CPCP Catalyst Initiative: Norfolk

CATALYST INITIATIVE ROUND 2

Patrick Mullins, a theatre artist, worked with the LGBT Center of Hampton Roads, a program of ACCESS AIDS Care that promotes LGBT health and human rights, while providing a safe space for the LGBT community. Their work together focused on how theater can facilitate a space that empowers trans people to educate, advocate, and deepen understanding of transgender issues through publicly sharing their personal experiences. Their story over a year of collaboration is one of profound listening and trust-building, being fully present in moments of complexity and challenge, and creating an invitation for public support, empathy, and investment towards a community of people who are often marginalized.

Norfolk, VA Center for Performance and Civic Practice NORFOLK - I

Photos by Eric Hause II -NORFOLK

Contents The Partners

2

How it Started

4

Planning

5

The Event

6

Learnings

22

Successes

22

Ripple Effects

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THE PARTNERS

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The Partners

Patrick Mullins is currently Interim Artistic Director at

The LGBT Center of Hampton Roads is a program

Virginia Stage Company where he most recently directed

of ACCESS AIDS Care. ACCESS AIDS Care opened

and adapted The Taming of the Shrew, a synth-pop

their doors in 1989 to serve women and children

fantasia mixing cross-gendered casting, Shakespeare's

living with HIV/AIDS. Today, they are the largest, most

text and the music of DJP and MrT. Other recent

comprehensive AIDS Service Organization in the region.

projects include Light Seeking Light - an immersive

In 2011, they opened the region’s first and only LGBT

Shakespearean festival/visual art installation/

Center. In 2015, more than 4,000 people came through

performance event in Town Point Park. In 2010 he was

the doors at the LGBT Center of Hampton Roads,

recognized by the Hampton Roads Cultural Alliance with

including more than 400 LGBT youth. The Center’s

the Bettie Minette Cooper Arts Educator award. Patrick

clinical mental health services, support groups, social

holds an MFA in Theatre from the University of South

activities held in a “safe space” have truly benefited the

Carolina.

community of Hampton Roads.

Stacie Walls-Beegle has served as CEO of ACCESS AIDS Care/LGBT Center of Hampton Roads since 2001. In 2011, ACCESS AIDS Care opened the region’s first and only LGBT Center of Hampton Roads, located in Norfolk, VA. Stacie is a native of Kansas, but has been in Norfolk more than 20 years. She has 25 years of human service experience in mental health, HIV/AIDS and LGBT programs. She has held executive management positions in non-profits for more than 20 years. She has worked in multiple community partnership projects and coalitions. She serves on the board of directors for Centerlink, Dining Out For Life International and Hampton Roads Business Outreach.

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HOW IT STARTED

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How it Started Patrick and Stacie first became acquainted when Patrick was the vice president of Hampton Roads’ Pride, an organization that unites Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender (LGBT) and allied communities in support of inclusion, dignity, and equality of all people. While the two hadn’t worked together directly on a project, they have had a long working relationship revolving around LGBT community issues and awareness.

Patrick approached Stacie to learn about who connected with the LGBT Center might benefit from an arts-based collaboration centered on listening and responding to self-identified needs. Stacie immediately mentioned the local trans community as a group in need of a voice that could highly benefit from the opportunity to be heard.

Patrick and Stacie had both worked closely with multiple groups from the transgender community. They stated that, while awareness of trans issues is greater now than the past, there is still a great deal of less than positive backlash and discussion. Even within the LGBT community there is much misunderstanding and discrimination aimed at the trans population. Patrick and Stacie wished to be a part of facilitating a conversation with members of the trans community, to learn what would be most useful for them, and to discover how theater-based tools could best support the needs of this diverse group of people.

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PLANNING 6 -NORFOLK

Planning To learn from their insight gained while working with members of the trans community, Patrick and Stacie included the LGBT Center staff in their conversations. Together, they strategized how to offer an invitation that would bring a diverse group of people through the doors and create an environment for people to open up and share their points of view.

As one strategy to invite participation, Patrick and Stacie hosted a listening session in December of 2015. Stacie put out a broad invitation to members of the trans community, including those who generally do not access services at the LGBT Center.

Stacie, Patrick and the center’s staff followed up with more direct invitations to bring people to the meeting. To create a welcoming environment, they provided food and drink for those in attendance.

This first session was attended by people representing a diversity of racial, socioeconomic, and social backgrounds. Using ensemble-building strategies from theatre, Patrick led a conversation that invited the group to consider both what they valued as well as the challenges they face. This led the group to identify specific needs, including: ! mentoring ! advocacy ! empowerment ! self-esteem ! access to restrooms ! understanding ! greater awareness of trans issues among the general public ! greater awareness of trans needs for medical and other professionals ! how trans people with privilege can support those who come from less privilege ! how to ensure your own needs are met

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“It was really nice to voice everything that I had been going through and experiencing and having people relate to that and understand.

It’s not often that we have something that unifies us. The trans community here is fairly small, we’re kind of all under the LGBT umbrella. The trans community sometimes gets drowned out by the LGBT community as a whole, sometimes we get inched out because not everyone can relate to our issues.”

