CornellWatch

When I attended the first Kitsch meeting of the Fall 2011 Semester I learned about the Ithaca Freeskool, a nonprofit volunteer community school inspired by similar getups in Santa Cruz, California. The conversation below was with volunteer Lily Gershon.

Shea: When did Ithaca Freeskool start?

Lily: Our earliest calendar is from 2007. Dirk Trachy and another early organizer had visited Santa Cruz California and seen their Freeskool in action. When they returned to Ithaca they started their own version here.

Shea: What is its main mission?

Lily: Freeskool is a grassroots, not for profit, all volunteer community building initiative that creates spaces where people teach and attend classes with one another without cost. Primarily, but not exclusively, geared towards adults, anyone can teach and anyone can attend. Freeskool fosters ties between people and provides access to skills and knowledge in an informal and empowering setting.

Shea: Tell me some logistics: cost of running the program, things the organization does to promote, etc.

Lily: We have three semesters a year. Each semester we need some money for printing, maybe 300 calendars at 10 cents each and the paper, maybe $20. Each semester we put up flyers, write press releases, email our mailing list and update our website and Facebook. We also just spread the word by telling people.

No one gets paid. Sometimes when we have money from grants or donations we make videos, buttons, and purchase snacks for social events.

Shea: Who are the staff members?

Lily: We don’t exactly have a “staff”, more like volunteers. They are me, Mckenzie Jones-Rounds, Dirk Trachy, Greg Rothman, Marina Gershon, Shira Golding and Ari Moore.

Shea: What are some of your favorite classes taught in the past?

Lily: Breakdancing, Capoiera, Mushroom Walk, Origami Night, Queer Erotica Writing Group, Bike Mechanics, Traditional and Experimental Animation, Improv class, DIY Movie Making.

Shea: For anyone just learning what Ithaca Freeskool is, what would you tell them?

Lily: Ithaca Freeskool is a group of people who organize free classes in and for the community. The classes are taught by anyone who has an interest in sharing their knowledge and skills. The classes are informal, held often in people’s homes, or public spaces. Anyone can attend. It’s a great way to discuss issues in a community and explore the kinds of things people are most currently interested in. And it’s an alternative to main stream education which often lacks flexibility and can be very costly. It’s a lot of fun participating in something that changes every semester, and brings in all the diverse interests of a community.

Questions about classes? Visit their website at ithacafreeskool.wordpress.com or e-mail the “staff” at ithaca_freeskool@riseup.net

Tweet this! Tweet

Greetings, fellow Cornellian! I come to you with the news that you too have the power to vote for the undergraduate student-elected trustee, one among 64 powerful persons who control Cornell’s destiny. Mostly by consulting with Miss Cleo. The Cornell Daily Sun went down and did the normal journalistic thing of taking video at a debate sponsored by none other than themselves, but I decided to make a mash-up video of the budding politicians’ uncannily uniform rhetoric. It would’ve been longer and better, but my video editing program was being a total [expletive for female genitalia] and lost my work not once, not twice, but thrice. Voting for the Student-elected Trustee ends tomorrow at 8am, but you can enjoy this little guy anytime:

Hey y’all! I’m allll up in the Twittertubes right now (username: CornellWatch), tweeting up a STORM. Sort of. My first tweet was an intro, and my second was about how the inner workings of our HTML are unraveling before our very eyes — help? Click here and follow me!

On this lovely Thursday night (tonight, that is) at 8pm, I’m bringing the folks at IVY — that Ithaca College-produced show that Cornellians love to hate — to Willard Straight Hall’s Memorial Room for a sneak preview of their second season, which debuts April 14th. Come meet the people who pretend to be people who are supposed to represent you, Cornellian, in some approximate fashion. Yeah.

