“The real question is: do you think there is a need for organizing in Greensboro? Do you think there is a need for organizing on Guilford College campus? Is there a need for you to be part of something which is trying to change this community and the area in which you are living?”

Gerald Taylor — lead organizer for the Industrial Areas Foundation’s Southeast region chapter — posed these and other questions in a preliminary discussion held with Guilford students and faculty on Feb. 17 in Bryan Jr. Auditorium to see whether Guilford has the drive and potential to become a new chapter of the IAF.

The IAF, America’s oldest community-organizing network, is an affiliation which enables communities to fight systematic injustice and social inequities through grassroots organizing.

“We move into communities by invitation only,” said Taylor. “This step is intentional; it forces communities to organize around getting signatures for our invitation.”

Sherry Giles, associate professor of justice and policy studies, organized the event. Giles received training by the IAF while she was working as a counselor in the public school system of Brooklyn, N.Y. 

“I saw that organizing parents to address the issues that made it hard to raise their children in their neighborhoods gave (the parents) the confidence and skills to improve their lives and their communities,” said Giles in an e-mail interview.

Giles hopes that Taylor’s talk will spark discussions among students, faculty and staff on the problems they feel most strongly about changing.

“It’s key to find issues that a large number of people feel passionate about,” Giles said. “One of the wonderful things about organizing is that it builds community.”

Taylor also emphasized the need to listen to what individuals care most about.

“We will always be called outside agitators,” Taylor said. “That’s exactly right, I don’t deny it. I’m very proud of it. Our goal is to change the fabric of a place.”

This cannot be achieved, however, unless the organizers focus on the idiosyncratic struggles unique to each location, ultimately entering into a reciprocal relationship with the communities they are helping to organize.

Taylor discussed the strategies the IAF has employed successfully in the past.

“Civil disruption is about using resources and people in as creative a way as possible to achieve change,” Taylor said.

When a Chicago mayor in the 1960s refused to meet with community members, the IAF threatened to organize an event that Taylor jokingly referred to as a “shit-in.” The plan was to bring one thousand people to the O’Hare airport and occupy every bathroom stall and urinal.

“The mayor was panicking because he knew if this happened it would cause a major back-up,” Taylor said. “We got our meeting.”

But far from dwelling on the past, Taylor provoked attendees of the meeting to search within themselves for those issues they are willing to fight for.

“So is there any reason to organize here,” Taylor said again. “Or are you all living in paradise? You don’t have any debt; you don’t have anything to worry about. Well that’s good. It’s nice that there can be places like that.”

Taylor emphasized the fact that as college graduates, we will not be immune to hardship and injustice.

“Our economy is in serious trouble,” Taylor said. “If you want a world where there are going to be employment opportunities for you — quality jobs in the area you are interested in — you are going to have to help fight to get them.”

In order to collaborate with IAF, the next step for Guilford will be to join together as a community and determine what it is that we are passionate about changing.

Senior Zak Wear sees potential in a partnership between the college and IAF.

“We have a lot of really energetic students here, but many of the initiatives I have seen have been mildly uncoordinated to say the least,” said Wear. “I feel like strength of the IAF becoming involved with Guilford is that it will give us a much more deliberate focus in terms of what we are trying to accomplish.”

Interested students may contact Sherry Giles at [email protected].