Organizing Communities and Empowering Youth with Mr. Jahmal Cole

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

Chicago, community, started, podcast, feel, hoodie, activists, today, Malcolm, learning, campus, kids, leading, school, talk

SPEAKERS

Amy Vujaklija, Joi Patterson, Jahmal Cole

Jahmal Cole: 00:03

success looks like moving towards my fear. How can I not be fearful today? How can I not do that? Right?

Amy Vujaklija: 00:11

Welcome to our podcast teaching and leading with Dr. Amy and Dr. Joi. I am Dr. Amy Vujaklija, Director of educator preparation. And I

Joi Patterson: 00:23

am Dr. Joi Patterson chief diversity officer. Our podcast addresses issues through the lens of diversity, equity and inclusion, along with solutions for us to grow as educators. So

Amy Vujaklija: 00:38

join us on our journey to become better teachers and leaders. So let's get into it. Hello, Dr. Joi.

Joi Patterson: 00:48

Hello, Dr. Amy.

Amy Vujaklija: 00:50

Wow. We are alive in broadcasting from our very own Governor State University's podcast booth for our radio Jaguar.

Joi Patterson: 01:00

Absolutely go go upstate. This is exciting, and it's super exciting that we have our first guest in the radio room right. Mr. Jamal Cole.

Amy Vujaklija: 01:15

Jahmal Cole came to us today to speak for our Martin Luther King Jr. Breakfast and a fantastic event. We had music from Crete Monix jazz band speakers, Jahmal Cove really led us with some inspiration and some stories and we want to go further with that today. Their one on one time with him? Yes, absolutely. Jahmal Cole is a champion of social justice. His mission is to build a more interconnected Chicago on the pillars of service and education. As the founder and CEO of the city's fastest growing social impact organization. My Block my hood, my city. Jamal Cole is the creator of an exposure based education program for teens, and a network of volunteer initiatives that serves Chicago communities year round. Traveling youth, mentorship and community organizing are the subjects of Jamal's highly acclaimed books and speeches. He has spoken to audiences ranging from high school students to the mayor of Chicago. In 2022, Jahmal Cole received an honorary doctorate degree in humanities in philanthropy from Adler University. Congratulations Dr. Cole, and was voted best activist by the Chicago Reader Jabaal was named one of the 25 most powerful Chicagoans by cranes magazine. He has also been awarded the 2020 American Red Cross Community Impact Hero Award. In 2019, Jahmal Cole was named to Crain's 40, under 40. He's also the recipient of the 2019 champion of Freedom Award, the 2018 Chicago Defender men of excellence on array and the 2018 Chicago City Council resolution award in 2018. He was also named one of the 20 most inspiring Chicagoans by streetwise magazine, and a Chicago in of the Year by Chicago magazine. He was recently voted 2021, activist of the Year by Chicago magazine. Welcome to our podcast.

Jahmal Cole: 03:41

Thank you for having me. Thank you for having me here today. It's a beautiful campus.

Joi Patterson: 03:46

Thank you. It is such a pleasure. So before we really get into it, and we have a lot of questions for you, actually, we want you to do most of the talk. But we have some questions for you. I want our audience to get to know you better. So tell us about you know your critical journey that led you on this pathway to where you are now in doing the activism work that you're doing. Yeah,

Jahmal Cole: 04:10

I'm just a my dad was playing Malcolm X and Stokely Carmichael. I watched the movie Malcolm X. So many times I thought Denzel Washington was Malcolm X growing up, like, everybody was watching Aladdin and I was watching Malcolm X. My dad would play Malcolm speeches in the car. At the basketball games. Everybody's playing music. My dad's playing Malcolm X, you know, and so, everybody teased me and called me Booker T Washington and all that kind of stuff. He made me wear suits to school every day. But I wanted to be like Malcolm, I wanted to be like Martin. I wanted people to think I was smart. I wanted the crowd to cheer for me. I wanted to, I wanted to speak in front of the currency exchange and the beauty supply store and get the oohs and ahhs and teach people. So I just tried to do that as my backdrop. The beauty of the beauty supply store is my back backdrop. I just went in and started learning about my community and figuring out how I could teach people if the red line was closing down for a year. I want to know is that a inconvenience to people? If charter schools are moving in? Is that an inconvenience? How do you feel about that versus traditional public schools? What's going on in community? How can I learn and teach people and I, I just went for gusto, just go into the library every month and begging the branch manager to let me use the community room. And flyer all month, nobody would show up, and he feel bad and sent his staff in there. Listen to me speak, due at the end of next month, and two people will show up, I'd appreciate them that turned into four. I appreciate it. It turned into eight that's kind of I just started that way, really from the mud.

