Grant Recipients

Grant Recipients: Teams and Descriptions

Arts in the Parks for Holland, Michigan

Pablo Peschiera (English), Richard Perez (Theatre), Stephen Maiullo (Classics), with Jason Shamblin, Jessica VanGinhoven, Kristen Hintz and Aaron Bodbyl-Mast (Ottawa County Parks and Recreation)

Grant: $33,500, June 2021

This project will forge a partnership with Hope College, Ottawa County Parks and the greater Holland area in order to create programming for people of all backgrounds and of all identities to gather and pursue the connections between nature and artistic expression, with an explicit aim to reach underserved communities. In this first phase of the project, the team will gather qualitative data that will help understand how to provide arts events in Ottawa County Parks for the greater Holland area and Ottawa County. Through a series of “community conversations,” led by key stakeholders drawn from local community partners and consultants, this project aims to build lasting relationships in our community that will invite everyone to representation in arts and humanities nature-based programming.

¡Canto! A Latinx Vocal Intensive

Eric Reyes (Music) with Johnny Rodriguez (Latin Americans United for Progress)

Grant: $26,002, February 2022; $10,000, October 2022

This partnership between the Department of Music at Hope College and Latin Americans United for Progress (LAUP) seeks to create intentional space for young Latinx vocalists to receive high-level vocal training, as well as develop a deeper understanding of the historical context of classical Latinx music. ¡Canto! A Latinx Vocal Intensive is a two-week-long, fully funded program for 12 Latinx high school students in the Holland area. Over the course of this vocal intensive, students will study and perform works composed solely by classical Latinx artists, both ancient and modern. This celebration of Latinx music and young artists will manifest itself in various settings throughout the program: students will receive private voice lessons, rehearse in small vocal ensembles, attend lectures and sessions discussing the history of Latinx music, engage in conversations with professional Latinx classical musicians, as well as receive mentorship from Latinx leaders in the community. This embracing of Latinx music seeks to promote significant and meaningful art that has often been overlooked in the story of Classical music. The program is capped at 12 students so as to focus on creating transformational experiences for students, placing a high emphasis on individual training and mentorship. A culminating celebration will take place at the conclusion of this program in the Jack Miller Center for the Arts where students will perform works they have studied over the course of the vocal intensive. Supplemental funding supports additional training and performances at the LAUP Gala and Vespers.

Celebration of Holland’s Historical Diversity

Susan Ipri Brown (Engineering) and Ricki Levine (Holland Museum)

Grant: $50,000, December 2020; $9,497, October 2022

A continuing partnership between ExploreHope Academic Outreach Office and the Holland Museum will explore the rich and diverse cultural history of the development of innovation in Holland. This project aims to create new museum exhibits to celebrate the diverse Hispanic community in the region, by bringing their voices, contributions and traditions into the narrative. The museum will be coordinating this exhibit development work with their Cultural Lens program, which includes partnership with the Holland-based Latin Americans United for Progress (LAUP). Hope student engagement and experiential learning within the context of this project will remain a pillar throughout. Using artifacts from the Holland Museum within a new course, “Documenting Holland’s Historical Diversity,” students will research in-depth a local topic significantly impacted by the diverse community of the area, and we will compile this material into a set of digital history exhibits. The students will collaborate with museum staff to understand the research steps, exhibit planning and exhibit delivery processes. Additionally, Hope students will be provided internships at the museum over the course of the project to provide continuity and implementation work for the new exhibits. Community programs, lesson plans and field trips for area classrooms will be sponsored for students to engage with the new exhibit portfolio. Supplemental funding supports gathering oral histories from the community.

Crossover: Conversations in Community

Daniel Woolsey (Spanish) and Tito Venegas and Emily Kubbe (Intersection Ministries RCA/CRC)

Grant: $10,000, September 2021; $8,759, October 2022

Building on the several effective ESL (English as a Second Language) programs in the Holland-Zeeland area, this program emphasizes one-on-one and small group conversational opportunities for learners at an intermediate level. Bringing together Spanish-speaking English learners from the community with English-speaking Spanish students from Hope College, this program creates a time and space for community members and Hope students alike to practice their second language. In addition, this program emphasizes the development of cultural competency, by creating a curriculum of conversational topics that goes beyond practical, day-to-day applications and explores more substantive cultural content. By creating a time and space for conversations of this kind to take place between English learners and Spanish learners, this project hopes to deepen participants' knowledge, appreciation and respect for the different cultures and experiences represented in our community. Supplemental funding supports a second year of programming.

English Language Support for West Michigan Refugees

Joshua Kraut (French) and Shelli Brinks (Bethany Christian Services)

Grant: $9,631, February 2022

Of the many challenges facing resettled refugees in the United States, one of the most pressing is to learn English. Most often, the difficulties are logistical: transportation, childcare and conflicting work schedules make it impossible to attend classes regularly. The stakes could hardly be higher, however, as proficiency in English correlates with everything from educational and economic opportunities to better healthcare outcomes. Limited English ability also contributes to a sense of isolation and difficulties integrating in the wider community.

