Sterling Terrain V02 - Flipbook - Page 27
Sterling College | 25
take off because they are the very people
made vulnerable or left with unmet needs
under existing systems. Taking the time to
turn inward before directing attention and
energy outward prepares us to show up in
ways that are less likely to recreate familiar
yet harmful patterns and less likely to be
personally depleting.
The next course, Communities of Care,
supports resourced individuals in building
strong, flexible, caring, and healing connections. It shows us how to foster the
communities where we can live into the
future we want to create. As bell hooks
said, “One of the most vital ways we sustain ourselves is by building communities
of resistance, places where we know we
are not alone.”
Culture, Coalition, and Movement Building brings the wisdom of our movement
ancestors, personal and communal. The
course dives deep into the histories of
movements, into how people have made
change in the past, and how that can inform the change we make now and in the
future. This history is both grounding and
invigorating as it gifts us with possibilities.
Empathy as a Force for Social Good
takes its inspiration from and builds on
the work of one of our featured good trouble makers, Dr. Lia Howard, who has built
a program to dive into empathy in her
large university community. The course
focuses on the kind of deep and relational empathy that brings us closer to each
other and holds us accountable for showing up to the movements around us, and
not just our own. This kind of empathy is
an essential antidote to the polarization
that has gripped contemporary societies and is continually, algorithmically fed
by the outrage factories of social media.
The final course takes everything that has
come before and revolves outward, giving
learners an actionable methodology to
craft the compelling narratives that create cultural change. Story Justice uses
the ways our brains work, how our cultures
are built, and the necessity of humanizing
each other to build the futures we want to
live. It is a hands-on way to create change
and shape culture through our neurobiology, our history, our cultures, and our traditions.
Michelle Auerbach PhD,
EcoGather Consulting Scholar
At the heart of this certificate program is
the work of shaping change itself. Change
shaping is a term that we borrow with gratitude from the wisdom tradition of Octavia
E. Butler who introduced it in her books
Parable of the Sower and Parable of the
Talents. She writes, “All that you touch, You
Change. All that you Change, Changes you.
The only lasting truth Is Change.”
Michelle Auerbach is a world-builder and
community-maker who uses all her geeky
skills to support and educate change
shapers. She works toward a more just and
loving place where more people get taken
care of better. Michelle has been studying
change and developing her practice for
over 40 years. She was trained in facilitation and change management as well as
individual and group coaching at the Columbia University School of Public Health,
Kaiser Permanente, and the New York City
Department of Health as well as through
movements and teachers on the ground.
She was a professor of Ancient World Languages and Humanities for a decade and
served as chair of the Arts and Humanities
discipline for the State of Colorado Department of Higher Education. Currently, she
teaches communication and story justice
for changemakers at the University of Colorado and Sterling College.
Scan to see all
available courses:
Michelle’s PhD dissertation was written on
story as a trauma sensitive change technology for individuals, organizations, and
communities. She studies the way we respond to change from wisdom traditions
that go back 6000 years to the neurobiology that drives our connected selves.
Her book, Resilience: The Life Saving Skill
of Story came out in 2022 and her second
book on change shaping and storytelling is
due out in 2023.