I accidentally volunteered for something that I knew nothing about. You see, on March 15th and March 16th, I had the pleasure of spending nineteen hours locked in a room with fifteen people (some of whom I had never spoken to before), learning about AVP, the Alternatives to Violence Project. Even though I went in dreading spending my Saturday in a room with people I barely knew, it may have been one of the best experiences of my junior year.
By accidentally volunteered, I mean it’s more like I was coerced. You see, there are some strong current TASQUE leaders who I heard hyping it up, and without knowing anything about it, I signed up to spend nine and a half hours a day at Friends Academy on a Saturday and Sunday to learn about Alternatives to Violence.
Like any good student who signs up for something when they know nothing about it, I really didn’t want to go. Actually, I was going to skip it until my friend saw me on the email and asked me if I was going. Fortunately, I said yes. So, at 8:45 am on a Saturday, I arrived at Friends Academy and walked into the Lower School, dreading the rest of my day. However, I was greeted very warmly by many TASQUE leaders and fellow students who also had no clue what they were doing. Honestly, I was kind of just relieved I wasn’t alone.
At 9:00 am, us newbies gathered in the Lower School Library and met our proctors, Super Suzanne, Jazzy John (if you went to Lower School at Friends, you’ll know him as Teacher John), Meticulous Maria, and Safe Stephan. You might be wondering, what’s with the adjectives? Well, Mindful Marina will fill you in. When you start AVP, you have to take on an adjective name. It’s the first step; before anything else, they make you change your name. So I became Mindful Marina, but my favorite adjectives were acrobatic, awesome, ecstatic, sweet, and auspicious. Sadly, according to Inkwell guidelines, I can’t tell you who had these adjectives, but I can tell you that they are all amazing and were equally as confused as I was when we had to change our names.
The next thing we did was define Alternatives to Violence, and at this point, you’re probably asking, what is AVP? Well, AVP is a movement rooted in prison reform. Back in the 1970s, a group of inmates at Greenhaven Prison in New York had witnessed violent prison riots, and many realized that prison was not going to help them reform themselves. If they wanted to do that, they would have to do it themselves. That is, until some Quakers who had conducted non-violence training after the Vietnam War met with the inmates and created AVP, a program that includes non-violent workshops to help reform prisoners and make them feel safe.
You might be wondering why students do AVP. Well, it’s actually pretty simple. Anyone can benefit from it. Have you ever been in a situation where you have an extremely strong opinion, and someone else also has one but in the exact opposite way? Well, look no further. AVP is devoted to settling all conflicts by looking at people’s inner good and finding common ground.
There are two programs at Friends for AVP right now: the beginner and advanced workshops. The beginner workshop is the introduction, advanced is the more intermediate phase, and after that, you can learn to be a proctor for AVP and work in prisons, schools, and many other places, trying to fight for nonviolence.
Honestly, I had fun. There were a solid ten minutes where I had to stare someone in the eyes; that scared me, but I learned to be a better listener. During our lunch breaks, everyone was super open and talked like we had been friends for years; being stuck in a room with the same people for hours really does that to you. At some point, someone had to get on the ground and flop like a fish, so that was pretty fun. There were games, stories, and activities the whole time, we even did improv.
Plus, the school bought ten crates of chocolate chip cookies for the program, so there was an unlimited amount of cookies. They also bought fifteen pizzas. I got to bring a whole one home for my family.
Overall, I had a lot of fun doing Alternatives to Violence, but I won’t say it was without its challenges. Obviously, if you are doing a program on nonviolent problem-solving, you need examples of problems. Well, there’s a whole AVP manual on what problems to use for beginners; unfortunately, our proctors decided to go off-book, and a massive argument started during Alternatives to Violence…
Our proctors disagreed; everybody in the beginner’s workshop could not believe what had happened, and after that, we all kind of withdrew. I can say for sure that I withdrew; the statement hurt me so bad that I genuinely refused to answer two of the four proctors for the rest of the day. The next day, those same two proctors attempted to solve the issue but only made things worse. I have nothing against the proctors, but it was hard to focus afterward. Eventually, we got the energy back, but some of the experience was definitely not the best.
However, I would say it’s worth it to do Alternatives to Violence; I had a great time. I plan to do the advanced workshop next year, even though I have to spend nineteen hours at school. It was a really worthwhile experience, and if you have time, I think you should do Alternatives to Violence and see what the program is about. Who knows, if you’re dedicated, it might be your future!
