me to we

2024-25 winter newsletter

The News, Nepal, Hughes, and an Experiment

With all the loud voices in the news saying what the US ought to be doing or what the world ought to be doing right now, shouldn’t we be making space for our students’ voices, for them to be heard? — what they think is important, what future they can envision for themselves, their communities, and the world? Their dreams?

That’s what Dreamline does and has been doing since 2016.

Here’s how it plays out in Dreamline’s roots:

NEPAL

Dreamline was inspired by the tradition of Nepalese prayer flags. They are pieces of cloth on a line with good wishes for the world and they go out in public spaces, often dramatic ones like places near mountain tops. The belief is that as the wind blows them they blow the good wishes around the world. Dreamline is not religious or specifically spiritual in any way, but the spirit of public display and public good is fundamental to Dreamline’s work.

LANGSTON HUGHES

The dream poetry of Langston Hughes, specifically his poem “Dream Keeper,” inspired the concept for Dreamline and Hughes poetry is included in all of our programs. His valuation of what really matters to people, their “heart melodies,” and of dreams as part of our common humanity is central to Dreamline.

AN EXPERIMENT…

This year we’re trying an experiment. Our Board Event Planning Group recently decided that we will have an in-school online program as our year-end culminating event with the intention of connecting more students in more places to each other. Students will

see and hear groups of other students in other places
get inspired by our special guest speaker
sing together (yes we can do that),
and hear individual students share their dream banners out loud.

This is instead of the live June event we’ve had in the past with local attendees but little participation outside the Philadelphia region.

Dates

To do this, classes need to make Dream Banners by April l8 –in the next two and half months — to experience our student-to-student connections in the Dreamline Festival Wednesday, April 30th. We have free cloth and Dreamline ribbons to send out by request.

If you’re a teacher reading this, I hope you’ll complete your 2024-25 Registration today if you haven’t already. As I recently said to a group of 5th graders, “Dreams alone don’t change problems. But without them, NO change ever happens.”

I hope everyone will attend the event online so you can hear for yourself the “heart melodies” of students across our community. We’ll sent out link information closer to the day.

And we’re working on an installation of Dream Banners in the Philadelphia region later this year and through the summer for public display and public good. It won’t be a Nepalese mountain top, but it will be where it’s noticed.

Yours dreaming and doing,

–Jeffrey Harlan

PROGRAM UPDATE

2024-25: More Languages, More Options, More Belonging

As we have been working with schools this year, we’ve been developing more program options to meet needs. We’re pleased to have released two new class activity sequence options for our Dream Banner program and several language options.

Teachers can now select from three options for leading their classes in the Dream Banner Project:

Sequence A is short, structured, and includes open-ended writing prompts for Dream Banner creation. It provides lesson slides, handouts, and slide-by-slide directions. The slides are available in English, Spanish, and Hindi. Handouts are available in English and Spanish.

Sequence B is slightly longer, more structured, and includes more directed prompts for Dream Banner creation. It also provides lesson slides, handouts, and slide-by-slide directions. Slides and handouts are available in English and Spanish.

Design Your Own Sequence is what some will recognize as “the old origins” Dreamline. It is a list of basic requirements for Dream Banners along with a menu of options to select from including videos, handouts, maps, banner collections, and teacher how-tos.

All are free with 2024-25 Registration.

King Day Dream Rip

Thanks to the tireless efforts of more than a dozen volunteers, we measured, ripped, and packed more than 1,000 pieces of 9 in x 12 in fabric to send out to teachers for their students’ Dream Banners this year. This was part of Global Citizen’s annual King Day of Service at Girard College, the largest and oldest King Day event in the US. There were moving speeches from Pennsylvania’s governor as well as Philadelphia’s mayor, superintendent of schools and others all urging each of us to sustain and grow our community efforts in the coming years. We were proud to be a part of it.

To Register as a Dreamline Volunteer, click HERE

To request cloth banners and ribbon for your class click HERE.

FROM THE BOARD

Humming, Reflecting, and Responding

Volunteers at Work

As Amanda Earl scopes out upcoming conferences for Dreamline, Barbara Bassett organizes our 2025 public Dream Banner installation, Lisa Fair and Ron Carleton investigate new grants, Wanda Odom reviews tee shirt design and messaging, Abigail Jones and Lourin Plant cook up content for the new online festival, and Jeffrey Harlan keeps Dreamline programs responsive and relevant, Dreamline’s volunteer working board is humming with activity.

Focus on the Future

In addition, the Board will be meeting for its second retreat this year in the last week of February to continue its investigation of Dreamline’s core values, vision, and mission. The focus thus far has been to rededicate Dreamline’s programming and funding efforts to a broadening of participation as we recognize our wide demographic and international reach as one of our most valuable contributions to the educational nonprofit world. More to come on that in our next newsletter.

Upcoming Annual Campaign

You can expect to receive a call or communication from one of our Board members to say thank you for your past contributions and to invite your support of our efforts to broaden Dreamline’s national and international reach in response to global fragmentation and the need to find our common humanity, a tangible outcome of shared dreams.

ON THE HORIZON

February, 2025: Langston Hughes Birthday Month

This a popular time for starting Dreamline activities as Feb. 1 is the birthday of the poet Langston Hughes whose poem “Dream Keeper” got the Dreamine project started. (See our Music Video page for recordings of this poem set to music, the Dreamline Theme Song.) February is also US Black History Month.

March 31, 2025: Deadline for Dreamline Online Festival 2025 Registration

To have your students participate in the all- school connection program and celebration targeted for Wednesday, April 30 and to receive Dreamline merch in advance, register by this date. Registration link posted soon. Click here for updates.