
Real Talk for Change’s approach brings together age-old methods of facilitated small group dialogue, and community organizing with modern machine learning, data visualization, and social network design. Our technology enables communities to organize conversations across the full diversity of their population, identify patterns of what people share across these conversations, and channel these voices to influence decision making in a more grounded and direct way than ever before.

Our pilot program will recruit over 30 community organizations and trusted leaders across Boston to host over 100 small, recorded conversations in the lead-up to the 2021 Boston Mayoral and city council elections. Once captured, our Real Talk Fellows will use our online platform to highlight and summarize the conversations in a publicly viewable dashboard that displays patterns, themes, and insights from the neighborhood conversations. This platform will be made available to the public, in addition to candidates for Mayor and city council. We will then surface these voices and perspectives in the media, electoral debates, and our online platform to constructively shape the 2021 Boston election cycle.

In addition to helping to create a campaign that is generally more grounded in and responsive to Bostonians’ lived experiences, this system is designed to encourage cross-community listening as well as to provide improved visibility and accountability between the candidates and the public. A key role of the technology is to provide transparency to all participants. People who participate in a conversation can see how their voices are being used and – through public forums such as media interviews and public debates – see that community concerns are influencing the election process. We believe over time this kind of visible action will encourage new voters and build trust between historically underheard communities, local media, and local institutions.
Facilitators
Real Talk for Change Facilitators are trusted leaders that facilitate conversations with their communities and share team progress. They are skilled in the art of communication. They have earned the trust of their neighbors. They are dedicated champions of their communities. Together, they are on a collective mission to reform our democracy in the name of equity.
We provide training and compensation for our facilitators. Please email us @ realtalk-facilitator@media.mit.edu you’d like to become a facilitator.

Zakiya Alake
Facilitator Trainer

Dawn Duncan
Facilitator Trainer

Fran Smith
Facilitator Trainer

Corey Thompson
Facilitator

Mike King
Facilitator

Marilyn Forman
Facilitator

Shareef Smith
Facilitator

Nurys Camargo
Facilitator

Elvis Rosario
Facilitator

Reverend Don Nanstad
Facilitator

Rebecca Lin
Facilitator

Iyanna Ziona Stewart
Facilitator

Jacqueline Martínez
Facilitator

George Halfkenny
Facilitator
Campaign manager & Project Leads

Ron Bell
Campaign Manager, Real Talk For Change & Director, Dunk the Vote

Ceasar McDowell
Associate Director, Center for Constructive Communication & Professor, Department of Urban Studies and Planning, MIT

Deb Roy
Director, Center for Constructive Communication & Professor, Professor, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, MIT
Project advisors & communications

Karilyn Crockett
Assistant Professor of Urban History, Public Policy & Planning, MIT

Michael Jacoby Brown
Organizer, Trainer and Consultant

Eldin Villafañe
Public Relations
Center for constructive communication Team

Perris Richter
Head of Design, CCC

Vandinika Shukla
Strategist, CCC

Lorena Tovar
Project Coordinator, CCC

Sarah Ballinger
Head of Program Management, CCC

Dimitra Dimitrakopoulou
Visiting Assistant Professor, CCC

Maggie Hughes
Research Assistant, CCC

Dennis Jen
Lead Research Software Engineer, CCC

Artemisia Luk
Designer, CCC

Wonjune Kang
Research Assistant, CCC

Doug Beeferman
Research Scientist, CCC

Nabeel Gillani
Postdoctoral Associate, CCC

Ellen Hoffman
Special Projects, CCC

Thanh Mai Phan
Research Software Engineer, CCC

Heather Pierce
Senior Administrative Assistant, CCC

Andrew Heyward
Advisor, CCC

Tibisay Zea
Content Creator, CCC

Wes Chow
Head of Engineering, CCC

Ondina Frate
Research Software Engineer, CCC

Maridena Rojas
CCC Fellow

Somala Diby
CCC Fellow
Cortico Team

Alex Kelly Berman
Director of Partnership Strategy, Cortico

David van Dokkum
COO, Cortico

Kelly Paola
Partner Support Specialist, Cortico