Almost a year later!

Can you believe it? Santuary@Knox is actually up and running!

It took the better part of a year to get going, however, it really is up and running! The Pilot is still underway, but the project has clients, we do stuff, and we are all learning lots!

Just a reminder....
Santuary@Knox is a learning centre that is run out of the church for kids who live and circulate throughout the city centre. Most of the clientele are not currently enrolled in a school. Most have not been to school in multiple years. The oldest person coming is 17, with the youngest being 15. These kids have all been under the jurisdiction of Child Welfare at some point with most of them being continuing clients of the Social Services industry.

Clients can come to the church to learn anything they wish to learn. This is an interesting phenomenon, because most of these kids really don't know what they want to learn, just that there is a lot of stuff to learn. As they haven't been in school for a long time, they really don't have a lot of ability to stay focused on anything for very long. At the moment, everyone who has come to Santuary@Knox has been diagnosed ADHD and have had very unsuccessful experiences with medication intended to treat ADHD.

The theory behind the program is to allow individuals to come to the church to learn something they want to learn. I have some good assistive technologies available. With these, I hope to show them that they truly can learn something and to transform their self-identities from being non-learners to being learners. It sounds simple enough, however, it really is complicated with all their history in schools, their individual histories at home and in foster care, their drug use, their experiences with incarceration and the legal system, and their understanding of what churches do.

I know that the process can work through my experiences in schools and through my doctoral research. However, this is a really interesting group with which to work and the process is far more complicated. The hurdles are huge and can seem insurmountable, What seems to happen is that, just when I am about to give up, something happens to give me a glimmer of hope and then I remember to trust the process. Things take time. It took more than a few days to produce all the baggage they carry around with them. It will take time to see real change happen.

Though I did state that learning is occurring (and I strongly believe that to be truth), there is currently very little "academic" learning happening within this setting (if any). First of all, the kids need to learn that I can be trusted. That is likely their first hurdle to overcome, though getting through the church doors is really difficult for some of them. Trust is crucial for them - to be able to take the necessary risks that learning entails. I think I'd like to write just about those risks some day, as it seems that many people do not understand how big a risk that is for these people. Maybe next time.

Learning to trust me entails all kinds of tests (good and bad experiences). There are purposeful tests as well as those that just happen in day-to-day interactions. Though I hate "being on guard," I realize that almost any situation can develop into a teachable moment about trust. So I am so incredibly intentional about this work.

Another aspect of learning about trust is me learning that I can trust them. This is sometimes very amusing, as the way adults typically trust kids doesn't really work in this situation. These kids are street survivors. One of my clients has been under the supervision of Child Welfare since being in early elementary school. Most adults have failed these kids - from their point of view. Their parents are seen to have failed to keep them safe. Teachers have failed to help them learn what they think they need to learn. Social workers fail to give them what they think they need. In some cases, the kids may be right. Whether they are or not, adults are not seen to be the source of a lot of care and support. So they know how to manipulate them to meet their perceived needs. Though I need to learn to trust them, I can not use the "normal" filters to determine whether they are trustworthy. Instead, I try to determine if I can trust how they might react or behave in certain situations. I have to learn when I can believe what they tell me and when it really doesn't matter what they say. The whole process of developing my trust in them is really a new experience for me and I feel like I am learning so much.

Just learning about each other is really an interesting process. As this is a pilot and the budget is minimal, I am alone with them most of the time. There is a plan for including volunteers, however, I have had to drastically revise that plan as I go along. For the moment, I have to accept that I am alone with them.

This has some of those closest to me extremely concerned. Because I am a gay man, they feel that I am extremely vulnerable to false accusations of sexual misconduct. Though this could be a very real possibility, I have lived with this all my career. As a male in an elementary school, I was often alone with children. As a secondary teacher, I was also often alone with students. There were times when we went on extended field trips in the wilderness, to Quebec, and other places where I would find myself alone with individual students. I have had to trust my own instincts and trust that when I am centrered on meeting the needs of someone else, my own behaviours will reflect that sense of service to others. In 34 years, I have not had a problem with it. As a trusted male in an elementary school, students often came to see me as a pseudo-parental figure. It is a common experience among teachers. As such, kids would approach me for different kinds of nurture. When a needy child approaches you for a hug, I don't think I can say "Sorry, this might be misunderstood by an observer, so stay well away from me."

This does not mean that I am not careful. I always ensure that my hugging is done in very public places where I can be observed by many rather than a few. I try to be extremely aware, so that I am sure that I let go as soon as a child begins to let go. I also am on the alert for any kind of inappropriate expressions. Otherwise, I become naively vulnerable. Some might say that I am being naive in spite of my diligence, however, I need to set my own boundaries. If I am here to help, then I need to be free to do so. All the same, I am extremely self-reflective about whose needs are being met and what my intentions truly are. So far, this has kept things clear.

So lots of the learning at this juncture is about social interaction. There is also a lot of two-way learning. They teach me stuff each day, and I hope they are learning from me. We share technological expertise. We share learning processes. We learn about each other. When they are ready, which will be an individual experience, we will enter into a more structural learning experience. At the moment it continues to be very experiential and not following much of a planned sequence.

I invite you to share this journey with us through this blog, which I plan on adding to much more frequently.

Your comments are always welcome.