Yeah. You technically start the meeting if you'd like to. Maybe if we could do, if y'all are amenable, the agenda and the minutes. Until Shayna. It's here. Yeah. Yeah, I can't make those. Calls for you also. So we're missing. Yeah. Yeah. And she, her email sounded as if she was not, maybe not making it at all. She is. Sorry. Sorry, I'm late. Hi. Hi. I fell in. Yeah. So I can't complain about anything. And yet I. Illnesses that aren't COVID still exist. It's weird. Yeah. How's everyone else doing? Yeah. It wasn't that. Well, should we get started? Let me message. Lauren real quick. And then, yeah, we were just going to. I know I just shared the note from. Too late last night. And so I'm sorry that. I haven't shared it before, but. You know, just start with. Start with that before going into the report back from. Other city committees and from the city council budget meeting. And then maybe we'll get started. So I don't know if you want to, do you want to take, take it away? Start it off. Sure. Well, first of all. Hi, everybody. It's good to see you. And yes, I, we. As you know, we had submitted a proposal to the city council budget meeting. And then if we have time to talk about some of the other things on our agenda, does that all? How does that sound for folks? We jumped around a little bit. So. So I don't know. So do you want to, do you want to take, take it away? Start it off. Okay.  And that was part of an original plan that we had. Created several years ago, actually before COVID. If anyone can remember back that far. And we. We have a dog barking in the background. In fact, I'm just going to let her in this room. And that will help. Hold on just a moment. I'll hear our untrained COVID puppy. Anyway, so we. We just thought it would make sense to. Kind of pull back from that. And. You know, offer you a little bit of support and some consulting hours to kind of transition you to the next step. So I'll just talk briefly about kind of the rationale for a big convening, which could still happen virtually. But the rationale for. Doing a combination of small group work, like the focus groups are one to one interview. So that personal relationship. And also large events like a summit. Accomplish different things. So the small. Work really creates opportunities for everybody to have a voice. There's a really important relationship building component to that. And, and then the large group convenings are places where you can really create kind of collective momentum. And build excitement. And then. A shared vision for the work. So we think. Excuse my dog. Sorry. So we think that the best processes kind of combine those different kinds of activities. All of those things are needed. One thing I'll say is that the relationship building piece. You all have to do that, right? Like you can't hire a consultant to do that for you.  Like there's no substitute for that. And so it seems like if, you know, the pivot because of COVID and different things to not try to do a big community right now, that's where they can continue to happen. Really helpful to your, your cause. As time goes on. And so, you know, we are happy to just fully step back. But if it would be helpful, we're all also happy to just offer a few consulting hours to help you all.  I know that we do have an email list. We're happy to be a go, between if the city wants to do a communication with folks, just giving them an update about what's happening and also creating some kind of invitation for some of that, more of that one to one relationship building. We're happy to be kind of a pass through between the city and that group that we talked with last year. So I think that was everything I tried to say in the email. I'll just pause there. So, can you explain sort of, I heard a couple of different things there, but then you're committed to the next step being a large, large group. And there are no other next steps in your equity process that isn't that. So you would be taking a step back until COVID concerns are over. Is that what I'm hearing? Well, it's not, it's not exactly that simple. Cameron, I think also we, you know, we're having, we're, we have a lot of work right now. We have a lot of projects and we're trying to work in places where we feel we can have maximum impact. And so that, you know, we're making decisions all the time about what we're going to be able to move forward with and what we're, what we can't move forward with. And it seemed like because there was just not, it wasn't, you know, it didn't seem clear that to this group that was the next step that made the most sense, especially because of COVID and uncertainties about in person gatherings and all of that. We just felt that there are things that the community could be working on right now.  There's other consultants you could provide. But we are saying that what we can offer you right now is a little bit of consulting to help bridge the work that you've done to the next step. But I do think Cameron, to answer your question, there are, there's many different approaches to getting this work done. And so there's a lot of relationship building and more one-on-one work that the community could definitely be doing.  