do we perceive the world in relation to ourselves? They went on to say that “The consumption has twisted how the art is produced. People consume it for the aesthetic and not the meaning.” I just found that interesting to see how the chapter made him think and also really reevaluate how we as balck people perceive ourselves.
– Isaiah Roach, Kheprw