Howdunnit

In recent years glottophobia has been the subject of growing awareness in France and has led a number of public figures to speak out about how they have been shamed for their accents.

A residential recycling program in Philadelphia is picking up electronics and clothing from homes for a fee. Retrievr has already prevented 100,000 pounds of waste from ending up in landfills. The program was implemented through the city’s Pitch & Pilot program which put out call for “solutions to reduce waste and increase waste diversion” in a bid to achieve Philadelphia’s goal of Zero Waste by 2035.

Amy Edelstein thought that if high school students knew how to meditate they could learn how to focus, stay on track, and regulate negative self-talk. They could become better. So, in 2014 she started the Inner Strength Foundation to provide public schools with research-backed mindfulness curriculum. The curriculum has become a 12-week program, with instructors visiting classrooms in 19 schools across the city once a week.

The Brock Commons Tallwood House in Canada was the tallest building made of wood when it opened in 2017. Now, thanks to government policies, scientific research, and hundreds of examples of proof-of-concept, more developers around the world are looking to construct buildings out of timber. Using timber is cheaper than cement, concrete, and steel and can actually store carbon emissions in its supports instead of releasing the greenhouse gas into the atmosphere.

Instrument rentals help to address a gap in privilege. The Central Branch of Brooklyn Public Library in New York City is one of several programs in the US and Canada that loan out musical instruments for free. The program in NYC began with the support of a grant from BKLYN Incubator. Similar programs in Philadelphia and Toronto, Canada, loan instruments to members of their community through funding from grant programs.

By Courtney Duchene reporting for The Philadelphia Citizen

Jumpstart Germantown and five spinoff programs trained about 1,000 people in the art of locally controlled neighborhood rehabilitation. The Jumpstart programs target particular neighborhoods, mainly mid-range housing stock with vacant and deteriorating conditions, and lend money to newly minted developers to fix and resell the properties. Housing rehabs maintain the character of neighborhoods, rather than gentrifying them or making wholesale redevelopment changes. Beyond the community improvement benefits, the program helps diversify the real estate business and provides employment opportunities.

The Philadelphia Black Giving Circle supports Black-led and Black-serving nonprofits, offering funding that was raised through the Black community. The giving circle has helped to build personal relationships with people of color, strengthen the community, and increase donation amounts to nonprofits tackling issues in the community. The initiative is an effort to model a more equitable form of philanthropy.

Since he took over the Volusia County, Florida, Sheriff's Office in 2016, Philadelphia police veteran Mike Chitwood changed many of his department's personnel and put the entire 1,000-employee department through de-escalation training. By 2019, the reforms were credited with cutting deputies' use of force in half, all while crime dropped by 40% and arrests by 30%. A core piece of the training, inspired by Scottish police, is the Police Executive Research Forum's ICAT program, which emphasizes critical thinking and communication skills over the threat of deadly force.

The Iowa Correctional Institution for Women has reformed how inmates are treated, adapting approaches informed by gender and past trauma. A new campus provides private counseling suites and a mental health unit, larger cells with light controls and a visitation area with play space and a garden so women can engage with their children. Disciplinary policies have also shifted toward building women up for returning to society rather than automatic discipline for small infractions.

Facebook groups are reuniting bicycle-theft victims with their property by creating a place to report thefts and alerting others to be on the lookout for the bikes. A pandemic-inspired boom in bicycling, as a means to avoid public transportation, has fed a concurrent boom in bike thefts. Police praise the Facebook groups' public spirit and effectiveness, but warn of risks when confronting those trying to sell stolen bikes. More than 90% of bike theft reports to police hit a dead end, lowering faith in the police as a solution.