Joi Patterson: 05:31

Earlier this week. Dr. Amy and I, we had an opportunity to interview Dr. Crystal Harris. And our conversation was on racial healing, you know, in celebration of the National Day of racial healing. And she also talked about her childhood and her parents, and how that was the start of her activism. So it's just, I love how it just all comes together. It's part of who you are like you didn't have a choice.

Jahmal Cole: 06:01

No, my mom was a Jehovah Witness. She raised us, we went to the hall three times a week. And so Sundays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, I'd have to put out and then Saturdays going out knocking on those doors. I didn't know I was learning to be a community organizer. I hated going to church on Sundays, because I wanted to watch football, my dad, but my dad insisted that I go because he said, I don't want you to be afraid to talk to white people. So you got to go to the church. And so I had to go four times a week with my mom. And so that's kind of my mom, I you know, my dad takes a lot of credit. But my mom really spent the 10,000 hours with me, reading the Bible, learning how to memorize presentations and giving hand gesture. So I spent a lot of time doing that.

Amy Vujaklija: 06:41

Let's talk more about your inspiration. Sure. You've right that you didn't ask for the role of community activist, but it's when you lead with love. Yeah, you truly do. What are who would you say is your biggest inspiration?

Jahmal Cole: 07:01

I would say it sounds cliche, but Barack Obama probably, you know, because when I was I don't know how 24 and I saw him at the bud Billiken parade. I felt like I want to, that's gonna be a president like, wow, like, would it who is who is that? You know, he wasn't even a senator. He was running against allen keys. But he was confident he was married. He was on the back of a Benz waving to the people in the crowd. I was like, I want to be like that, like, who was that? And then I read his book. And I was like, wow, he has like, he's teaching the fundamentals to community organizing. Like, if he left a playbook on how he did it, what? I'm going to all go gardens where he started, so I just followed everything he did, like, okay. And I read about his elections and how, you know, his wife was new, Michelle was like, Man, you bought the spin off kids college money, if you've been losing the he's like, I let her take comfort in the fact that I was gonna lose, like, what does brilliant. It's so well, my wife was always like, well, you spent too much money. And like, I've read the playbook on this before. Obama to me is, um, I'm very rarely Am I super nervous when I got to meet him. I think what I said to him was like, he'd been in so many countries, and he was just like, that's all came

Joi Patterson: 08:13

up. That's the question. You thought.

Jahmal Cole: 08:16

All these countries, he was like, what? Yeah. And so, yeah, I got to go to a basketball game with him one time, and I thought that was just phenomenal. So that's

Joi Patterson: 08:24

great. Wow. So we introduced you earlier, you know, as being a catalyst for change. And that doesn't come easy. It doesn't come without a lot of drama. Right. So what actions have you taken if you could think that you've gotten the most pushback on number one? And also, what do you say to your haters? And then I kind of want you to expound on that too, because we're not just talking about normal everyday haters. You have some extreme haters, so you've been able to relate to Dr. King, you've been able to relate to Malcolm X. Can you talk about that? Yeah.

Jahmal Cole: 09:14

Well, I try not to respond to my ego now. Because, you know, I'm 40. And so I'm trying to, you know, be more mature. And I recognize I got kids and I don't want them to, you know, to make the same mistakes I did. There's some activists come up to me and they say, Well, you know, you're, you're not you like Dr. King. You're not like Malcolm, we're like Malcolm, like, we're on the front lines, like you like Dr. King and like, I want to be Malcolm, like, What do you mean, like, well, I want to be like, you know, and but I realized there's a lot of different types of activists and we all have our different roles and, and, you know, tactics on how we tackle issues. Some activists their specialty, is making sure causes aren't forgotten or being behind ambulances. Some activists like me have nonprofit programs where we take teenagers on field trips. All that is good for Chicago because it puts pressure on institutions to address issues we care about. So I've learned to just not react in, in, in Think about it. But yeah, I am again. And also I stand guard at the door, my thoughts and I watch what I take in. But I can't be petty sometimes I will go to Instagram. And if somebody says something negative about me, I'm sensitive, you know, you've spent all month working on a speech, and then you get 50,000 views and somebody comments negatively, you know that. That's not it's not the best. And so I sometimes I'm petty and I will go look into who that person is. But anyways, I am. I'm growing. I'm growing, and I'm evolving. So

