What can I accomplish during a summer?

What can I accomplish during a summer?

The question of what is possible to accomplish during a summer is a complicated question. I think considering the personal and communal relations most have with our projects, it is expected that we might have some overambitious goals for this summer. For example, one of my goals is to between forty to sixty oral history interviews. However, that might not be possible given the time constraints of summer and the different communal sectors that I am trying to bring together for this project. The different sectors of this project is also further complicated due to my distance from Miami at that moment.

I want to plan as much as possible before arriving to Miami this summer, specifically in deciding what the student’s final project will be. On the one hand this means planning and outlining the final project of this summer, but I also want to leave creative space for students and community partner to come together to decide what the final iteration of this project shall be. So more than what can I accomplish during the summer, I think that the question to be asked, what should be accomplished this summer? What is ethically responsible and where should avenues be left open for intuition and spontaneity.

This is of course one of the intricacies of doing this kind of work. On the one hand, we have we to plan both for professional and personal outcomes. On the other hand, building relationships and organic growth and collaboration are things that cannot be measured and accouted for. Attempting to find this balance is one of the goals of this project.