(originally published in Tampa Bay Parenting, May 2009)

The news isn’t all bad these days for some Tampa cultural arts organizations. Thanks to funds left over from the now defunct Renaissance Center for the Arts (RCFTA), those laboring to bring cultural arts to Tampa residents have additional money to further their efforts.

Phoenix grants were awarded organizations that fit with the original mission of RCFTA: to enhance cultural awareness for youth and adults in Tampa Bay. Of the twenty-three organizations that applied, fourteen received grants at a reception held April 1 at the interim site of the Tampa Museum of Art.

Melinda Chavez, Executive Director of the Tampa Bay Business Committee for the Arts, is very happy about receiving a Phoenix grant. Chavez says the grant will be used to fund three scholarships within an existing program that makes annual awards to outstanding high-school students in the performing, visual and literary arts categories.

A Phoenix grant will help seventh and eighth grade Academy Prep Center students illustrate environmental and sustainable living lessons from the Earth Charter with the help of University of Tampa faculty on Earth Day, 2010. Jan Roberts, founder and President of Earth Charter U.S., says that students will demonstrate Earth Charter ideas through storytelling, mural painting, sculptures, photography, dance and the spoken word on both campuses.

Fran Powers, founder of Powerstories Theatre and grant recipient says the money will be used to fund the newest program, Girlstories Theatre Project (GTP). GTP is a ten month program for 25 middle-school girls that kicks off with a six-week summer intensive in June. Girls meet from 9 am to 5 pm five days a week, to study theatre, music, dance, improvisation, art, technical theatre and how to tell a personal story. Young girls are selected mostly on their desire to become a leader in the community rather than performance ability. “In these challenging economic times, it is a thrill for the Board to donate funds to expand children’s arts programming, supporting our core mission.” said RCFTA director, grants committee chair and City Councilwoman Linda Saul-Sena.

Other grant winners include Plant City Children’s Theatre, Bits n’ Pieces Puppet Theatre, Glazer Children’s Museum, Stageworks, Tampa Museum of Art , Friends of the Carrollwood Cultural Center, Plant High School Academic Foundation, Southshore Arts Council, Center Place Fine Arts and Civic Association and Walton Academy for the Performing Arts.

The Renaissance Center for the Arts began in 1999 with renovation on what once was the First Congregational Church in Tampa Heights. Although many successful events and programs took place at the Center, funding challenges ultimately kept the RCFTA from fulfilling its mission. The Board of Directors of the RCFTA is pleased that it could grant the remaining assets of the organization to deserving arts related organizations throughout greater Tampa and further support cultural arts in the community.

RCFTA president, Mark Segel added, “Although it’s very disappointing to the entire board that the Renaissance Center could not continue as we envisioned it, we’re very pleased that through these grants we can leave a lasting legacy throughout the arts community of greater Tampa.”

by Elizabeth A. Leib

This morning as MitzvahBoy is getting dressed to go to Sunday school and Mark gathers his tallit and prayer shawl for morning prayers at Kol Ami Synagogue, I’m flicking through cable channels to see what I can find. I hit pay dirt on C-Span’s Washington Journal where the Al Jazeera Washington Bureau Chief, Abderrahima Foukara is taking questions from callers on the response from the Arab world to President-Elect Obama.

I’ve been wanting to explore the Arab immigrant experience after reading Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s story, “Infidel”. But a few years ago under the Bush administration, it seemed dangerous to do so publicly. Call me chicken, but exploring ideas can have very unpleasant social consequences and in some parts of the world, can get you killed.

To list a few examples: the filmmaker Van Gogh stabbed on the streets of Denmark over his film, Submission; angry mobs threatening violence over the Danish cartoons lampooning Muhammad; death fatwas issued on Ali and Rushdie; and of course, 9/11. Muslim activists in the Netherlands have called for Dutch politician Geert Wilders to be prosecuted under the blasphemy laws for having argued that Islam was incompatible with personal freedoms and Western democracy in his 10 minute film “Fitna”.

And finally, there was the stark reminder last year each school day when I dropped off MitzvahBoy for his kindergarten class at the Hillel School of Tampa : a police car at the school entrance.

We are Jews living in a neighborhood with a growing Muslim population and where Sami Al-Arian has lived for years. And I have yet to be able to connect with our Muslim neighbors - the culture divide is deep.

Frankly, everything I’ve seen and read about the position of woman in Islamic countries is offensive to my values. I’ve read on the subject extensively, books and essays and on the blogosphere. Combined with what I observe in my day to day life, I can’t find evidence that in general terms Muslims are living in America with much interest in integrating and adapting. I’m looking for political and civic engagement - and the voices of Arab women. Why aren’t they active in the local PTA? I have what I think are reasonable fears that this particular immigrant group may be antagonistic to our democratic traditions. Having women walking the neighborhood draped in black from head to toe creeps me out and reminds me of Margret Atwoods scary novel about the suppression of women, “The Handmaid’s Tale.” So chicken I will be.

