There’s ongoing construction- but feel free to poke around!
Attention Community Organizers!
Young QTBIPOC Artists Matter, and their voices are needed now more than ever.
Art making has the potential to empower and transform. Art itself can be a unheard voice seen, a salve that helps invisible wounds heal, and an invaluable tool for conscientization.
Here you will find a collection of resources, lessons plans, and academic research to help you as you create empowering opportunities for young artists. These resources are available free and are always growing.
During Social Justice Arts and SEL Curriculum (Grades 11-12) , each child will take on the role of artist, activist, and researcher. Collaboratively, they will investigate injustice within their community, develop creative responses of resistance, and present their work to the broader community. In doing so, the artists will develop their personal/artistic voice and appreciate their valuable contribution to contemporary social justice movements. The possibilities are limited by the creativity of the young artists, ergo the possibilities are endless.
Schedule a free 15 minute consultation with me
I am a queer artist, educator, and activist with experience in arts-based community building. I have the experience to lead lessons, train others, and support ongoing initiatives.
I would love to hear your vision- let’s connect! dayp@umich.edu
More About Me:
Hi! My name is Day Parker. I am a white, queer, trans-femme radical optimist and I believe in the transformative power of art. I am currently curating a collection of art-related resources for radical (re)imagination, youth voice amplification, and queer liberation. I am using this work to inform a curriculum that I’m calling the trans*formative social justice arts education project.
My goal is to empower trans* and queer youth by creating space for them to exercise their creativity, agency, and authentic expression. I also strive to have my curriculum be trauma-informed to center healing and emotional wellness. Young people, especially QTBIPOC youth, are facing unprecedented levels of toxic stress. Creative expression will play a role in how we address the growing mental health crisis within our schools and communities.
I’m interested in achieving these goals by facilitating the creation and distribution of zines. This form of action is a medium for collective reflection, popular education, and creative resistance. I particularly want to create space for trans joy to be celebrated, which in itself is a revolutionary act.
Our social justice work needs the voices and creative input of young folks. Zines have the potential to raise critical consciousness led by voices that have been historically marginalized. Especially in a time when books by queer authors are centers of debate and being removed from shelves, it is time to publish these voices in the streets.
This project is being developed as I attend the University of Michigan which resides on the ancestral, traditional, and contemporary lands of the Anishinaabeg – The Three Fire Confederacy of the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations, as well as the Wyandot Nation. In particular, the university resides on land gifted by the three Nations and the Wyandot Nation, along with many other Indigenous Nations, in the 1817 Treaty of Fort Meigs. The language of "gift" in the original treaty entails mutual relationships between treaty parties, respect, and obligation on the part of the settlers. I advocate for Indigenous struggles against ongoing settler-colonization and this curriculum strives to be anti-imperial.
Some of the work referenced here is protected by copyright, but otherwise you’re free to copy, modify, and use this however you see fit <3
