01 / October
Make connections.
Recruit adult participants through existing relationships and begin the first recorded conversations.
The project
A place for your story.
A chance to see each other.
Here, Together is a storytelling and listening project built around a simple question: What does it take to belong? The first chapter begins in Richmond, with curiosity about lives across Virginia.
The everyday connections
that hold a community
together.
Belonging takes shape in classrooms and workplaces, in faith communities and friendships, in the languages people speak and the ways they welcome one another.
This project will invite Virginians to share those experiences in their own voices. It will also notice the organizations, practices, and informal relationships that help people build a life here.
The aim is to listen for what is already happening, amplify it with permission, and ask what we can learn together.
Proposed pilot · October–December 2026
A small beginning, with intention.
02 / November
Listen and reflect.
Record, edit, and share stories with participants for feedback. Notice themes and promising community practices.
03 / December
Come together.
Share completed, approved stories; hold a small listening gathering; document lessons and possibilities for collaboration.
Proposed schedule from the seed-grant application. Funding and final dates are not confirmed.
What the pilot hopes to make possible
More than a
collection of stories.
More nuanced narratives
Three to four people sharing experiences that complicate simplified ideas about language, migration, race, and community.
Stronger relationships
A goal of at least 10 new or strengthened relationships among participants, neighbors, advocates, and potential partners.
A model worth learning from
A record of what worked, what surprised us, and whether a larger Virginia-wide effort would be useful.
These are proposed goals, not completed results.
Rooted in relationships.
Open to being changed.
The project grows from experience in advocacy, community organizing, education, ESL teaching, and civic engagement. Its seed proposal connects the work to lessons from the Virginia Progressive Leadership Project: relationships, narrative, trust, and collective capacity.
That background offers a place to begin. The people who participate will help shape what comes next.
Read the listening approachThere’s room for you here
What could we build
here, together?
A conversation, a connection, a place to begin. Help make this small pilot possible.
Explore the funding opportunity