- TARYN MCLEAN, PARTICIPANT

Stacie introduced the idea of a cumulative event aimed at addressing some of these identified needs and asked the group to think about the type of event they would want. People began to coalesce around the idea of a multi-faceted trans pride day. Some people in the room offered to take ownership over the planning of some of these elements.

“There’s a bit of restlessness in the room to find a goal. There are so many goals that cut through all of the strata; an event that causes awareness also helps increase self esteem. That’s a huge part of this. I don’t know where the group will take us, but I warrant the group will include that in some way.”

- PATRICK

The LGBT Center staff spoke about how delighted they were at how much they learned from this listening session. This was the first time a group this diverse had been brought together.

“I don’t know where the group will take us and I’m working on keeping that openness. There is a vibration in the room when folks speak - you can feel the level of need there. It’s beautiful, that they're able to be that self aware about it, but it’s intimidating.”

- PATRICK

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QUESTIONS 10 -NORFOLK

Questions In a planning conversation about how to utilize the momentum from the first session into a creative process that might culminate in an event, Patrick and Michael Rohd from the Center for Performance and Civic Practice addressed the following questions: “How do we acknowledge the breadth and complexity of the needs expressed and also find unity in goals and actions?

We know the positives in the room and we know the challenges, they’re not going to disappear; how do we as a group move forward in this conversation?

How do we invite ownership into a theatre-based process that allows for participation from those who do not identify as performers?”

- PATRICK

“It seems like there’s some clarity in the group- they want education and advocacy beyond the group and the culture. I wonder if the question is who specifically would you reach that would make this feel like successful and worthwhile work. Is it school-aged kids? Business people? Conservatives? Liberals?

And if the answer is everybody, I’d spend a little energy saying let’s get specific. Let’s think about a place where people frequent that feels like a cross section of everybody that you’d like to reach. If you go right to ‘let’s make something’, you skip the step of how do we educate and advocate, which means reaching people. The who and the where might help you determine the what.”

- MICHAEL

Together they strategized about how to focus on identifying a few of the needs that felt the most critical for the group, to conceptualize potential next steps, plan additional sessions for the group to meet, and create a clear trajectory for those involved.

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CHALLENGES 12 -NORFOLK

Challenges “The learning curve for me has been incredibly steep.

I almost feel like the artistic practice part is going to be the easiest part of the puzzle, because right now the conversation is so broad. And while we have a lot in common in the room, we’re still trying to find some consistency in participation. We have a lot of commonalities, but there’s a lot of difference as well.

We focused on needs and goals in our last session and that helped us clarify ideas and build more commonalities.”

- PATRICK

“The thick of what Patrick and I are in right now is part of my everyday work. I worry that this particular population is very unreliable. We had 18-20 show up the first night and another 15-18 show up the next night and they’re all different. And they don’t show up at 7, they showed up at 7:40, 7:45, 7:50. We’re going to have to figure out a way to keep them engaged that makes it extremely motivating for them. We struggle with this same issue of engagement in our support groups and our education programs. And that’s going to be a challenge for us, I think.”

- STACIE

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NEXT STEPS 14 -NORFOLK

Next Steps Patrick, Stacie, and the LGBT Center staff, as a way to encourage participation, held sessions in the LGBT Center. They discovered that some of the people who came to the center for counseling or other reasons would end up joining the conversations.

As the group continued to unify over commonalities, there were still challenges in finding cohesion. Racial, socio-economic, and social barriers were present and even though it wasn’t something that was spoken about in the generous room that had been created, at times it influenced how the participants interacted with each other.

“We have a very committed and very diverse staff here at the agency and their participation in this has been invaluable. A few members of the staff would join each session and when people weren’t speaking up in the group, when we had participants who weren’t talking, the staff, because they’re a part of the community, did a really great job initiating and instigating the conversation that I think otherwise would have struggled.”

-STACIE

“I can’t say enough how fantastic her staff is.”

- PATRICK

During the sessions, multiple people in the group voiced the concern that nobody was interested in hearing their stories, that this was something people didn’t care about. However, Patrick had been contacted by many people outside of the trans community who expressed their interest, who offered help, and asked to be involved.

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“We had a pretty nice sized meeting where everyone went around and shared our ‘coming of age’ stories, that was super valuable. That inspired us and each other to talk about this publically, these are experiences that other people won’t have, let’s use this chance to relate to people, enlighten people.”

-TARY N M C L E A N , PA RTI C I PAN T

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“We had this big moment when we decided it was going to be a story slam, this one moment when one individual said, ‘I think it’s great, but whose stories are we going to tell?’. And the whole group answered ‘our stories!’. It was this electrifying, amazing moment. I’ve begun doing story gathering with individuals; I sat down with a trans man yesterday who told me his story about how he chose his name, and the power of what a gift that is, that you get to choose your name. These are stories they’ve been working on their whole lives.”

-PATRICK

After working individually with people, Patrick then brought a core group of seven participants together to share stories with each other and decide how to move forward with the presentation. Patrick, Stacie and the LGBT Center staff focused on keeping momentum going and helping the participants feel comfortable with sharing.

