Minnesota Voices is a TC Daily Planet feature that highlights individuals from many different places in our community. They are not just the usual voices who are quoted in news stories and appear on editorial pages (though those people may appear from time to time), but artists, business owners, community organizers, teachers, and more.Minnesota Voices stories are, above all, interesting and personal. These stories are NOT dry, formulaic, or the same old, same old message that a lobbyist or advocate has given sixteen times already. Minnesota Voices focuses on who people are and what they do in the world, and on what motivates their lives. For information about writing a Minnesota Voices article, click here. Continue Reading
Mahmoud El-Kati has an interesting face. He looks stern until he smiles, which he does frequently, and he maintains a direct gaze animated by the rise and fall of his arched brow; it expresses the intellectual nature of a man who has worked hard as an educator and civil rights activist over the past 50 years in the Twin Cities. That face will be the subject of a sculpture portrait titled “Faces of Rondo.” The piece, which will be installed at the Victoria Station light rail station, will honor a group of individuals who have had a positive impact on the Rondo community.El-Kati is a Professor Emeritus of History at Macalester College, a noted essayist, speaker, honoree of Macalester’s Mahmoud El-Kati Distinguished Lectureship in American Studies and an author. His most recent book is Haiti: The Hidden Truth (2010). Besides El-Kati, other “Faces of Rondo” honorees include people such as Billy Williams, an African-American executive political assistant; Pearla Mae Barnes, active in the foster care system; and Lou Bellamy, founder and artistic director of Penumbra Theatre. Continue Reading
North Minneapolis has many fences. Four feet high chain link fences, ten feet high homemade wood fences, chest high white plastic picket fences. Fences staked in the 1920s, last fall, in the 70s. I notice them on my runs, which span from six to ten miles, total, every six days. Sometimes I run into neighboring northeast Minneapolis, and on occasion into suburban Robbinsdale. Continue Reading
Much has been made of Rush Limbaugh’s use of the terms “slut’ and “prostitute” to degrade Ms. Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown law student who testified in favor of affordable contraception for all women. I too, felt outrage at his remarks. What he said next, however, reached even deeper than anger or outrage to me. He suggested that women who support Ms. Continue Reading
“There is no wire connecting my mind to yours,” Abdikadir Adan Xiito informs me crisply. He’s explaining his philosophy for teaching math to children, in between sessions correcting the workbooks of two dozen young students in an afternoon homework class at the tutoring school here that bears his name, the Xiito Academy.The young Somali boys and girls bend over their desks solving sets of addition, multiplication and fraction problems. One might expect high-energy hubbub and hijinks in a late afternoon class for kids, after they’ve spent a full day in school. But no, the room is quiet, energized but serene.The swish of turning notebook pages is the loudest sound in the room.Every few minutes, a child completes a set of problems, jumps up and plops down in a chair next to Teacher Xiito (pronounced HEE-toe, the word is a nickname meaning “skinny” in Somali), nervously handing over a notebook for his corrections.Elegant and slim, decked out in a woolen scarf, Xiito exudes an air of focused intensity. In the classroom, his focus is somehow placed equally on every child in the room. He speeds through each finished problem set that is brought to him with a ballpoint pen, drawing a quick slash through the correct answers, engaging the students to correct the flubs.A Minnesota Miracle“Very good,” he finally pronounces before writing down a fresh set of addition problems for a seven-year-old boy, the set customized to slightly expand the child’s skill level. Continue Reading
“I have been making theater with kids pretty much since I was a teenager myself,” Dudley Voigt explained about her work here in the Twin Cities as both an artist and educator.She arrived in the Twin Cities from Vermont in the early 1990s. Her interests fell primarily in the area of art and social change and she majored in theater at Macalester College. After graduating in 1994, Voigt worked as an intern and guest artist for four years at St. Paul Central’s Central Touring Theater with Jan Mandell. Mandell, a national leader, uses theater to empower urban youth, giving voice to a population whose experiences aren’t often represented in education.“My training and my passion is in both text and physical performance,” said Voigt. Continue Reading
Not many politicians can lay claim to development work abroad as an important stage in their journey to public service. Chris Tolbert, newly elected city councilmember for St.
