ACL in Action: Mayor Penny Sweet & Megan Kennedy
What could be more of an adaptive challenge than being THE epicenter of the pandemic in the United States in March of 2020? Mayor Penny Sweet of Kirkland spoke to the Class of 2023 about how she put adaptive community leadership skills to work when the pandemic hit the Life Care Center in Kirkland before we had any knowledge, answers or guidance from authorities on how to respond to this epidemic. Joining Mayor Sweet was Megan Kennedy, Director of the University of Washington’s Resilience Lab, who spoke to the class about how she first began using her ACL skills early in her career to improve UW students’ access to mental health and wellness resources.
The Class of 2023 appreciated the opportunity to have access to leaders in their community who were tackling big challenges using ACL approaches. Kennedy spoke in detail about the process of convening the Student Well-Being Collaborative stakeholder group that included all the voices necessary to make sure their solution would be inclusive and impactful. She also shared how she slowly introduced key concepts of ACL to bring synchronicity to how the team worked together, which ultimately allowed the group to dig deeper into the hard conversations and differences of opinion.
“It was a great learning opportunity to hear stories from both Mayor Sweet and Megan Kennedy on the adaptive process,” said Kristi Oosterveen, LE Class of 2023 student. “To hear the importance of including the appropriate voices in the room (or situation), to not be afraid to ask questions and to know that mistakes can be made throughout a process are key to being adaptive. Allowing for disagreements so you hear all sides and know that open communication can lead you to a great outcome.”
Kennedy further shared the successes, failures and learnings of the project. The Collaborative found it very challenging to resist leaping into action along the way and accepting a technical solution to an adaptive challenge. Each of the stakeholders represented a different aspect of mental health on campus and it took a lot of focus to get past their fear of losing individual identity when collaborating to create a centralized wellness website. In fact, one group couldn’t get past this fear. Overall, she was very impressed with the group’s ability to learn ACL concepts and apply them – the group became more authentic with each other, they were able to hold the heat and tolerate discomfort.
Mayor Sweet shared a video with the class documenting how the pandemic was responded to by the city government, first responders and the community. Thankfully, many in leadership were familiar with ACL concepts and if not, were used to working with people who were, so collaboration came easier during the heat of needing to make many decisions very quickly. Mayor Sweet concluded with how her heart was filled daily during the pandemic by the outpouring of support from the Kirkland community members.