“Everyone’s been very generous and Stacie’s staff is amazing and just so committed. They’re excited, whenever they deal with their clients, it’s about a health issue, there’s always a very specific need, but being able to spend time hearing stories and hearing more about the community that they’ve been spending so much time with, the staff seems to have really been empowered and excited about that.”

-PATRICK

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THE EVENT 18 -NORFOLK

The Event On May 19, 2016, the seven participants told their stories in a story slam event held at Work | Release in Norfolk, Virginia, called “TRANSpoken – True Stories by Trans Persons of Hampton Roads”. The event was free, open to the public, and they performed to a full audience of 155 people, many not personally connected to the trans community.

The participants told personal stories on topics ranging from medical visits, serving in the military, government workplace sensitivity training, familial challenges, employment discrimination, and being a stay at home mom. Patrick and Stacie collaborated with staff to include in the audience people affiliated with the medical profession and the military as well as educators and religious leaders with the intention of educating and deepening understanding of transgender issues and experiences. The majority of the LGBT Center staff also attended the event.

“After I got over the nervousness and got going, it was definitely interesting to share my story. I’m a fairly private person, not that I’ve kept my transition secret, but it was good to share that part of myself and have that sense of vulnerability.

I tried to speak truthfully from everything I experienced and was feeling. I was motivated by the thought that someone in that room might be going through the same thing, but might not have someone to relate to or talk to about it. That sharing my story was potentially meaningful to someone else.”

-TARYN MCLEAN, PARTICIPANT

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Audience Response “I never really realized how rough it could be for transgender individuals.” “...how important someone's name can really be...”

“I felt that this panel really highlighted the difference in experiences between white trans female experiences and the experiences of the transwomen of color.”

“Trans people are still treated poorly in the military.”

“I am extremely touched by everyone's stories. Their courage gives me the confidence to be a better me.”

“I am grateful to be here tonight to listen to everyone's life stories. I appreciate the courage and bravery it takes to speak to strangers about the private details of your life. It has been a very inspiring night!” “...honored to live in a city where honesty, love and individuality can be celebrated...”

“I feel great when I'm surrounded by other trans community members. I usually have anxiety around crowds, but feel at home here.” “...how to find motivation to stand up more for who you are...”

“I am not alone.”

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“I tried to talk to as many people as I could afterward, I got a lot of hugs and encouragement, people who didn’t know the different sides of things, especially for transgender service members and the military’s perspective. I met some new people and got some contacts to be able to mentor some other people. I met some great people who reached out to me with opportunities to speak further and expand on it to other groups.”

-TARY N M C L E A N , PA RTI C I PAN T

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REFLECTIONS 22 -NORFOLK

Reflections “It was the most diverse group that comes to the LGBT center, quite frankly. We had women of color and we had female to male transitioning and we had male to female transitioning and we had high-income and we had people who had employment security and then people who work the streets and grew up in the system. We had this diverse group of people and it was amazing. And I think for me, it was an opportunity to say to my staff, ‘look this can happen by just following your work plan and without a major budget change and you know, we made a big impact.’”

-STACIE

“I think that having an outside facilitator was very, very helpful. I think my staff could do it, but I think it was nice to have the creative component that Patrick brought to the table. It gave it a different spin. It wasn't just a support group. It was more about their story and their performance.”

-STACIE

“Knowing that I had trained counselors in there with me, made it feel like a place that I could be.”

-PATRICK

“I don't know that I would have automatically put this type of project together without the impetus of CPCP. Patrick found it and brought it forward, but I'm not sure that I would have recognized that this was a great way to work. It made me look at partnerships in a different way; how we can bring awareness to issues and how we can educate, using different community partners than what we normally use.”

-STACIE

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RIPPLES 24 -NORFOLK

Ripples “We were concerned initially - what if there’s that one protester who shows up to disrupt or people don’t show up, but seeing how many people did show up and come out - we didn’t expect that and that was nice.”

-TARYN MCLEAN, PARTICIPANT

Patrick and Stacie reported that, because of the positive response to the event, they and the participants of TRANSpoken are excited to explore next steps for the project. Ideas included having another public story sharing event and recording their stories into a podcast for wider distribution to medical and education professionals and members of the military.

“Some of the folks that they wanted to reach, military personnel and doctors, we tried to get as many of those folks to the event as possible. And there were quite a few of them in attendance.”

-PATRICK

“The event made me realize that though parts of my life are insignificant and I don’t really think it could impact someone, this showed me that it does and can, I’m a pioneer in some things, being a transgender member of the military, and this is something bigger than me; than my wanting privacy about. It was a rewarding experience to be able to change people’s perspectives on something that could be very easily stereotypes.”

-TARYN MCLEAN, PARTICIPANT

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The Catalyst Initiative is an action research initiative — a model for supporting, advancing, and learning from innovative artist and community partner collaborations in order to reveal new possibilities for artistic contributions to community problem-solving and growth.

CENTER FOR PERFORMANCE + CIVIC PRACTICE © 2017 T H E C P C P. O R G THE ANDREW W.

MELLON FOUNDATION

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