Play It Forward
Reciprocity in motion. Access in action.
Creative Recess doesn’t wait for opportunity; it travels toward it.
I know what it means to depend on systems that don’t always keep their promises. AmeriCorps taught me how fragile safety nets can be; the Ryan White CARE Act helps keep me here to do this work. Those experiences shape how Creative Recess handles resources: with empathy for precarity, respect for survival, and a commitment to design work that centers dignity over optics.
I don’t work for free; I work to play it forward.
When I talk about ethical hustle or mutual investment, it’s not theory — it’s practice.
Ethical Hustle
The Ethical Hustle is how Creative Recess practices mutual investment in motion: earning a living in right relationship with people, institutions, and the planet. It’s transparency as praxis — showing how the work supports itself without selling its soul.
Field Trip Fund
The Field Trip Fund is the heartbeat that keeps Creative Recess alive — fueled by annual memberships, supplemented by generosity from tips and The Exchange, and celebrated through the Almanac of Awe. It’s how we practice transparency as gratitude: every dollar, hour, and idea moving in rhythm with those who make this work possible.
The Field Trip Fund is a transparent fund sustaining operations, access, and community travel — fueling scholarships, partnerships, and possibility in motion. The Field Trip Fund keeps possibility in motion — a creative mutual-aid model that redistributes access, resources, and imagination so no one is left out of the Playground.
The Fund covers living expenses and operating costs — plus a little play and adventure — because leisure and liberation are part of the work. It also provides scholarships, community access, and travel support for Creative Recess programs.
Guidelines for Collaboration & Contribution
Possibility works best when everyone plays fair. Each booking, membership, or contribution feeds the Fund — which, in turn, feeds the next person, project, or partnership. It’s not charity; it’s reciprocity.
I love partnering with:
- Educators, artists, organizers building liberation where they live
- Groups practicing accountability, equity, imagination
- Orgs ready to redesign structure, not just optics
Creative Recess believes in ethical participation, not purity. We work within imperfect systems while practicing fairness, transparency, and mutual care. I may decline work that relies on extraction, tokenism, or harm — not out of exclusion, but integrity.
This means:
- naming tradeoffs
- declining extractive gigs
- choosing collaborations that honor reciprocity
- designing alternatives that redistribute access and authorship
- centering dignity over deliverables
Every contribution fuels creative freedom. It sustains the coaching, workshops, and field experiences that bring this work to life — not to extract profit, but to extend possibility.
Ways to Support:
- One-time gifts or recurring memberships
- In-kind help (travel credits, gift cards, direct vendor payments)
- Commissions (art, workshops, keynotes, collaborations)
Because tending the flame of possibility is both care and courage.
Purity politics freezes motion. Creative Recess chooses ethical participation: moving within imperfect systems while minimizing harm, maximizing coherence, and practicing repair. That means naming tradeoffs, declining extractive gigs, and designing alternatives that redistribute access and authorship.
We do not measure virtue.
We measure whether people can participate with integrity, agency, and dignity.
When we slip, we repair.
When we learn, we share.
That’s the work.