Mission Statement
Oakland Leaf actively works in solidarity with Oakland inner-city youth, their families, educators, artists, organizers, and community based organizations for individual, collective, structural, and environmental transformation. Together we build towards connection in a more just, self-determining, ecologically
sustainable, artistically rich, and loving society.
We put into action multiple ways of teaching, learning, doing, critical sense making, and knowing to understand our realities, oppressions, and our de- veloping identities, which in turn are needed for positive action. Because healthy community minded folks are central to sustaining our movement, we work to provide supportive & nurturing leadership to those within Oakland Leaf, to build over the long haul as family.
Through this sustained commitment as family, rather than serving, we struggle together in solidarity, because this is where power lies. So we do this with multiple roles for involvement, not just during active social resistance, but also by intentionally cultivating celebration, self-determination, and community
dialog.
We plant seeds to grow. We root in, rise up, and branch out. We're commited to stay.
Description
Through our work at Oakland Leaf, we contribute to a more connected, just, self-determining, ecologically sustainable, and loving society.
Our collective struggle and consciousness nurtures us to "be the ones we have been waiting for," as poet June Jordan once said. We cultivate youth and adult relationships by acting and interacting as family through the interweaving of Social Justice, Urban Ecology, Youth Empowerment, and the Arts.
Through our work as a multi-generational community, we honor the legacy of our ancestral traditions and historical struggles. In recognizing this, we practice & engage in culture production by contributing to and co-creating:
** teaching & learning spaces that cultivate creative & critical action within a loving and familial environment
** art, music, dance, and community events
** products that influence thought, celebrate the expression of ourselves, and challenge mainstream ways of being & thinking
** green spaces & natural food resources
** a network of supports to make resources accessible to families and ourselves
** work practices & celebrations that honor, nurture, & sustain ourselves as people
** a center to house our work & each other over the long haul.
vision
