New England Animal Rights Workshop 2007 Report

On April 14th, 2007 I hosted the first annual Educational Forum for Sharing Knowledge and Networking. The day began with 9 am Registration. At 9:30, we kicked the day off by welcoming everyone, including folks from the animal abusing professions and any LE officers. We had folks from MA, CT, VT, NH plus NY. And there were 11 exhibits to visit. The exhibitor organizations were: Through their Eyes, Maple Farm Sanctuary, Circle of Compassion, Farm Sanctuary, Commonwealth Cats, Grey2KUSA, House Rabbit Network, New Hampshire Animal Rights League, International Animal Rescue, Best Friends Network, and NEAVS.

Opening words stressed that the goal for the day was to educate and share knowledge. There was ONE RULE: To Respect each other; Respect each others differences/philosophies/tactics; and to Play nice! Some important announcements were: That the environmental movement was also represented that day- in the form of comprehensive recycling and composting. The compost able plates and bowls were donated by a grant from an Environmental Club at Worcester State College. Thanks Peter!

The workshop was free but there was a requested donation of $10 that covered the cost of the food, a tip for Dawn Herbele- a vegan chef and good friend to animals who volunteered her time and a donation to the library (use of the space was FREE).

Speakers for the day were: Christine Dorchak from Grey2KUSA, Justin Goodman from UConn Animal Rights Coalition, Suzanne Trayhan & Deb Young of House Rabbit Network and Jodie Wiederkehr & Jennifer Campbell from New England Anti-Vivisection Society (R&R and ESEC). Discussion Leaders for the day were: Melissa Feldman from Circle of Compassion, Jamie Kordack, Cheri Ezell from Maple Farm Sanctuary and Steve Baer.

The menu for the day included a fruit buffet and Soyboy smoked tofu (donated) and sausages in the morning, 3 types of sandwiches, Soyboy ravioli pasta (donated) salad, and meatballs for lunch and So Delicious Dairy Free Orange Dreamcicles (donated) at the end of the day. A BIG thank you to Soyboy and Turtle Mountain companies! Whole Foods of Hadley, MA also donated many great items, thank you very much! Coupons in the packets that everyone received included coupons from Whole Soy and Company- thanks!

A fun Icebreaker using overhead cartoons got everyone mingling and having a good time reading AR related themes found in our Sunday Funnies!

At the end of the day, I asked folks for 3 things. Here they are in order:

Feedback about the workshop- very informative; This was fantastic! I liked the broad range of subjects as well as the smaller discussion points. Great to hear about the different groups in New England; An incredibly rewarding day; I loved Cheri’s story. I hope she will speak again. It was very moving! Please invite her back; My first AR workshop. Glad to see there are people who do care and are active. LIBERATE!; So wonderful- nice work. It went by really fast so it wasn’t very long at all. I think it was pretty perfect when I reflect on the day some more, I will let you know more input by e-mail if I come up w/anything- thanks so much, Jamie; Great event. So glad I came- it’s hopeful to see so many people here- unfortunate that everyone was affiliated w/a group and not just interested people looking to join (there were some folks not affiliated, for some, their first “taste” of animal rights- J). I think everyone here was great but also pretty knowledgeable about AR. How do we reach the others?; Thanks so much for putting this on for us- we all appreciate it!; Very good- just enough structure. Very interesting speakers- good to catch up. Food delicious! Very well thought out and managed.; Jamie, you rock! Excellent presentations; It was a great day! It was very helpful to attend a conference with local individuals, rather than a national conference, because it was easier to network. It was a very beneficial day; It was great w/a nice range of topics; I’m glad house rabbits were represented; Thanks for the soy cream; Thank you Jamie, for the wonderful food and environmentally friendly ethic- I loved the composting!; Food was excellent!! I wish more people showed up; The space for networking opportunities and hearing the latest developments was great. All speakers were fantastic. The food was an excellent plus; I felt so well taken care of- the food/name tags/exhibits/Div. of topics/length of breaks and lunch, etc.; Thanks. By all means, do it again! 20-minute talks were ideal length. Good to interrupt/break every 1-1/1/2 hours; Speakers and food were wonderful! Thank you so much for putting this together; Didn’t attend all day but loved what I heard- hope you do it again! Food was excellent!; It was awesome. I only made half, unfortunately. Well worth the effort; Very informative- wish it was 2 days or just printout on what we can do to help; Really loved the info. on greyhounds; Great event. Very energizing.

Suggestions for next year’s workshop- would like to see some politician(s) involved for next year- really does work, votes/votes/votes!; I couldn’t be here a whole day, so I missed some, but I thought it was great to have the whole day. Somehow incorporating action items would be great; Have political advisor for elections tabling; More interactive sessions/group discussions; It was a long day- but interesting. Make a list to hand out of all people here so we can leave w/a sheet of info. Try to reach out (somehow) to random people who may not know much about animal rights; Next year, way more time needed for networking. Lots of cool people but no time to talk.; Recommendations: very few. Better air circulators and microphone for speakers; Would like to see animal law, how consuming eggs and dairy and wearing leather/wool, etc. support the same cruel meat production industries, handouts w/quick facts and statistics; Everything seemed to work out this year, so I don’t have any suggestions; More time/discussion on A.E.T.A, less time on icebreaker session; No gluten free vegan food :(. Started too early in the morning; Like to see a talk about birds as pets; Next year, if you do the same thing, it will be awesome perhaps to do it along with the ‘State of the Union’ for animals. Also include lawyers so they can mention what they need legwork people to help them with; Cartoon activity was great and achieved many goals, but we either need 2 lights or bigger cartoons as it was hard to read; More advertising next time? (i.e. getting the word out and attracting 100-200 people); Provide water if possible, please; I would ask that more focus be on what we can do politically to bring change. It doesn’t do any good for animals if we just relate all our stories of animal abuse. (to be clear, this workshop was a beginner’s educational forum and not meant to be strategic. The target audience was and will be newcomers to the movement. Some of the exhibits “handled” ‘what you can do’ topics and ideas. We don’t have enough time in 6-8 hours/a 1-day workshop to do much more than education first- J.); Next year, have sessions on immediate action we can take.

Testimonials about the donated Turtle Mountain orangesicles- Yum! Tasty, creamy and delicious!; Great ice-cream! Yum!; Ice cream is delicious!; Very tasty!; I love all Soy Delicious products. I’m so glad we vegans now have “creamsicles”; I wouldn’t have known it was a healthy vegan snack because this creamsicle tastes like the ones I had as a little girl as our Saturday afternoon treat!; Tastes like the orange push up pops I ate as a child, delicious!; Ice cream was insanely good!; Sorry- hate soy(crossed out)- Never mind- I tried it! It’s Excellent!; Loved the ice cream!! Very creamy!!; Best damn ice cream I’ve ever had. It didn’t give me an ice cream headache.

 
Jamie Kordack