/* Written 9:12 AM Oct 26, 1994 by ctwo in igc:ctwo.news */
/* ---------- "The New Generation of Organizers" ---------- */
CELEBRATING THE MINORITY ACTIVIST APPRENTICESHIP PROGRAM
The Minority Activist Apprenticeship Program is CTWO's organizer training
program. It has produced hundreds of highly-trained community and labor
organizers, most of whom continue to work in social justice organizations
around the country. 1994 was MAAP's tenth year, celebrated with a gala
banquet in downtown Oakland.
The short quotes below are made-up interior dialogues that originally
appeared alongside candid shots of MAAP interns during the course of their
first week orientation and introduction to organizing.
After that is a short article about MAAP that appeared in the Fall 1994
CTWO Times, the newsletter of the Center for Third World Organizing. The
CTWO Times is free, can can be had by calling CTWO at (510) 533-7583 and
asking to be put on the mailing list. Or write to 1218 East 21st Street,
Oakland, CA 94606. Or send e-mail to
There are five responses to this topic, which are the site reports from
five cities and towns where MAAP interns were placed in 1994 for their
field training.
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"Oh my God, what have I gotten myself into? Am I going to be able to do
this? Do I want to do this? Wow, talk about diversity. Food's not bad.
When are they going to give us a break? I don't think I'm going to like
doorknocking. Hey, that skinny guy with the hair is pretty cute! Let's
see: Monday night we have a session, Tuesday night another one, Wednesday
another one. There's always Thursday. Damn. Maybe Ill take a nap instead.
Doorknocking isn't so bad after all. Met some nice people out there, wasn't
even scared. Yeah, I can do this. Now, I wonder where they are going to
send me. That one sister seems like a real hard-ass, hope they dont send me
to her site. But this stuff is fresh, like, I wish I knew all this when we
were trying to jam those university suits. Wonder where I'm going. . .
Uh, oh. Not a ritual. This is sure to be lame. Standing together, singing,
holding hands, hearing people talk out loud about their hopes and their
fears. This is cool. I am inspired! Ready to go out and agitate, organize,
put the pieces together. Man, those folks in the 'hood are going to be
glad to see me! We are going to do some organizing!"
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TEN YEARS OF MAAP!
The Minority Activist Apprenticeship Program is ten years old! What began
as a plan to develop a program to train organizers of color has turned into
one of the countrys best organizer training schools.
Hundreds of MAAP graduates now staff grassroots social justice
organizations, labor unions, advocacy groups and other organizations from
one end of the country to another. United by their common experience in
MAAP, inspired by the long and remarkable history of grassroots organizing
in communities of color, and driven by a burning desire for justice, these
dynamic organizers daily make significant contributions to campaigns for
dignity, fair treatment and equality.
"In my opinion, if we did not have MAAP we would have to sit down and
invent it immediately," says Mark Toney, director of Direct Action for
Rights and Equality in Providence, Rhode Island. "Highly-trained and
motivated organizers of color are in high demand these days, and nobody
turns out more highly-trained or better-motivated organizers than MAAP. I
only wish MAAP could produce ten times the number."
The tenth anniversary of MAAP was celebrated at a gala banquet, held at an
Oakland restaurant called the Lantern, on August 12. More than three
hundred friends and colleagues turned out to enjoy the festivities, meet up
with folks in the CTWO family they may not have seen in months or years,
and take a look back at some of the MAAPs history. On the walls were
poster-sized photos from MAAP years stretching back to 1985, when three
interns worked with the Farm Labor Organizing Committee in Toledo, Ohio.
MAAP interns traditionally have gone to work with outside labor unions and
community organizations such as FLOC, but as CTWO has grown over the years
and started organizing projects in three cities most interns now work with
CTWO-initiated projects. Wherever they wind up, MAAP graduates always find
themselves dropped in the middle of a hot organizing campaign. "It's pretty
exciting," says MAAP graduate Gina Acebo, "and I can defintely say that
MAAP changed my whole life."
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MAAP GRADUATES
1985 Gloria Alonzo Francis Calpotura Evelyn Rodriquez
1986 Marcos Beleche Maria Borje Glenn Caddick Martin Carrera Arron Guevara
Miguel Luna Wende Marshall Saul Martinez Sonia Pea Donna Reed Earlene
Somera Pat Stuart Sandra Walters Kathleen Washington Carmen Zelaya
1987 Regina Acebo Michael Asman Guerrero Clifford Bernie Kathy Byun Jeffrey
Chang Lamont Chatman Milyoung Cho Alice Criner Mark Iwasaki Nancy Lee Jos
Martinez Deborah Moran Mike Mostafa Alfred Perez Theresa Perez Nancy Pineda
Richard Ramirez Tonya Rhodes Stephanie Ro Sandra Saunders Rinku Sen Martin
Sul Cheryl Taylor Vea Thai
1988 Marita Alvarez Antoine Bracy Lisa Castellano Luz Catarineau Lisa Chan
Julie Chan Margaret Coan Ana Collado Tomica Gergerson Tracy Hampton
Joselito Laudencia Ya-Lin Lin Mazaina Meritt Vasuki Nesiah Ramona Ruark
John Reed Micahel Sandoval Michele Stein Kisa Takesue Alex Torres Jiway
Tung Phua Xiong Claire Jung Jin Yoo
1989 Telia Anderson Elsa Barboza Samuel Beckless Michael Brown Joannie
Chang Lisa Coxson Sandra Davis Frank Eason Susan Fernandez Douglas Fischer
Gary Fresquez Margarita Gutierrez Ernie Guzman Charles Huang Mona Ingram
Zeenab Johnson Manosothy Ken Juliana La Battaglia Jeannie Roxas London
Barbara Nabors-Glass Antoinette Rouse Philip Ting Young-Im Janel Yoo
1990 Anuradha Advani Sumeeta Gawande Josu Guillen Alex Gutierrez Daniel
HoSang Wei-Ling Huber Nancy Johnson Peter Lin Rumi Matsuyama Rima McCoy
Raquel Murillo Nelson Nuez Rowena Pineda Niru Somasundaram Theresa
Thuy-Diep Tran
1991 Belkis Bais Nicole Cuadra Libero Della Piana Rochelle Dodd Aida Franco
Amy Hsi Linh Tue Hong Karen Khor Sam Liu La Raye Lyles Claudia Martinez
Guadalupe Medina Rosana Reyes Cristina Riegos Maria Salazar Rahdi Taylor
Patty Wing Lau Gail Yamauchi
1992 Vince Barron Mary Boler Wendall Chin Harvey Daniels Conteh Davis
Thomas Garrett James Johnson Hong Luu Ngethe Maina Rafael Medina Francisco
Navarette Suk Rhee Tousette Sefman Patricia Torres
1993 Shaka Akil Saquana Charley Lulu Chou Lisa Cohen Aime Cole Antonio Diaz
Patricia Edwards Alex Gutierrez Mario Hill Danielle Mahones Steven W. Moore
Karimah Nonyameko Deepali Punjabi Arun Rasiah Thy Tran Jhomphy Ventura
Cindy Wiesner Gloria Yellowhorse Ruth Yun
1994
Maria Corral Mimi Ho Alice Lee Dawn Philips Stacey Reed Ted
Robinson Ikuko Sato Zovie Shivers Lihbin Shiao Corry Stevenson
Lead MAAP Shakira Abdullah Flora Burke Rita Cotton Darryl Epps
Gwen Hardy Dale Jackson Ann Johnson Shannon Smith Robbie Smith
Kevin Watley