Amy Vujaklija: 10:41

hopefully we all are. Yeah. Martin Luther King Jr. said, if you want to change the world, pick up a pen and write. You have done just that. Could you share a little about what writing has done for you and for your community? What impact do you hope your writing will have?

Jahmal Cole: 11:04

Yeah, I tried to write a book a year, you know, I grew up listening to NAS, and him being vulnerable. And um, you know, I've written seven so far. Yeah. And so I writing is the way I learn like being creative. It takes a brave person to be creative. And I learn best by creating and so I am. I try to plagiarize life, like that's my style of writing. Like if I'm on the red line, and here's how it smells or here's how that sounds want to change the pop in or, or it's really just, when I reflect after the day on what I did, and turn those things into my things that I tried to do like currency exchange campaign, we're all standing on the currency exchange and assigned to one and 50 people look for bank accounts, instead of cashing a check at the currency exchange. I will I find it fascinating when I started doing research that over the course of a lifetime as people spend $40,000 in fees at the currency exchange, and they charge 3% on your $100, but they have bulletproof glass windows up to me, I'm like, You're robbing us. But you have the bulletproof glass windows up, you know what I mean? So I write about stuff like that, because it's a I plagiarize everything that happens in my life.

Amy Vujaklija: 12:12

What impact have you already seen from the writing that you've done?

Jahmal Cole: 12:18

Well, it encourages my daughters to write. My daughter wants to write horror movies, I have no clue why I'm scared of watching scary movies. I have the washroom with her in the daytime now what she wants to write, and I don't know why she wants to do that. But anyways, I think that, um, also, if you have a book, you don't need a resume. Like, you know, like, I've never had to have a resume for a job. When I come in, I just bring the book and that says everything you need to say like, Hey, this is what I've done. And people

Joi Patterson: 12:45

are you can bring your daughter.

Jahmal Cole: 12:48

She's get the job, and I wouldn't for sure. See you. Yeah.

Joi Patterson: 12:55

This week, we you know, first of all, Amy, we're behind in our writing. Yes, that that is amazing.

Jahmal Cole: 13:04

You have inspired me 1000 words a day. 1000 a day, you got it.

Joi Patterson: 13:07

Oh my goodness. And and so you're teaching your daughter, you're modeling for your daughter, just like your parents did for you. This week, we've learned several things about racial trauma in the healing process. One, starting with research and history. The next step was connection, making connections, and you're out there making these connections all the time. The third thing was healing. You know, and that takes us working together with a diverse group. And then that fourth thing is taking action, which you are doing, you're taking a lot of action. So what something so this is advice to us if you could give us advice. And Governor State University, this is this is our hood. Right? And we have a whole community around us. And Dr. Amy and I in particular, we do a lot with Title One schools in our area. So we're constantly reaching out and we have programs. What is something that you think that we could do as a community where we take action?

Jahmal Cole: 14:24

Yeah, leadership to me is taking action. It's not really what you say is taking action. And I think that allowing students from under resourced communities to experience your campus would be a great way to take action.

Joi Patterson: 14:36

And I see you understood what title one and I should have explained Title One schools were but these are students who at least have 40% 40% or more on free reduced lunch. So we're talking about schools that have a high poverty population. So thank you, but you jumped in. You knew exactly yeah,

Jahmal Cole: 14:54

for sure. I didn't even know a food stamp. You know, wasn't real money. And so I put one in a pot machine and it broke. So As I found out, I was on welfare growing up, but I loved free lunches, but But I say that to say, yeah, thank God that you guys are doing that work. That's leadership. Because a lot of kids, they don't know what's possible until they get on the campus and see it like man, like, like you guys have art garden outside, you know, that's, that blows people's mind, you know, I mean, like, wow, who created that? Who were they? Were they rich? How do they believe in themselves and their ideas like they made it happen, right. And so you guys exposing kids to your campus, now it's possible for them. And exposure is key. So that's one of the ways also allowing speakers like myself to come to campus and arouse enthusiasm or inspire hope. I think that is a really good way to get people together. And people want to work at places that are socially engaged. So I think that's how you can keep people so y'all are leaders in that regard. So

