 EI COO Lesley Showers gives Chicago CSO Angela Tovar a tour of the community kitchen at ICA GreenRise. Chicago’s new Chief Sustainability Officer, Angela Tovar, visited ICA GreenRise on September 28, 2020 to tour the mixed-use building and learn how it serves both people and the environment as a hub for sustainable community.
Tovar’s visit came in response to a letter sent by the GreenRise Restoration Project (GRRP) Advisory Team to Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot urging her administration to support the project with capital investment and an operating grant. Lightfoot was previously introduced to ICA GreenRise at a North Side community meeting organized by LISC Chicago in May, 2019, just prior to being sworn in as Mayor.  GreenRise Business Liaison and Intentional Community resident Ashleigh Hughes. My personal understanding of intentional is bringing full awareness and presence to a particular activity. That can lead to being mindful about your carbon footprint, but also more broadly how what you do either directly or indirectly affects your neighbor. That's probably the biggest opportunity to feel empowered to take the right steps to make life as harmonious as possible. Ashleigh Hughes joined the ICA team as GreenRise Business Liaison in March, 2020. She has been a resident of the GreenRise Intentional Community since June, 2019. As both staff and resident, she helps recruit new members, resolve conflict, and cultivate a positive and intentional community.
 ICA’s new Interim Executive Director Phil Waitzman in front of ICA GreenRise. The Institute of Cultural Affairs and the Ecumenical Institute have hired Philip Waitzman as the new Interim Executive Director, effective Oct 19, 2020. Phil will facilitate the development of a strategic business model and supporting systems that reflect Institutes’ rich history and mission to build a just and equitable society in harmony with planet Earth.
 ToP Trainers hold up cards to share brief reflections on the progress made during a virtual planning meeting. Four new Technology of Participation (ToP) online training courses launched this past month, a major milestone in a months-long journey to translate the facilitation methods authentically to the virtual world. We're proud to offer a small selection of courses available now--ToP Facilitation Methods (TFM) Online, ToP Strategic Planning (TSP) Online, Shift Happens: Design Principles for a Virtual World, and Action Planning Practice Lab on Miro. All the online courses are designed to train participants to apply ToP facilitation skills virtually.
 Matt Cardoni at the Third Annual Uptown Garden Walk in 2018. I feel like the [ICA] team consistently cares about the planet and the community, and are willing to put their time and effort into making them better. I trust their intentions and their actions, which is a rare thing. Matt Cardoni is founder of Green Lightning Marketing, a digital marketing consultancy that works with nonprofit organizations, mission-driven businesses and educational institutions. He has been a member of Chicago Sustainability Leaders Network for six years, helped launch and organize the Uptown Garden Walk, and has connected numerous digital marketing students and volunteers with ICA.
 The new development by Sarah's Circle will cover 40% of the lot at 4747 N Sheridan Rd and provide supportive housing for women. The Ecumenical Institute (EI), ICA’s sister organization that owns and operates ICA GreenRise, has signed a sales agreement to sell 40% of our parking lot at 4747 N Sheridan Rd to Sarah’s Circle, an Uptown-based nonprofit organization that provides a continuum of programs and supportive housing to help women permanently end their homelessness.
 Toni Anderson at the Sacred Keepers Youth (SKY) Garden in Bronzeville during a CSLN bike ride in 2019. [ICA] methods challenge the internal narrative that a person is holding that they may have to inspect to become available to a greater good or a collective movement, and it's rare that those two things get challenged in the same way. Toni Anderson is Founder and Executive Director of Sacred Keepers Sustainability Lab, a Chicago-based non-profit dedicated to teaching youth to inherit the earth through environmental STEM education, sustainable service learning initiatives, and youth-driven social philanthropy. She has been a member of Chicago Sustainability Leaders Network since it formed in 2013, is working toward certification in our Technology of Participation methods, and joined our board in June, 2020.
 The Kemper Insurance building that has housed ICA since the 1970s was rebranded as the ICA GreenRise Uptown Learning Laboratory in 2014. We’re honored to announce that ICA GreenRise has received a major State Capital Grant from the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity (DCEO) to invest in renovating key building features. The $150,000 award will support upgrades to the building’s fire safety system, part of a roster of capital improvements planned as part of the GreenRise Renovation Project (GRRP).
 Our Program team leads co-grantees of the Listen. Lead. Share. clean energy campaign through a virtual training on ToP facilitation methods. “Folks in this group wear a lot of hats—community leaders, community organizers, parents, pastors. When you come into those different roles you bring different skills and focuses and things that you’re trying to do with a group, and facilitation is no different,” said ICA staffer Samantha Sainsbury to a group of organizers leading efforts to expand clean energy opportunities to Illinoisans.
Funded by a grant through the Energy Foundation and Illinois Environmental Council, ICA partnered with the Illinois Clean Jobs Coalition (ICJC) to offer a training series in our Technology of Participation (ToP) facilitation methods to fellow grantees engaged in the Listen. Lead. Share. (LLS) campaign.  Our team leads a pilot session of Shift Happens, a new virtual facilitation course for designing participatory events. The Technology of Participation (ToP) methods were distilled from decades of experience facilitating meaningful, transformative experiences in community. The methods have been applied throughout the world, in cities, towns, and villages. They have been used at every scale from the United Nations and Fortune 500 companies down to staff meetings and family gatherings. For most of its history, ToP has thrived in-person, face-to-face.
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4750 N Sheridan Rd, Chicago, IL 60640
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