IGE is a meeting place for community groups that share our concerns about human rights and education for multicultural and religious awareness. We promote peaceful conflict resolution through training, workshops with youth and adults, and ongoing community discussion.

May Day is International Workers Day

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May Day

Join Us On May Day!  All Workers Are Essential!

 

Saturday, May 1, 2021 Noon Spirit of Solidarity Monument

(220 Front Avenue across from the Grand Rapids Public Museum)

On May Day we gather to remember the workers, both essential and retired, who lost their lives this past year due to the mishandling of the Covid-19 pandemic. 

We also honor the Haymarket Martyrs of Chicago, who along with furniture workers in Grand Rapids, fought for the 8-hour day and a new, better world. Back in 1886, the Chicago police attacked striking workers injuring and killing dozens. The State of Illinois then hung four of eight labor leaders after a rigged trial. Out of this outrage a new world-wide labor movement was born. So today in every country, May 1st is celebrated as International Workers Day!

We want safer work conditions for all workers and to build a strong labor movement. Our demands are honest and simple: 

Build Back Better with Unions! Support the AFL-CIO’s push to pass the PRO Act

Jobs or income now! Extend unemployment to 26 weeks, not 20. Make Michigan unemployment great again!

Stop racist police brutality and end police crimes. Support community control of the police.

Support the Equality Act! Fight discrimination against the LGBTQIA+

Support immigrant rights. No more kids in cages! Legalization for all!

The workers, united, will never be defeated!

Hosted by IATSE Local 26 (Stagehands), ATU Local 836 (Bus Drivers), and the Kent-Ionia Labor Council.  

“Salt of the Earth” Movie & Discussion

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Virginia Jenks Chambers portrays her involvement in the miners strike. Born November 8, 1917 in St. Louis Missouri, Virginia and her husband Tom Chambers were founding members of IGE. Virginia died February, 1990.

IGE is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.  Join us by Zoom or with limited seating in the IGE office.  We will be showing the movie on Zoom and/or you can watch in advance on YouTube (Salt of the Earth movie)  and then join our discussion.  For the Zoom link or office reservations, please leave a message at 616-259-6124.

Credit to IMDb

Non-Violence in The Present

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Non-violence is not talked about very much at this time, but it is a crucial component of human life.  It is true that humans want to maintain themselves in groups of similar people.  It feels safer and easier.  However, the fear of apparently different others eventually leads to violence against other people, property, and institutions. We must recognize that fear and bravely practice non-violence.  We may have been socialized to accept violence. It is difficult to be non-violent, especially since it is seen as cowardice and weakness, but it is absolutely necessary in these troubled times. There are very useful books, videos, and teachers who can help us change our thinking and actions. Gene Sharp has written a great deal and so has Marshall Rosenberg. Great pacifists like Dorothy Day and others struggled to promote peaceful ways of relating to others. Non-violence requires constant practice.

 

Twelve-step programs promote respect for oneself and others and ways of saying your truth in kind ways, “say what you mean, but don’t say it mean.” We begin with goodwill, acceptance, and listening to others in order to achieve conflict resolution.  The structures of humanity in families, other relationships, business, and government need to always begin with the assumption of goodwill and honesty tempered with kindness. Yes, sometimes hostile behavior requires defensive action to protect ourselves and others, but hostility should never come first.

 

Formal education and informal socialization must stress the equality of all humans. Everyone deserves to be treated equitably. Of course, babies, sick, and infirm people need extra care and attention. We must practice the cultivation of courage and patience with ourselves and others. Differences of countries of origin, color, gender, gender preference, wealth, age, intelligence, religion in people should not determine greater or lesser status. Connection with others is a necessity for all humans. Our Institute for Global Education office has some good literature on non-violence for all ages of people.

By: Kate Villaire

Essentials for Smiles: Care items for the Unhoused

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Smiles all around!

March 12,, 2021

Dear Patron,

There are many unhoused citizens in and around greater Grand Rapids this year. The wintertime was especially difficult for these individuals due to the harsh winter weather in Michigan. The encampment at Heartside Park was uprooted as well, making things more difficult for them because it takes away the makeshift homes they had established for themselves. The Covid-19 Pandemic is only exasperating the situation because the people need to remain apart and in sanitary conditions to remain healthy. The dire need that the unhoused have is only growing. Now that spring is around the corner, we hope to brighten people’s days with simple essential items that are vital for their wellbeing.

At the Institute for Global Education (IGE), we seek to help our unhoused neighbors and friends by partnering with local non-profits. We have found that St. Mark’s Episcopal Church at 134 Division Avenue North, Grand Rapids, MI 49503 provides services to these individuals. At the IGE, we started gathering supplies to put together care packages of essential products.

Would you consider donating either funding or essentials outlined below for our care packages to help us achieve our mission?

We call this mission “Essentials for Smiles” in hopes of brightening people’s days and ensuring they have essentials they need for the foreseeable future such as masks, chap sticks, and gloves.

We greatly appreciate your donation and it will be used to put together more care packages. If you wish to contribute funds, please go to Paypal or send us a check made out to IGE indicating “Essentials for Smiles”. To donate essentials, please call our office at 616-454-1642.

Sincerely,

Essentials for Smiles Committee

Non-Violence; Martin Luther King Jr. and Ghandi

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MLK Dream Speech curtesy of The Washington Post
Martin Luther King Jr.’s Speech “I have a dream” in 1963.

Many years ago, I spent some time in Tennessee. There was an organization in Memphis similar to Institue for Global Education (IGE), and I was volunteering with them. People from Grand Rapids who had been members of IGE and had moved South had founded this organization, using the IGE as a pattern. On Martin Luther King Jr’s (MLK) Birthday, in order to celebrate, the group held a well-attended event in a giant church in Memphis. Arun Ghandi, Mahatma Ghandi’s grandson, was the featured speaker. I remember talking to Arun after he spoke. I gave him the January 15th page from my page-a-day quote calendar: it quoted Ghandi about non-violence in honor of MLK’s birthday. Arun loved the calendar page and told me that Martin Luther King Jr. was the only one who had seriously implemented his grandfather’s ideas. He had used them to craft the American non-violent civil rights revolution. Arun said he was staying there in Memphis in order to research and study MLK’s papers.

More things you might not know about Martin Luther King Jr.; Martin Luther King Jr. was not born with that name. His birth name was Michael King Jr. If he later changed his name from Michael King Jr. to Martin Luther King, Jr., how could he be a Jr.? Because his father was also Michael King – Michael King Sr. The father changed his own name to Martin Luther and the son followed. So, the Jr. is correct as his name was the same as his father’s at 12 years of age, Martin Luther King Jr. jumped out of a second-story window, allegedly attempting suicide. At 15 years of age, without finishing high school, Martin Luther King Jr. started at Morehouse College in Atlanta. He graduated in 1948 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology. He then entered Crozier Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania and finished with a Doctor of Divinity degree in 1951. He received his Ph.D. in Theology from Boston University in 1955 and became Dr. King.

How many times did MLK Jr. go to jail? 29. This sounds like a lot especially for a scholar and preacher and purveyor of non-violence. But remember, the police and the government wanted to punish him for his activities. For example, one time he was jailed for driving 30 mph in a 25-mph zone. How many times did people attempt to take MLK Jr.’s life? Twice, that we know of. What close relative of MLK Jr.’s did an assassin kill? His mother. How many African Americans have a declared federal holiday on the day of their birth? One. How many other Americans have a declared federal holiday on the day of their birth? Two – both were Presidents.

By: Diane Baum