In concert with Grand Rapids-based Bethany Christian Services, our project will pair Hope College students in beginning French with Bethany refugee clients for weekly, online English tutoring. Coordinated, online ESL tutoring support represents an important next-step in responding the challenging logistics of helping refugees integrate into their host society. Funding from the project will enable the purchase of Chromebooks for Bethany clients to use for tutoring sessions as well as myriad other needs, a significant asset for the newly arrived families. Bolstering Bethany Christian Service's ESL instructional capacity long term will mean that their clients will be able to more quickly find educational opportunities and skilled work.

But the benefits of this project are not reducible to purely economic considerations. Hope College students are making connections with neighbors whose paths they may never have crossed otherwise. They have an opportunity both to learn from and to offer support to the newly arrived strangers in their midst. Recently resettled individuals and families can begin developing meaningful relationships within their new host country, building community and easing the transition to life in the United States.

Food Disparities and Food Justice in Greater Holland

Berta Carrasco de Miguel (Spanish) and Scott Rumpsa (Community Action House)

Grant: $50,000, December 2020; $10,163, October 2022

Food is a definitive marker of culture and belonging. Food pantries distribute food to people in need. However, too often this food does not often reflect the cultures of the people being served. This project seeks to address this problem by finding not only what minoritized populations would like to see in a food bank but also why they want certain foods, how they use them and when they may need them. Community Action House (CAH) and our Hope College team will work together as CAH opens its new Food Club, an innovative approach to healthy food access that will convert the current food pantry into a non-profit, member-based grocery store that allows for high-dignity access to affordable, nutritious and culturally relevant food choices. Together we will create a strong Community Outreach and Engagement Team in which Hope College students engage with the target populations to adjust and improve Food Club offerings based on client needs and feedback to ensure cultural relevance and sensitivity. The team will also lead a communications effort to share the innovative message of the Food Club as a pathway to healthy food access with target populations and the broader community. Supplemental funding supports the initial planning for a community garden.

Holland Community Arts and Activism

Katherine Sullivan and Lisa WAlcott (Art and Art History) and Emily Christensen (CultureWorks)

Grant: $49,000, July 2022

This collaboration with CultureWorks addresses the wicked problem of a lack of diverse representation in the visual arts in our community, which is due in part to an underrepresentation of BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and people of color) leadership in visual arts organizations, weak and underfunded efforts to recruit and support BIPOC artists, and a lack of access to traditional arts programming among the BIPOC community because of financial, geographic or transportation limitations. Funding for this project will directly support greater BIPOC engagement in the visual arts by assisting with hiring a full-time program director of color at CultureWorks; supporting after-school classes for BIPOC youth; supporting diverse leadership and multicultural and multi-ethic curriculum development; creating a visiting artist program; and outfitting the CultureWorks studio with industry-standard equipment.

Holland Van Raalte Farm Civil War Muster Community Education Initiative

Fred Johnson (History) and Rick Veenhoven (Van Raalte Farm Civil War Muster)

Grant: $51,004, June 2021

The Community Education Initiative will support the annual Van Raalte Civil War Muster (third Sunday in September) to focus on themes of the Underground Railroad (2021) and the End of the Civil War and Reconstruction (2022), especially for the local 5th-grade students who attend on school field trips. With re-enactors sharing (for example) the political outlook of Abraham Lincoln, the fiery calls for socioeconomic justice by Frederick Douglass, or the demands for gender equality and suffrage rights by Susan B. Anthony and Elizbeth Cady Stanton, the Holland Van Raalte Farm Civil War Muster presents opportunities for its audience to engage with some of the most urgent issues of the nineteenth century. Since updated versions of those challenges divide contemporary Americans this is a compelling opportunity to increase people’s knowledge of their historical origins. This annual event will better our community to meet and reconcile the myriad factors that are at the center of the human struggle to harmoniously coexist in the world’s largest multi-ethnic, multiracial, multi-faith, multi-linguistic democratic republic.

Igniting Change

Llena Chavis (Social work) and Lindsay Cherry (I AM Academy)

Grant: $27,994, February 2022

Igniting Change will focus on the school-to-prison pipeline within our community. This grant will support two years of anti-racist efforts in schools and the police force, and will empower children of color in Holland through the implementation of intergroup dialogue training for students and community leaders. Intergroup dialogue brings together members of a community with diverse social identities in a cooperative, small-group learning environment. Intergroup dialogue aims to increase critical self and social awareness, intergroup communication, and understanding and collaborative actions. In this way, it breaks down biases of class, gender, race, ethnicity and more by creating a safe space of understanding, learning and growth. When we are able to acknowledge our biases, take time to address them, and plan action based on justice and equity, we can then begin to build a community that is inclusive. I AM Academy and Hope College will bring together students and adults from around the community to participate within the cohorts. A pre- and post-test will be administered to evaluate the efficacy of the program and to improve future implementation. The predicted impact is that not only will the participant’s self awareness, empathy and cultural competence improve, the work will expand beyond the participants in their broader lives.

