The Service for Center of Action has released the schedule for the Change the Status Quo Social Justice Leadership Conference that is taking place this Saturday, Feb. 26.
The Change the Status Quo conference is a full-day event where members of the San Luis Obispo community can attend a keynote speaker and several workshop sessions to learn about various social justice topics and issues. This year’s keynote speaker is writer, abolitionist organizer and creative educator Hoda Kotebi.
“We are delighted to have Hoda Katebi joining us as our keynote speaker,” senior coordinator for the Center for Service in Action Bradley Kyker said in a press release. “As a young activist, we believe she will be very relatable and inspiring to our students as they explore how they can take ownership of their role in affecting social change.”
Registration for the event is open now on Eventbrite. For the full day of events, tickets are $10 for Cal Poly students and AmeriCorps Fellows and $30 for general admission. Tickets are $15 to attend just Katebi’s presentation.
The conference will start at 9 a.m. with the keynote speaker which will end at 10 a.m. After the keynote, there will be four workshop sessions held throughout the day and will take place on campus.
Each session contains several workshop topics that guests can choose from. Sessions will be a mix of 30 minute presentations or 60 minute interactive workshops. The workshop topics include Racial Justice and Allyship, Service, Leadership and Social Justice, Intersectionality, Socio-Economic Justice, Gender and Sexuality, Environmental Justice and Jewish Culture and Antisemitism. The list of workshops can be found here.
A variety of people will be leading the workshops throughout the day. Some workshops are run by Cal Poly professors, others are run by Cal Poly clubs and students and several workshops are run by outside organizations and community members.
At the end of the day, there will be a closing activity for all attendees in the Multi-Activity Center. This activity will be run by Cal Poly professors Joey Gray, Sandy Shen and Keri Schwab and attendees will be able to use what they have learned to propose solutions to the topics addressed in the conference.
According to their website, the Center for Service of Action hopes to “empower attendees to use the Learn by Doing spirit to challenge social norms, ask critical questions, demand solutions and make lasting social change” through this conference.