Amy Vujaklija: 15:50

no, I get pulled into the news vortex. We know it can be really disturbing. It's really heartbreaking and hard. nationally, locally, globally. But I love what you said, Stand guard at the door of your thoughts. What are ways you keep positive energy while still staying informed about what is going on in the world and the community? What advice do you have for us who gets sucked in and need to stay afloat?

Jahmal Cole: 16:24

I try to listen to my wife more. I mean, because I feel like she is smart. She is I'm learning I'm learning. Because she's keeps me grounded. You know, she always um, she wants to go on. Let the end of the month she wants to go to California. I'm like, No, I don't want to go. But I realized that life happens in between your plan so I can have all these speeches planned. I can have all this activism plan, but she's like, let's go to Atlanta or let's go to Cali or let's do something. And I'm just starting to like to trust her that her judgment and all that stuff. So I'm also I spend time with my kids. You know, they don't care nothing about you know, you know, I'm dad and they're gonna try to pull my my beard or pull up my hair. My daughters think my hair is ugly, my cut your hair and go back to what you were doing before. And I only started growing it because my son, I wanted to keep him healthy for 18 years. That's why I started growing it but But anyways, yeah, so I listened to my wife, I tried to stand on like, I tried to, if I say I'm gonna do something, I tried to do it. Oh, and anytime that I get weary, I volunteer. Like, I think that that is the key to getting back into the work. Once you get around your ear to the streets, you go out there that really kindles the spirit of community organizer for me.

Amy Vujaklija: 17:34

You shared some stories during your talk today. And that's about being part of the community. Hearing the narratives. You have your own narrative, your own stories. Could you share some of the stories that keep you grounded that keep you volunteering? Keep you working as a mentor? Yeah.

Jahmal Cole: 18:00

Of course, I I was talking earlier about the kids that I asked like Marco asked him, I said, Hey, you know, what do you do this weekend? He said, I had a great weekend. Jamal, you know, I ate some good food. I got to travel a little bit. I got to dance. I was like, well, that's awesome. And I would just have a family reunion. He's like, Oh, no, I just want to leak in signs on Saturday night. This is the best funeral ever been to the best funeral you ever been to this kid was in ninth grade. He had been a 15 funerals. You know, I won. I went to in Atlanta. My wife's from Atlanta. So recently, I'm working on another book called it's not regular to. And so I'm doing research. And I passed by a gun store in Atlanta, and they had a machine gun with a silencer in the window. And so I stopped by to talk to the owner. Like, what's the purpose of a machine gun with a silencer? There's not a lot of deer out here with a you know, bulletproof vest, like why do you get to a machine is that? Well, first of all, it's not called a silencer. And it's in the movies. It's called an air compressor. And the reason why I have it is easy is for home defense, as a home defense is that yet this gun is so loud, that if you were to shoot it off in your house, you would hurt your kids and your wife's eardrums. So you want to get the bad guys, right? You don't want to hurt that. I was like, go, that's not regular. So anyway, that kind of stuff to me is like blows my mind. And those stories irked me to the point where I want to wake people up by writing or speaking or challenging them. And um, yeah, that's, that's why that that inspires me to do it.

Joi Patterson: 19:27

So I want to go back to connection. Sure, because I actually saw this today. And a couple of times in your story. You talked about the young man and him what we would have considered of maybe it was a family reunion or something. It was a funeral to him. But you make that connection and you don't judge and I think that's what pulls us apart is that we think we can relate. And although that may not be your experience, yeah, but being able to draw that person in and have a connection. Yeah. It is important. I also saw you with those high school students today. Yeah. And I saw fire. I saw you really in your element as a mentor and connecting with them. I want to know from you because in your organization and we have we're we're sporting our hoodies, I wish you all could see them my block my hood, my city, and I was born and raised in Chicago in Inglewood. I purchased my first home as an adult in Ashburn community. So I'm a proud Chicagoland. So I know you have a wonderful strategic plan for this organization, because we're seeing some of the fruits of your labor. What does success look like to you?

