A Conversation with the Future

Imagine Chicago’s primary interest, from the beginning, has been to create intergenerational learning communities which develop imaginative, effective citizens — people who can think independently and act with others to effect positive change of their own design, who have skills, hope and courage to actively shape the future of their community. As a starting point, Imagine Chicago’s design team initiated two parallel pilot processes in 1993-1994 for engaging the city of Chicago in a broad-based conversation about its future: a citywide appreciative inquiry and a series of community-based and community-led appreciative inquiries. Both were intended to gather Chicago stories and commitments, discover who and what gives life to the city, and to provide significant leadership opportunities for youth, who most clearly represent the city’s future. The premise was that young people could be agents of hope and inspiration, if they were freed from the negative stereotypes in which they held themselves and were held by others.

The citywide interview process involved approximately 50 young people who interviewed about 140 Chicago citizens, who were recognized by members of Imagine Chicago’s design team as "Chicago glue". These included artists, media executives, civic and grassroots leaders, politicians, business and professional leaders, and other young people. The interviewees represented over half of Chicago’s neighborhoods. Young people were principally recruited from existing youth initiatives (Chicago Area Project, Chicago Cluster Initiative, Public Allies, the Urban Teacher Corps, local schools), but also became involved through friends and family members. In the community pilots, Imagine Chicago collaborated with local organizations.

Each pilot incorporated a combination of action and reflection, skill building and creative analysis. In the citywide pilot, interviewers were given modest coaching in interviewing skills and equipped with a set of appreciative inquiry questions created by the Imagine Chicago design team (see box, page 13). They were encouraged to also ask questions that arose for them throughout the interview, and to engage the interviewee in as personal and positive a conversation as possible. As part of the interview process, young people also sent a follow-up thank you letter to the interviewee, summarizing the conversation, what they had learned and their appreciation for the interviewee’s contribution to the life of the city.

The community-based pilots offered a number of diverse examples of how appreciative inquiry could be practiced. For example, the Lawndale and Little Village pilot took place with almost no advanced notice or training; yet, twenty younger children, in the company of Urban Peace Corps volunteers, interviewed local community builders across different ethnic communities. The young mentors were sufficiently energized by the process to conduct the training and implementation of a similar process in Grand Boulevard. In that pilot, a dozen or more elementary children from an urban housing project were involved in community interviewing and visioning exercises.

With the African American Leadership Partnership, a coalition of 62 black churches on the South and West sides of Chicago, intergenerational appreciative inquiry was linked into community assessment and outreach by local churches. The Woodlawn Organization used the process to reconfigure their community outreach programs to include teenagers as organizing partners. Appreciative inquiry gave them a way to focus their community organizing strategy around positive issues.

All of the pilot interview projects broadened the participants’ views of what was possible, both within themselves and within the city. Looking into the face of a young person, adult leaders found themselves thinking hard about the future and what they could do to ensure that it would be a bright one for the coming generation. Young people learned the power of their own commitment and how to make a difference. Positive intergenerational civic conversations bridged the experience and wisdom of seasoned community builders with the energy and commitment of youth searching for purpose. They yielded deeper insights into the collective future of neighborhoods and of the city as a whole, and paved the way for a wide spectrum of work with Imagine Chicago.