What a difference a year makes. MitzvahBoy is now at public school and has for his first grade teacher a woman who wears a head-scarf. We have an incoming president who carries Hussein as his middle name. And in my mailbox this week is an invitation from Torah University, an educational outreach of the congregation where Mark and I were married, to attend a series of classes titled, “A Muslim Perspective: To Begin to Understand the Islamic Experience that will Encourage an Open Dialogue.” The class are held at Saint Paul’s Catholic Church. I’ve made plans to attend and blog about the discussions. Stay tuned.

Two of my favorite community organizers:

Tampa’s Rob Ray and Presidential candidate Barack Obama

The true nature of the current Republican party was on display last week in the speeches of the party faithful. Particularly abhorrent were the comments of derision of the very values it pretends to have - service to country. I’m talking about all the put downs of the work of community organizers.

I was happy to learn this week that Community Organizers have, well, organized. Visit the new website, “Community Organizers Fight Back” for more information. The Daily Show offered relief in its satirical interpretation of the Republican definition of the word “Service.”  Stewart joked during a clip of a people at the convention waving signs with the word to mean that they were asking for a waiter or waitress to serve them.

by Elizabeth A. Leib

Wow McCain - I’ve finally regained a little of the respect I once had for you, the rascal reform-minded maverick. When the news of Palin’s appointment was announced we learned in the same report about the controversy surrounding the new VP nominee over the firing of her brother-in-law. He’s a state trouper who is embroiled in a nasty custody dispute with Palin’s sister. The decision to place a pro-life political novice on your ticket is a major gift to us Obama supporters. And thanks for making a more interesting choice than Romney!

In my lifelong quest to live better several ideas turn up again and again. Reading Daniel H. Pink’s excellent
“A Whole New Mind - Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future” this weekend reminds me of how important gratitude is to living well. Pink recommends readers make a list as long as your years of things to be grateful for.

Here’s mine - in no particular order (except for the first two).

1. Mark Leib 2. Jeremy Leib 3. beach weekends with #1 & #2  4. jagermeister   5. Emily Dickenson 6. our house  7. Hillel School of Tampa  8.poets  9. Harriet/Trish Leib  10. living in the internet age  11. sandy little shoes  12. roasted vegetables  13.clean air & water  14. writers  15. my childhood  16. Florida Health Kids Insurance  17. tai-chi  18.sound of frogs in our lake after it rains  19. good health  20. Studio@620  21. everything about my past life up to this point 22.WMNF  23. my little sister Lauren Brannon  24. Cafe Kili  25. good health of husband&son  26. Mary’s new baby girl  27. playing in the rain on the beach with Jeremy  28.kosher meat  29. Marla Grant  30. Jim Teixeira   31. Jeremy’s toothless grin 32.Miki  33. Paralounge Drum Festival   34. Virginia Woolf 35. my laptop computer  36. sound of beach waves  37. Brian Lau  38. Lesley Spencer  39. Micah  40. Phoebe  41. Jeremy sitting quietly  42. Mark’s new play          43. opportunities to publish  44. cloud formations  45. lavender  46. Tampa Day Summer Camp

                                                                                    ***

by Elizabeth A. Leib

Media coverage is often politically motivated or influenced by powerful people like Rupert Murdock. This article by Kevin Hassett, director of economic-policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, is no exception. As a columnist for Bloomberg News, Hasset makes the case that current coverage of economic data pointing to recession favors Obama’s bid for the presidency. On the other hand, many argue that economic measurements favor corporations and the wealthy at a time when the majority of individuals and small businesses struggle disproportionately.

Responses to what we believe about the present and future state of the economy can be colorful and highly subjective. Paranoid? Then our economic system is manipulated by a powerful banking system, multi-national corporations and foreign governments. Believe the end of time is coming? Read the book of Revelations to find clues about how the digital economy may be a tool of the antichrist (think of the number 666 in a digital chip embedded on your forehead). Depressed? No one is in control and we’re all doomed.

Pick your poison I suppose.

So many articles and talk about parenting are at best silly claptrap and at worst, self-serving rambles by people convinced of their superior knowledge and skills. This one has a child in law school, that one in a prestigious prep school. We must endure with good grace their golden droppings as they strut and fluff atop a nest feathered by their children’s accomplishments. It’s tiresome to be in the company of such a person who never tires of the smell of their proven theories.

The good news is the world is filled with the wise and the foolish. I happened to be leafing through Natural Awakenings, a free health magazine published locally and found one of the most helpful articles on parenting by Thomas Moore I’ve read recently. In college I enjoyed reading his book Care of the Soul (not to be confused with Thomas Merton’s Seeds of Contemplation).

Moore writes personally, sharing a story about when his daughter is diagnosed with an autoimmune illness. He connects spirituality with parenting and the ways it can, for those who are alert, remove false virtue and increase faith. I particularly share his idea of the end goal: to help a child become a thoughtful, engaged adult. For me and my parenting partner it’s a goal worthy of the effort.