Jahmal Cole: 20:56

success looks like being alive. success looks like. Like every day is a battle between inclination and obligation. I'm inclined to do a lot of things, but I'm obligated to be a father to be a husband. success looks like making the right decisions every day for me. success looks like moving towards my fear. How can I not be fearful today? How can I not do that? Right? How can I? Yeah, that success. Um, my goal is to be a mayor. So that's my goal has always been like something I want to try to do. I want to I want to take a stand with integrity for what I believe in. But every time I like have a goal, God has a way of like, having his own lands for me. So I wanted to be a better listener, I think that'd be success for me. I want to be fearless. I think that would be success for me and be alive, man, because I got a cat. And I don't want to. I want to speak life into myself and others. So while you're

Joi Patterson: 22:13

here for a reason, I know you've been targeted three times. Because of the work that you're doing, and to survive those three horrific incident. You're here for reasons I hope you know that.

Jahmal Cole: 22:28

Yes, I received that. I appreciate that. I believe that. I believe that because that's traumatizing in itself. Like you know, that's really traumatizing. There's still with me, I still have PTSD today. I was shoveling snow on 71st and Merrill the other day and someone drove by and I was like, Man, I still have this PTSD, PTSD thing, and my wife sees it when I go to Atlanta or I leave Chicago. She's like, man, you calmer out here. You know, I don't realize that there's, you know, you almost just have to like, have your guards up all the time. You know, you don't want I got security. Now. You notice like that security. That's weird. It is weird, super weird. But anyways, that's we got to do so.

Amy Vujaklija: 23:10

We started this podcast in 2020, in the midst of the pandemic, and we didn't know what we were about to embark on. I feel like in many ways, we started walking into our fear, and talking about some tough topics to have issues, and always seemed to come through no matter what we were talking about. It was teaching, it was learning it was leading, but it always had a threat of equity and diversity and inclusion. And I'm wondering, what you might offer to us, is a step for us to help us walk into our fear, too. Guide us, what can we do on the podcast to have a greater impact? And greater positive impact? Yeah,

Jahmal Cole: 24:04

well, I think that, um, you guys starting a podcast around that time is very, it's awesome. It's also okay, I want to say it's striking, because, you know, a lot of companies in that time started reaching out to nonprofit organizations, and they, you didn't know if they cared about like, just as being denied or they cared about business being interrupted. So people in 2020, around George Floyd, they were, they were empathetic, and then 2021 I felt like they were compassionate. 2022 two, I felt like they were showing up. I guess that's compassionate, too. But in 2023, there's like a diversity, equity inclusion fatigue, like people are like, Ah, I don't you know, I'm not going to support the same organizations. So I would say that it's awesome that you guys are are consistently still going. I would. I would use just that like you use audio. I will use images as well to people that you bring into your podcast. I think that'd be You know, just seeing y'all is amazing. And you know you. Wow. Like I think just seeing a picture of that. I don't know if you guys are already doing that, but I'm saying that I wouldn't use that imagery. I would also just find like, whoever has a lot of followers on Instagram and I would find somebody with a big followership that is, it could be a comedian from Chicago, it can be like, corporate, I don't know if you know, he is he has a million followers and he makes videos off his iPhone, bring him here, talk to him, how did you build this? How do you make these TV shows with your with your iPhone, bring him in this campus and talk to him. I think students are going to want to know that it's gonna blow their mind is he he's doing it. I think that that will. I don't know. That's like

