Philadelphia Yearly Meeting

of the Religious Society of Friends

News of an Event

Intergenerational Spiritual Formation Program Announced

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The Spiritual Formation Program Working Group of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting has offered Spiritual Formation Programs for over 15 years and has helped many people seeking a deeper spiritual journey within our faith community.

At this time we are pleased to announce the Intergenerational Spiritual Formation Program, a new program that will focus more closely on the spiritual needs and journeys of Young Adult Friends. This program grew out of conversations among members of the Spiritual Formation Program Working Group, Young Adult Friends and the Young Adult Friends Coordinator earlier this year. Through additional meetings, conversations and a survey, we learned about the unique needs of Young Adult Friends and what started as an idea to involve Young Adult Friends eventually became what we now call the Intergenerational Spiritual Formation Program.

Why the title “Intergenerational” Spiritual Formation?” Many Young Adult Friends have spoken of their yearning for inclusion. They did not wish to have a program separate from other adult Friends but rather a program that takes into consideration their needs, such as time constraints. Frankly, this warmed the hearts of older adult Friends. We were overjoyed that Young Adult Friends, first and foremost want to deepen their spiritual journeys and, secondly, want to do so with older adult Friends.

The elements of Spiritual Formation include retreats, personal spiritual disciplines, readings, devotional groups and prayerful support. We look forward to joining with our young adults in worship, practice and witness to the Eternal in our lives.

If you are a Young Adult Friend we hope you will join us on your journey to deepen your spirituality. If you are an older adult Friend we hope you will consider this to be your invitation to deepen your spiritual journey in companionship with Young Adult Friends.

To learn more about the Spiritual Formation Program please see our website at www.pym.org/spiritual-formation. Or, better yet, find out more about the Intergenerational Spiritual Formation Program (and register) at www.pym.org/spiritual-formation-sept-2014.

 

A 5-Year Plan for Philadelphia Yearly Meeting

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Dear Friends,

Reflection is significant in our worship. We practice listening. We seek acquaintance with the divine. We find that of God in others and respect that of God within ourselves. These and more have been living spiritual experiences in the life and work of the Long-Range Planning Group.

Nearly three years ago the Yearly Meeting charged the Long Range Planning Group to discern specific directions for the Yearly Meeting as an organization and means to evaluate periodically how our systems are working. Re-Kindling Our Fire: A Five-Year Plan for Philadelphia Yearly Meeting is LRPG’s response to that charge. The plan attempts to capture what LRPG heard in listening as Friends expressed dissatisfactions with the past or present and hopes for the future. A theme that emerged is the desire to keep our structures simple so that our primary bond may be to God. We acknowledge that some decisions are for all of us while others can be delegated to small groups we entrust with responsibility and authority to act on our behalf and be accountable to us. We yearn to be more visible, vibrant, diverse and spiritually rooted; and we seek new ways to connect with one another and participate in the life and work that serves God and our wider spiritual community.

Reading Re-Kindling Our Fire could lift your spirits if you know what to expect. Our yearly meeting has over 100 meetings and close to 10,000 members – we are a large organization! When members cherish the intimacy and familiarity within their monthly meeting and possibly their quarter, some may resist shifting attention to how the larger level of our religious society operates. What you will find in the plan are vision and actions for our central work. Consider the vision; are we there yet? The plan is a roadmap so we may get closer to achieving our vision.

I encourage you to read the one-page Synopsis of the plan on the PYM website. For more information, the complete plan is also available on the PYM website: we suggest that you start with the overview on pages 6-7 of the plan, which summarize the six strategic directions and proposed action steps. A transition plan beginning on page 17 shows us the way over the coming year to move from our current structures to ones that are proposed. There are also two short videos available for you to view: one with Friends speaking about New Strategic Directions and one explaining the Proposed New Organizational Structure.

When you prepare yourself by absorbing the advance materials, you are preparing for a centered spiritual experience as we come together in Session to discern our way forward as a yearly meeting. You are likely to have questions about the plan – please join us at Annual Sessions for after-lunch “Conversations with LRPG” on Thursday and Friday in the plenary room.

In Session on Saturday afternoon, July 26, we will seek divine guidance as a wide and shared community. The Long Range Planning Group recommends the Yearly Meeting move forward together with this plan. In such a complex endeavor as a five-year plan, it would be unlikely that any one of us would be enthusiastic about every item in the plan – or satisfied that every item we had hoped to be there could be found. Discernment isn’t about my or your personal preferences. It’s about what it means to be a Religious Society of Friends.

Trusting in the Guide,

Suzanne R. Day
Clerk
Long Range Planning Group
suzanne@riverfarm.org

For more information:
Synopsis of the proposed 5-year Plan for Philadelphia Yearly Meeting
Re-Kindling Our Fire: A Five-Year Plan for Philadelphia Yearly Meeting 2015-2020
Video: New Strategic Directions (16 min)
Video: Proposed Organizational Structure Explained (12 min)

PYM Today and Tomorrow

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On Saturday, April 13, the Parlor at Arch Street Meeting House was abuzz with Friends engaged in strategic planning exercises and discernment to help advance the charge of the Long Range Planning Group (LRPG). The one-day consultation, “PYM Today and Tomorrow! – Learning, Listening and Leading Together,” was organized and facilitated by LRPG members and consultant, Larry Peers, from The Alban Institute. For this event LRPG invited a cross-section of Friends representing the whole adult age-spectrum, the geographic realm of our 103 meetings and many perspectives and levels of involvement of volunteers and staff within our PYM religious community and organization.