Introductory Drum Lessons

Robert Shipley (Music), Justin Caserta (Boys and Girls Club of Holland), and Henry Cherry (I AM Academy)

Grant: $9,722, July 2022

Jazz music is historically the heartbeat of the African American community, yet the reach into that community has been marginalized due to lack of resources and opportunity. Jazz music tells the story of America. The music of jazz stems directly from slavery and is a Black cultural art form with a violent history of association with white propaganda through Blackface Minstrelsy. However, within the Black community, jazz was central to the cultural renaissance that occurred during the great migration between 1916 and 1970. Regardless, there remains a split of consciousness, and it is endemic upon the practitioners, leaders and educators to heal that split. With this grant, we will reconnect these folkloric traditions with Holland’s youth by bringing drumming equipment and instruction to the Boys and Girls Club of Holland, with recruitment of students supported by I AM Academy. This program also aims to identify some talented and passionate kids to mentor into the field.

The Sacredness of Human Life: The Church at the Intersections of Faith and Race in Ottawa County, Michigan

Ernest Cole (ENglish) and Michael Houser (First Assemblies of God Church)

Grant: $10,000, July 2021

This oral history project will consider the 2014 death in Holland of Jonathan Bracamontes as a case study to explore the humanistic concepts of the sacredness of human life, its violation, and possibilities of healing and reconciliation. The project will explore the need for the Holland community to redefine roles and relationships in the contexts of human dignity, empathy, inclusion, agency and advocacy through sound Christian ethics and morality. The research makes the claim that while national attention has largely been focused on the intersections of race and policing, the church has for the most part been silent. Through dialog and community-focused conversation, this project will draw from the Christian discourse of engagement and reconciliation, in tandem with the national discourse on race, to explore a biblical theology of Christian ethics that refocuses the conversation on the sacredness of human life and the role of the local church in promoting this truth through the creation of the beloved community and an understanding of the intersections of faith and race.

Stories of Equity and Hope, Phase 1

Jesus Montaño (English) and Donna Lowry (Ready for School)

Grant: $10,000, December 2020

Ready for School, a non-profit, community organization in greater Holland, was established in 2008 to meet a critical need: preparing children for success in kindergarten. Kindergarten readiness is a complex issue. A child’s potential is unlocked through the interplay of social, economic and community factors. Over the last decade, collaborative efforts in health, education and public awareness have yielded success, increasing the level of readiness from 43% in 2009 to 70% in 2019. Even with this success, disparities in kindergarten readiness currently exist in our community. “Stories of Equity and Hope,” a partnership between Ready for School, Hope College and the Jack Ridl Visiting Writers Series, will address this issue. The initiative will draw on the power of stories to improve our understanding of what barriers exist, why they exist, as well as how best to move forward. In this, we are convinced that solutions involve seeking stories from disparate perspectives and listening to them attentively, thereby amplifying diverse voices in our community. Alongside our community story-gathering efforts, “Stories of Equity and Hope,” in partnership with the JRVWS, will bring noted children’s author Kwame Alexander to town. His book, Indigo Bloom and the Garden City, will be given out at his reading.

Stories of Equity and Hope, Phase 2

Regan Postma-Montaño (English and Spanish) and Donna Lowry (Ready for School)

Grant: $26,000, February 2022; $9,663, October 2022

Stories of Equity and Hope implementation grant builds on our team’s proof-of-concept grant to tackle the “wicked problem” of home and belonging, especially as it relates to the deep inequities that divide our community and the impact of these divides on kindergarten readiness. Our project seeks to break down these barriers and, in their stead, replace them with opportunities for all families in our community to feel as though they belong, as though this is home. To this end, our project will gather stories from parents/caregivers and professionals in the field of kindergarten readiness to better understand successes and barriers. These stories will be shared broadly via Ready for School’s website and a new podcast, thus allowing for greater access and novel ways for propelling understanding. Our project also will create diverse mini-libraries for Ready for School education and healthcare partners and for Habitat for Humanity new family homeowners. Alongside, we will host an author engagement for pre-K students and their families with Matt de la Peña, author of the picture book Last Stop on Market Street, via the Jack Ridl Visiting Writers Series/MI Humanities Lakeshore at Hope College. In all of this, we hope to affirm the richness of stories by/for people of various racial, ethnic, and other social identities in our community. Supplemental funding supports exploring the issue of childcare needs.

Supporting PK–5 Students' Bilingual Learning and Development Through Translanguaging Pedagogies

Mihyun Han (Education) and Deborah Van Duinen (education) and Holland Area Schools

Grant: $50,000, February 2022

This project is designed to support local PK-5 teachers’ work with their emergent bilingual students’ language and literacy development. We will provide a year-long professional development opportunity for 25 PK-5 teachers in the Holland area that is focused on translanguaging pedagogies. Through workshops, focus group experiences and access to interactive read-aloud videos in 10 different languages, our project endeavors to support teacher knowledge of second language acquisition and bilingual literacy development so they are better able to meet their emergent bilingual students’ needs.

Hope College

Grant Recipients

Grant Recipients: Teams and Descriptions

Summary of Faculty Partners

Summary of Community Partners