Teaching Tolerance in Camp MetroTown
Mosaic Miami shows teens how to appreciate diversity
Hannah Spence
Miami Times Staff Writer
Updated Jul 3, 2024
Although many teenagers spend their summers at the beach or in front of television screens, 50 Miami teens chose to devote six days of their vacation to Mosaic Miami’s Camp MetroTown, improving their leadership skills and learning about diversity.
“Camp MetroTown is really important because there is so much polarization in the world right now,” said Executive Director of Mosaic Miami, Matt Anderson, who has held his current role for three years. Prior to becoming director, he was the youngest board member in the nonprofit’s 90-year history before becoming its youngest executive director.
“With all the political divisiveness and complications in the world like the war in the Middle East and the Ukraine; the gaps in the way people think without allowing themselves to humanize one another, they don’t have the tools to find common ground and talk to each other,” he said. “At MetroTown, we help develop those tools. And the idea isn’t to make people agree with one another, the idea is to have people feel heard and create safe spaces so you can understand and appreciate where someone is coming from.”
The camp is called MetroTown because it was based on a camp called Anytown, a model which was held across the country since the 1950s. The principles are pretty much the same everywhere, with variations tailored to the city where the camp is being held.
Camp MetroTown is a free program that selects campers (whom they like to call delegates) who reflect Miami’s demographics. There are teens between the ages 14 and 18 who come from a wide range of races, ethnicities, sexual orientations, religions and socio-economic backgrounds. One of the camp’s goals is to create an opportunity for teens to interact with individuals they wouldn’t ordinarily be in the same room with.
The day starts at 7:30 a.m., when the youth participate in chores and activities like exercising and feeding the cats that roam Barry University in Miami Shores, where the camp is held. The delegates then get together for the morning circle at 9 a.m. where they reflect on the day and start a very busy schedule. Activities usually continue until 10:30 at night.
Seventeen-year-old delegate Angelina Byrd is glad that there was so much diversity at camp.
“I wouldn’t say I’m a very social person, but so far, I have found comfort in so many different kinds of people in such a short amount of time,” she said.
Byrd, who found out about camp MetroTown at an emerging leaders dinner where Matt Anderson was a speaker, did not see herself becoming close to younger kids.
“I was expecting it to just be rising seniors, but I am surprised at the maturity level of the younger teens,” she said.
Byrd says a part of camp that especially touched her was a talk given by a blind man who informed delegates about how to properly behave around a person with a visual impairment.
Another delegate is recent high school graduate Ashna Paudel. No stranger to connecting with people, Paudel served as president of the district student government association during her time at The School for Advanced Students’ Kendall campus. In this role, she represented 377,000 students from across Miami Dade County.
“I was connected to Matt on LinkedIn,” said Paudel. “I was hesitant at first, but then he messaged me again with a description. It was eye-catching to me. What really inspired me to join was the fact that it said it was going to be a social justice camp.”
Paudel, who is of Nepalese heritage, is grateful for the chance to spread knowledge about her culture – something she has never been able to do on such a large scale.
“My culture has always been overlooked in the broader South Asian mosaic,” she said. “I am constantly being asked things like, ‘do you speak Indian?’”
Paudel immigrated to the United States when she was 1 year old. She explains that while in Nepal, her family lived in a hut made of mud. They left their home country for better education opportunities and access to healthcare. Although Paudel’s story is an inspiring one, she realizes that hers is not the only one.
“The biggest thing I learned is that everybody has their life experience, and everybody is unique in their own way,” remarked Paudel.
Her experience is directly in line with one of the camp’s ideals.
“A key philosophy of the camp is that everything is dialogue-based,” said Barry University staff member and Mosaic consultant Courtney Berrien. “People get to share their stories; they get to share their experiences. We focus on building empathy. We do a lot of experiential learning.”
One of the empathy-building activities MetroTown utilizes is a game where participants become members of either an alpha or beta culture. Understanding the differences between alpha and beta personalities is essential in navigating social dynamics, relationships, and even careers. Alpha personalities are often described as confident, assertive, and dominant, while beta personalities are seen as more reserved, empathetic, and cooperative.
In this game, however, neither culture is dominant. Each group had their own customs that the other found odd, but they had to learn to work around them productively. The activity requires a lead facilitator, a facilitator for the alpha group, and another for the beta group. The alpha and beta leaders had to practice the detailed rules of each culture prior to facilitating the activity. Once the alphas and betas assembled in their designated rooms, they had to learn the characteristics, behaviors and mannerisms of their cultures. A debriefing at the end of the exercise allowed participants to explore the impact culture has on our impression of others.
“I hope that camp is our future,” said Berrien. “I hope that these young people go into the world and they are more interested in every member of our society belonging and feeling like they can be themselves.”