But you know, you know, there's a lot of work that the community is doing.  We heard some recommendations. You all have started to implement those things. And to your credit at the city side, Cameron, it sounds like you've been really intentional about kind of building some of those recommendations into your work plans. I think there's many opportunities to go back out to the community and just, you know, get feedback. Are we on the right track here is our approach making sense to the community. So that kind of feedback loop can happen in a lot of days. Large gathering is a way to have that feedback loop happen. And as I said, some of the, you know, advantages of that are that that can really create a lot of energy and momentum in the community to have a large gathering. But if that just doesn't seem like the right approach right now for a variety of reasons, then I think you can do that. I'm a little bit more individually with folks. I think, you know, building relationships and having that feedback loop feels like a really important. Next step for the where you are. You want to go. Yeah. Well, I have to start by saying I'm okay with not doing a big deal, a big event. I have attended too many of them that go on too long and people kind of lose interest at around lunchtime. And so I think also, we have no idea when COVID is going to be a threat. And I think we should abandon the idea of trying to pull people together because people will be reluctant to, to come to big. I think it's also a financial burden for people, even though we, you know, we're offering, we're offering stipends. They still have to take a day off from whatever it is that they are doing in their lives. And, and I think in these times, it's just not, it's just not a practical, I think even productive way of doing business. I think it's a, you know, it was a time when that those kinds of meetings worked in my view, but I don't think we're in, I think we're past that. I also think that we have started our processes of meeting different constituencies. And I think that it would be helpful to have the list that you will use in the assembly. And it would be helpful to have, to have, if we, if as we go through that development, if we have questions about how to approach people who are, you know, who are reluctant to be, you know, in, you know, identified or called upon, then it would be helpful for us to sort of have other strategies that, you know, you could suggest. But I think we, I think we have some momentum in our own group. We've started a few discussion about a few topics of our own. And we have developed some, some models for convening larger groups. We did the committee of committees and things like that. And we can build on that. So I'm, you know, I thank you. Thank you for the offer. Thank you for talking about it. I think we can go ahead on our own. The one thing I'll say about the list of focus group participants is, you know, happy to be a pass through with an invitation for them to share their information with you all. But I think, you know, we're not comfortable sharing the list unless that group of focus group participants indicates that they're willing for that to happen. So that's the one, the one caveat I would just put into the mix there. But you did say you were willing to send out emails on our behalf. Correct. Yes. I think we could work together to come up with an email from all of you with, you know, could have a, an invitation for them to, you know, share, share their contact information with you if they wanted to stay involved or, you know, participate in some way. That to me feels like a very useful next step. To try and do that as a piece of the relationship and building puzzle to invite those folks who had some interest in participating in the focus groups to, you know, maintain some kind of connection with CJ's equity work, the city's equity work. So I would support working on a communication around that to start to build some kind of a, you know, a list of those folks. Helen, do you have any thoughts? My, I just have a question about budget stuff. So it's mostly for Cameron. So if we don't use the funds as kind of originally intended, could we use them on other, on like other outreach or, or like we move them over, we roll them over or give them that. What are the different funding options? I have 10,000 in the proposed budget for fiscal year 23, which was to continue this work with the creative discourse group. I can't answer that question. I think that would need to go to council. And much the homelessness task force has a similar budget. And what council has asked from them is proposals on how they want to spend it, right? So that council is aware of what the, what the next steps are of the group and then they can approve the, for the release of funds, if you will. Yeah, I think it's not really my concern concern, but like where I'm coming up with this is that if we don't use the funds this year, will we lose it for, you know, next year or the year after kind of thing? And it's, I don't, I don't think so. Yeah. It's not kind of like we're going to want to not waste the money. No, no, it's still in our budget for years. We're three. So. Yep. Great. Well, so maybe I think. Cameron is the person or Cameron and Shayna, you know, please just circle back with me and we can. Maybe just make a plan to see, you know, how much time you think it would, you know, it would take for us to support you with these next steps that we just outlined. You can go from there. Yeah, I think, I think, you know, I, I can, I don't, I only speak for myself, but I think it would be very helpful to have someone help us figure out what those next steps should be. And so we really appreciate those consulting hours.  