Joi Patterson: 25:41

you're pretty mind blowing too. And I just want to remind our audience that you're listening to teaching and leading with Dr. Amy and Dr. Joy, and today, we have the incredible Mr. Jamal Cole, the CEO and founder of my block my hood, my city, and we're here this week on Martin Luther King, Jr. Week observing all the things that he's done. We've had a remarkable week. And today is like no other. Mr. Cole is spreading his love. He's sharing his views and his values, his perspective with our faculty, staff, students, and our partnering school Creek, Moni high schools. So we just really, really appreciate you being here. And you just talked about Dr. Amy, you could do this, you could do that you could do this. But we could do you doing? Well. So we have won silver silver awards, you know, wow. So we have about 100, in almost 100 will be near 150, some published podcasts. And now we're doing radio. So we're happy, we're evolving. And anytime we want to give up because I'm sure you've had time to this is a lot of work. Yeah. And we don't we don't get paid for the, you know, it's a lot of work. And anytime we feel like giving up. We meet someone like you. Yeah. And so this happens to us on a weekly basis. Someone like us, and then we say we can't stop. Yeah, there's so much to offer the community right there. Yeah. So much for us to learn. There's so many ways for us to connect. And we just want to be part of what you're part of, of just building community. Yeah, you know, having a more inclusive, equitable community. So we really respect the work that you're doing. We're ecstatic that you took the time to be with us today. Thank you.

Amy Vujaklija: 27:55

I'm curious about some of the fire that was happening with the crit Moni high school students

Jahmal Cole: 28:01

with fire. Yeah, yeah, I just sharing my story. I just I want to, it's not. I want to express more so than, yeah, I was just gonna express myself. Right. And, yes, I wanted them to feel that passion, because that's really what separates you. And and just, yeah,

Joi Patterson: 28:19

so it is a lesson for us to learn because I saw that connection. And you don't want to be so far removed, removed, where you can't relate to them. Yeah. So that's another thing we started talking about, as of last week, right? We don't want to be removed from students, we have to be able to connect to them, we have to even be able to see their pain. And respond to that. Yeah. And not shy away from it. So I saw all of that connection going on. But it's that connection. You know, especially when we have freshmen students hear, and it's hard retaining freshman college students, right, you know, that, you know, and many of them do not make it to their sophomore year. Yeah. And I think having that ability to connect better. Yeah,

Jahmal Cole: 29:10

I try to lead into storytelling. I think the storytelling element is I tell myself, Jamal, you're a great storyteller every day. And I try to tell teach through storytelling, that's kind of my what I learned from my nights, but as far as like, expressing myself. I just want to be vulnerable. And if I'm vulnerable, I think that's the bridge to connecting with people. So that's what I was trying to do today is like, make sure when you say it, you know, people will remember like, remember, like, 1% of your speech, but they can go walk away feeling like oh, man, I'll go into the league that'll go into the league, and they're gonna remember that, you know, and so I just want to if they remember it says that but I think I did my job. Well, thank

Joi Patterson: 29:46

you. It's been a pleasure. Ya know, I

Amy Vujaklija: 29:48

like what you're saying about vulnerability. we shy away from that, but that is the biggest piece of connection that we can offer. So before we close, I'd like to You know, our listeners would like to know, what initiatives do you have going on right now? What are some upcoming events that you can share that we can maybe get involved in?

Jahmal Cole: 30:11

Yeah, so we have our hoodie ball coming up on February 17. And so it's our annual fundraiser at the top of the Hancock, it's February 17. Definitely come where whatever hoodie means something to you. It could be your favorite sports team, a fraternity or sorority. We don't want the Green Bay Packers hoodies in there. But people express yourself whatever your hoodie I wore a hoodie that said God did last year and we have the hoodie awards, whoever has the best hoodie. We have a golden hoodie award to an activist we give out. We got 500 People wearing different hoodies called the hoodie ball, like a sneaker ball, but a hoodie ball, February 17. Go to our website for my blog.org For more information on that. And also, you know, we have, we have picket sign and activism workshops. We'd love to come to high schools and colleges to get people involved in making and being a part of our March coming up the march on Madison. So express yourself with the picket sign. They can say I am a man, they could say Jim Crow must go it could say equality for all. But just make sure you're committed to the words. We're fighting for humanity. We're not fighting for Instagram, but we want to teach you how to make picket signs and faithfulness, right until Yeah, bring us to a school near you. Just go to our website for my blog.org and sign your school up for a picket sign and activism workshops.

Joi Patterson: 31:20

Thank you. It's been a pleasure.

Amy Vujaklija: 31:22

Thank you. Thank you for listening to teaching and leading let's Dr. Amy and Dr. Joi. Visit our website at govst.edu/teaching and leading podcast to see the show notes from this episode.

Joi Patterson: 31:42

We appreciate Governor State University's work behind the scenes to make publishing possible. Stay tuned for more episodes with Dr. Amy and Dr. Joi