Friends arrived with eagerness and commitment to spend a whole day together in work and fellowship on the tasks of identifying critical issues for PYM today and imagining possible strategic directions for PYM for the future. Approximately 55 individuals, divided into small groups, gave input from personal experience, paused for silent group reflection and recorded responses to separate, critical questions posed by the consultant, which were then shared back to the whole group. To the tourist who happened to enter the vestibule on a visit to the meeting house that day, there was a spectacle of people employed in some serious work together in a sea of tightly packed tables and easels – a constant hum – broken by occasional bursts of movement, applause and laughter. In addition to producing very helpful information for the ongoing efforts of LRPG, participants were able to learn and practice some of the strategic thinking skills that are useful and necessary to an effective, ongoing planning function for our religious community and organization.

Prior to the April 13 event, the LRPG have reached out to Friends across our Yearly Meeting at eight regional listening sessions in the Spring of 2012, in an exercise in the meeting for worship for business at Annual Sessions in Philadelphia last July and with a progress report in January. With gratitude for the efforts of Friends who have shared insights and experiences from a place of faith and hope along with their encouragement, LRPG members are in the process of reviewing input and selecting specific strategies to recommend in preliminary form to PYM at Annual Sessions this July. LRPG hopes Friends will come to Annual Sessions to help season the recommendations. Finally, LRPG anticipates bringing a full written report and plan to Interim Meeting in November of this year.

 

Sallie Jones
Birmingham Meeting
LRPG member and an Alternate Clerk of PYM

For more information about the Long Range Planning Group, please visit our web page.

 

Public Education Concerns Conference Draws Over 100 Participants

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On Saturday, January 26, 2013 over 100 educators gathered for the PYM Public Education Concerns Conference at the William Penn Charter School in Philadelphia.  The conference brought together a wide spectrum of over 100 teachers and leaders in education to share their latest research and highlight effective classroom experience. By gathering together public, charter, and friends school educators PYM seeks to support an engaged coalition of partners in education.

Public education in Philadelphia is at a serious crossroads, and Philadelphia area Quaker educators believe that the provision of high-quality universal public education is fundamental to sustaining a functional democracy. The PYM conference included professional development, access to resources, and community building for teachers interested in improving public education resources.  The conference included the following programs:

Keynote Speaker

Alfred Lubrano, the Philadelphia Inquirer reporter, will be the keynote speaker. The program features 18 one-hour workshops of interest to the region’s public and charter school teachers, public school activists, and educators. Lunch will be combined with affinity group discussions, followed by a closing plenary session.

Workshop Topics

The conference took a practical approach to sharing the best of what committed educators have to offer.

Student Health/Trauma /Violence

  • Traumatic Stress and its Effect on Learning – Monica Sullivan, mental health professional, Health Federation
  • No Bullying Here! — Penny Colgan-Davis, Principal of Frankford Friends School and Betsy Berger, Educator
  • Family Issues that May Affect School Attendance and Performance — Shawn M. Lacy, Executive Director of Family Support Services – addressing child neglect, abuse and developmental delays in children
  • Readying the Mind for Learning: Mindfulness Techniques — Deborah Cooper, Coordinator of Friends Counseling Service at PYM
  • Appropriate Health Services absent a School Nurse — Colleen McCawley, Director of the Child Health Watch at Public Citizens for Children and Youth

 

Creativity/ Curriculum

  • Building Background Knowledge – hands-on learning Wade Tomlinson, 7th Grade teacher at Friends School Haverford
  • How to Spark Creativity in your Students – Louis Herbst, Middle School teacher at United Friends School
  • Creating Curriculum with a Conscience – Sydney Coffin, English teacher at The University City High School; with Bonnee Breese, and Deborah Smithey
  • Science and Conscience – Matt Cinelli, Oley Valley School District and Consultant/Advisor to Gilfus Education Group
  • Doing More with Less: Finding the Resources — Amy O’Leary, Director of Development and Alumni Relations, Frankford Friends School

 

Leadership

  • Organizing Education – Teacher Action Group (TAG) — Sarah Burgess, High school social studies teacher in public and charter schools with others
  • Leading Great Schools – Joan Countryman, Oprah Winfrey School in Africa, former Head of Lincoln School in Providence, Rhode Island
  • Enduring Public/Private Partnerships that Benefit Students – the William Penn Charter and Widener Memorial Schools –Jim Ballengee, Director of Service Learning, William Penn Charter School, & George Eastburn, Former Assistant Principal, Widener Memorial School
  • Introduction to Legislative Advocacy for Education – Bill Madeira, Advocate for Children
  • Servant Leadership – Developing the Skills for Effective Learning and Change –Brian Sullivan, Arch Street Meetinghouse Trust

 

Arts

  • Interactive Theater in the Classroom – Lisa Epstein, Artistic Director of Gas and Electric Arts in Mt Airy, PA
  • Making Sure there is Art and Art Education for Philly’s Students — Gretchen Iverson, Director of the Picasso Project, an arts advocacy division of PCCY
  • Integrating Art in the Classroom — Gillian Pokalo, Art Instructor at Plymouth Meeting Friends School