M.K. Gandhi Institute Year-End Update & Celebrations

Dear Friend,

Thank you for your interest in the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence. Instead of a November newsletter, we are writing to update you on our progress, and to ask if we might earn your support for our 2013 efforts to strengthen our communities through applied nonviolence. In the spirit of our namesake, the mission of the Gandhi Institute is to help individuals and communities develop the inner resources and practical skills needed to achieve a nonviolent, sustainable, and just world. Creating collaborative teams with other local nonprofits, academic institutions, community groups, and interested individuals, we work to end violence and injustice with: nonviolence education; positive conflict resolution and restorative justice; and sustainability and food justice. Because of our move into a house in the Plymouth-Exchange (PLEX) neighborhood in southwest Rochester this past spring, we look forward to having closer involvement with Rochester urban issues and a more visible community presence.

Recognition and feedback of our work.

Although we are a relatively young organization with a small staff and budget, we believe we have already contributed significantly to the Rochester region. We are proud that the Center for Dispute Settlement awarded us their Community Service for Peace Award. We also received the 2012 Contribution to Justice Award from RIT's Criminal Justice Department for our work in the area of restorative justice. We are guided by feedback that our efforts are making a difference in the community:

I am working directly on the programming that will support two hundred 10th graders to visit the Gandhi Institute to learn more about African-American Civil Rights history. From the first time I visited the Institute, I wanted students to come there to experience a community-based nonviolence organization. I wanted them to know for themselves that the nonviolence expressed throughout the Civil Rights Era is not a dusty historical concept but a living practice right here in our own city. I am very happy that the Institute will continue its programming at Wilson Academy for the fourth year. Staff and students in the school speak very highly of the training and efforts that the Gandhi Institute has offered, and of how much it means for students to meet and know others in the community who are so committed to peaceful conflict resolution and nonviolence. - Djinga St. Louis, Director of African and African-American Studies, Rochester City School District

We are careful stewards.

We are proud of our careful stewardship of our resources. Thanks to an extraordinarily dedicated staff and the commitment of a fast-growing volunteer force, our 2012 programming was accomplished with a modest budget of $190,000. We are grateful to the University of Rochester for providing approximately one-third of this amount plus pro-bono professional services. To make our programs possible, we rely on the generosity of individual donors. Because of you, we offer all of our activities and services on a donation basis - each program and training is open to anyone who wishes to attend, regardless of how much he or she can financially contribute. In this way we keep high-quality trainings accessible while attempting to maximize racial, age, and economic diversity in each group.

In 2013 your financial support will allow us to:

Provide training for youth to become nonviolence leaders in their communities
Answer requests for support from schools, community groups and faith communities with tailored workshops and trainings
Continue with current programming with increased effectiveness
Provide a nonviolence trainer with expertise in diversity issues to lead a Rochester racial dialogue and reconciliation retreat in March of 2013

As director of the Gandhi Institute, I am privileged to speak with hundreds of people each year, and each person expresses the wish to live in a safer community and world, where we have hope in the future and where we have trust in our collective ability to meet challenges with care for all. This is the world that the Gandhi Institute is working to create every day. Please support these efforts as generously as you can.

In peace and hope,

Kit Miller

Director, M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence

Highlights of Some Recent Endeavors

Dialogue & Education

We plan and facilitate inter-group dialogues, including interfaith dialogues.

We are active in a local collaboration that offers community dialogues on Race in local libraries, college campuses, and as an accompaniment to the exhibit on Race coming to the Rochester Museum and Science Center in 2013.

For the fourth year, college student volunteers are teaching nonviolence and conflict resolution to youth in Wilson Foundation Academy's In-School Suspension room. Undergraduate and graduate students learn nonviolence skills and pass them on to middle school students through this program.

We conduct trainings in peaceful communication, nonviolence principles, and social justice for a variety of groups and organizations, including Hillside Family of Agencies, Rochester City School District, St. Joseph's House of Hospitality, Rochester Works, Rochester Police Department, Genesee Community College, Monroe Community College, Black Student Caucus at Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School, University of Rochester, Rochester Broadway Theater League, and for numerous community leaders.

We welcome and mentor interns from around the country and world who stay for up to a year to learn about community-based, multidisciplinary approaches to nonviolence.

The Season for Nonviolence

As part of the 64-day Season for Nonviolence (January 30-April 4), we coordinate a team to better understand and reduce violence in our community. It includes representatives from the Ad Council, Teen Empowerment, Center for Dispute Settlement, Center for Youth, University of Rochester, Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester Central Library, ArtPeace, Mt. Olivet Baptist Church, Rochester Friends Meeting, and several other organizations along with many

volunteers.

The Season's programming includes a media campaign plus a series of community-wide lectures, performances, and exhibits by national leaders in civil rights, peacemaking, conflict de-escalation and resolution.

In 2012, we trained 50 at-risk youth in nonviolence principles and skills. We are continuing this leadership program in 2013, called the Youth Activist Movement, with 75 new youth.

Rochester's Season for Nonviolence is the largest local campaign in the world!

Restorative Justice
in the Community

Working with the Rochester Police Department, Partners in Restorative Initiatives and RIT's Center for Public Safety, we are implementing a project in Rochester to support patrol officers to use restorative

conversations when resolving minor offenses. This project is modeled after one in the United Kingdom which dramatically increased community satisfaction with police and saved over a million dollars in eighteen

months.

We advocate for the evidence-based use of restorative justice through presentations and ongoing dialogues with local leaders such as police chiefs, district attorneys, judges, school board presidents and superintendents, university officials, area philanthropists, and others.

We coordinate the Restorative Rochester project, a grassroots collaboration focused on public education and awareness with goals of reducing violence and recidivism and creating stronger communities through increasing use of restorative processes to respond to conflict.

Restoration & Partnerships

In the Plymouth-Exchange (PLEX) neighborhood, we worked with our landlords to rehabilitate a long-abandoned house to be our new headquarters. On the adjacent vacant lot, we are developing a food garden and outdoor meditation space.

We are forming multiple partnerships with neighbors, including a new after-school program for nearby School #19 and this coming summer hosting a farm stand and organic food distribution point for the neighborhood.

We hosted a week-long national restorative practices conference in August, a regional agricultural justice weekend retreat in November, and we share our new space with other groups doing social change work.

M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence

585- 463- 3266

929 South Plymouth Rochester, NY

14608

Namaste:

"I honor the place in you where the entire universe dwells.

I honor the place in you that is of light, love, truth, peace and wisdom."

M.K. Gandhi

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