Dissipative structures and long term OS

Rhett Hudson/Chris Weaver rhett&chris at main.nc.us
Sun Apr 16 14:53:05 PDT 2000


Hi Chris.

Your notion of "the OS community" is familiar territory.  I worked for a
year to help a community public school in Seattle (not-coincidentally a
focus school for Native American students/families) to develop into an
ongoing Open Space community.

One of our goals was to inspire/support groups of people in the community to
spontaneously self-organize at any time around any issue or project they
care about.  We call these groups "working groups" and created simple
guidelines for Convenors (anyone), guidelines which mainly spell out lines
of communication.

At the heart of our community is a council.  It consists of fourteen
members, from diverse parts of the community population, but not
representing those parts.  The fourteen council members act primarily as
facilitators, partnering with convenors out in the community to provide
support.  The council meets bi-weekly to hear reports and to prioritize/make
decisions on proposals from the working groups.  Council members serve the
community and "keep the wisdom" over time, but have no special powers;
ANYONE present at any council meeting is a full participant in the
decision-making process, which includes the Talking Circle and a consensus
process called "fist-to-five."

The school community holds a two-day Open Space once each year, in October.
I am sure that we could use OS more frequently with good effect.  But we
have found that the council's ongoing work serves to hold the space open for
an excellent level of self-organizing ferment.

The work of the council and its processes are clearly laid out in a set of
bylaws.  I was the convenor of the bylaws working group in 1998-99, which
was my service to my school and also my practicum project for a master's
degree in education.  If any of this sounds interesting I'm glad to provide
you (anyone out there) with copies of the bylaws.

I must express my joy whenever I read on this listerv of people using OS in
communities of indigenous people.  What our school achieved in Seattle grew
directly from the guidance of Elders from a number of First Nations.  The
circle grows, but it honors its roots.

-Chris Weaver


----------
>From: Chris Corrigan <corcom at INTERCHANGE.UBC.CA>
>To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
>Subject: Dissipative structures and long term OS
>Date: Fri, Apr 14, 2000, 5:51 AM
>

> Interesting poinits Birgitt...
>
> I'm about to embark upon my first long term OS relationship (all the
> rest have been short term affairs...fun for a while, but not
> MEANINGFUL...:-) ).  This is with three urban Aboriginal youth councils
> from BC and Alberta.  We have used Open Space in Vanocuver with one
> coulncil to get at some community priorities and we will be doing
> another one with all three councils as part of some training I'm
> offering.  The intent, especially here in Vancouver, is to use OST to
> create proposals for action from youth in the community that can then be
> funded by the youth council.
>
> For the training, they will be getting a half day crash course in OS,
> what it is and how it works, and then an afternoon and next morning in
> OS to experience the process and work on opportunities for leadership in
> their communities.  The councils want to develop the capacity to first
> of all work in Open Space, and eventually run them for themselves.
>
> Everyone's excited about this because it will give us a chance to see
> how OS can work over the long term with a community.  I don't know if
> others have looked at this, but it seems to me a variation on the OS
> organization: the OS community.
>
>



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