After many years of working to understand and support everyday communications about diversity in educational communities, I’ve expanded to examine the full range of communications in diverse communities that affect the success of young people.

In fall 2009, the Ford Foundation funded me as PI of the OneVille Project to work with people across the diverse community of Somerville, MA, to explore ways to support communication between the family members, educators, community members, and peers in young people’s lives. I’m now working with a growing community team of parents, researchers, community organizers, media people, young people and educators. OneVille's working hypothesis: if young people and the people who share their lives communicate regularly about how young people are doing, share ideas and information about supporting young people, and work together to support young people in targeted ways, every young person in Somerville can succeed. The project also contends that every young person’s success lifts the success of other young people and the community, as the learning environment improves overall.

The Superintendent, Mayor, and community of Somerville have welcomed our inquiry. This is an exciting joint exploration into a community as an ecosystem of communications about young people -- communications among educators, family members, young people, and community members, that happen using technology, face to face, and on paper. We’re learning a great deal about which communications among which people in a diverse community support community members to support the success of every child. (www.oneville.org).

The team has been testing tools and approaches that could support people in Somerville to communicate and work together to pursue the full potential of every young person. I'm researching those efforts and existing communication between the different people in Somerville young people’s lives.