Another thing I’m working on is called Sneuth, which stands for snoop and sleuth (and maybe snark) all put into one clunky yet surprisingly cool-sounding neologism. Our first project is Alternatournell, an alternate look at Cornell in video form as above. Check it out, and tell prospective freshman about it PLEASE. The first installment will be out Monday. Even if you don’t like the video content (it’s jerky at times :/ ), Get Low is involved. TO THE WINDOWWW. TO THE WALLLL.

Spring Ahead: An Artsy-Fartsy Look at a Sunny Saturday on the Quad from Evan Mulvihill on Vimeo.

The Sun reported at 4pm today that the Pussycat Dolls will be performing for Slope Day, presumably as the front runners. This is pretty sweet in terms of the “pop factor,” considering that last year’s main act “Gym Class Heroes” wasn’t exactly the biggest name. It is comparable, however, to 2007’s T.I., 2005’s Snoop Dogg, and 2004’s Kanye West. Anyway, what I want to know is who (a Cornell alum?) at the William Morris Agency decided to tip off the Sun. Also, whether the Slope Day Programming Board, which guards its picks very secretly, is pissed the eff off. Let me know at watch@kitschmag.com.

ADDENDUM: So, according to an anonymous source who asked not to be named, it looks as if the Dolls’ agents merely “confirmed [their] precognition” that they’d be headlining Slope Day. Precognition being that a student (who’s probably an E-Board member on the Slope Day Programming Board or at least having sex with one) tipped off a wily editor, who then called the William Morris Agency to “pretend to book an event on the same day as slope day. to which the contact replied ‘They’re booked in ithaca’ or something of the like.” That’s a helluv clever way to confirm a rumor. Kudos to y’all, Daily Punners. Sorry I was rude. The anonymous source added: “Power of the press baby.”

As you may have noticed, there haven’t been any posts in quite a few days — I’ve even been skipping the “weekly” features. I’ve been busy trying to balance drinking during the day for no reason other than my second semester senior-hood, making essay responses funny in order to mask the fact that I haven’t read of the books, and attempting to get a “job” in the “real world.” Since Spring Break began at 12:55pm today for me, I probably won’t be blogging over the course of the next week either, unless I get my ass in gear and put together a massive ‘Malgam Monday. See you guys after break. Oh, and, let me know if anything scandalous happens during it: watch@kitschmag.com, y’all.

Breaking: Guy with funny last name (above) will drone on for a number of minutes in front of a bunch of hungover college kids on Sat, May 23. He apparently doesn’t appreciate the grammatical intricacies of the dash — and neither do we! — so we’ll save the commentary for more qualified commentators and just repost the notification email:

Dear Seniors,

On behalf of the 2009 Convocation Committee, I am pleased to announce that Mr. David Plouffe, Chief Campaign Manager of Obama for America, President Barack Obama’s historic presidential campaign, will headline the Class of 2009’s Convocation Ceremony on Saturday, May 23, 2009.

Our committee sought an individual who has had a profound impact on the society that our class has been prepared to enter. Mr. Plouffe was the mastermind behind one of the most significant and groundbreaking elections in our nation’s history.  His insights and leadership helped transform a little known state senator from Illinois to the leader of the free world.

Read the rest of this entry »

Cookbooks Make You Fat: Says Brian Wansink, the professor who loves sending his press releases to the media. Also, foods like these make you fat.

Collegetown Council Proposal: Solid summary and analysis by the Ithacator.

Review blog discovers gay people kiss: And that they believe in this totally crazy idea that heterosexuality is normative. Crazy gays!

A Purposeful Ellipsis’d NYTimes Quotes: “Two decades ago a 23-year-old Cornell University graduate student brought the Internet to its knees…”

Cotton Candy Cure: It just might help labs grow tissue yay!

A New Low for Sun Blogs: “Allow me to preface this entry by letting the reader know that I am abroad in Scotland for the semester. Without that information, you may find yourself terribly lost. I have stepped outside of the culture I know all too well and revel in all too often, and have embarked on a journey to the birthplace of the bagpipe.”