Like I don't know. I'm not trained in this work, right? Okay. Well, I will. Cameron, if you want to, if you want to set up a meeting with me and Shayna, we can just talk about what that would look like. And we'll go from there. Thanks so much. Thanks everybody. Take care. Bye. Thank you. Bye. Thanks all. Um, so. Yeah, so what are, what are, I'm sorry, my brain's not totally plugged in here. What are, um, like next steps from that is, um, I mean, just, I think we should have a little bit more conversation about what are, what are next, yeah, what are next steps are. That makes sense. And I say one thing. So the original idea. The idea of hiring a constant company is that people will feel more comfortable to express their ideas. Right. Organizing meetings and whatever other things. Do you think they will still feel comfortable. Sharing their ideas. I think there should be some kind of, I hope I am right. Using, right, like middle. Middle person, right. Well, that's where I think using some of the consulting funds could be helpful in figuring out what would be the best. Interim, you know, next. Well, not even interim. What would be the best next step? Is it going directly to the focus groups? Is it something else? And I think that's where. Yeah, I feel like I don't have a strong vision and I haven't put the time in to make it, to think about what that looks like. Jeremy, did you have something? I was going to just respond. I think it, I think it depends. A lot of factors. I've. In my past and community engagement work. It's all about the setup. It's all about the questions. All about. Kind of. The issues as well. So I don't, I think it's possible to do. You know, maybe not in the focus groups because that's gotten to very sensitive. I think territory. But, you know, it's always what are the goals we're trying to achieve when we engage the community and. And what are the parameters of that? So. Yeah, I'm still unclear about. What the summit. Really was intended to do. So I agree with you, Michael. I don't think we're there yet. For some kind of a summit. So happy to like back off that. I think that's a really good point, Jeremy. It's like, what was the goal of the summit? And like, I, I know we. Know what it was to talk about. The steps that we've been doing. Here's the feedback we got from the other groups. Let's talk about it. Like, maybe. Well, maybe what we can discuss next meeting. Is, is going over the. Language in the proposal and the equity plan for the summit and see if we can brainstorm about other ways to get that information. Would that be useful? Cause I agree with Shayna. I've not thought about what the next steps are outside of this. Construct, right? This is the kind of roadmap we've been given to move this work forward. And now it's kind of like, oh, we, we literally cannot do that for health and safety reasons. What do we do now? So. That's, that's what I see. Maybe this group's next step is, is really trying to figure out another way to get at that same information. Mm-hmm. Go ahead. We need to have time to see what comes of the, the report that they submitted. We need a little bit of time to sort of let things happen so that we have something to report to people. And I had prepared a rather long piece that I sent to Shayna about, you know, my concerns about the summit. And, and I think. Once we, we, if we hold off and we start to see, and then, and then we start to see, that there are results of the, of the report that they, that the, the creative discourse submitted. Then I think we have a starting place for reporting to the, back to the community. And we, we can then start to think about, well, how are we going to reach. Reach. People and, and what segments or groups do we need to be in touch with in order to build the trust that the Susan Sue was talking about. In the meantime, I think, I don't know if Tom McCone is still planning to write an article about, about C. Jack. I think that would be helpful. I don't know if Tom McCone is still planning to write an article about, about C. Jack. I think that would be helpful. It's a way of establishing our, you know, trust. At least for those who will read the bridge. Or I think that's where he's planning to put it. And we can, you know, use, use the time to sort of gather information we need to, I think it'll be helpful to find out what, you know, have another meeting of the committee. The committees to see what kind of progress or changes they're making and, and where we can be helpful. I think we've, we've started to. Think about a couple of specific. Topics. Housing. For example. So. I think we just need to, you know, use the time to sort of gather information we need to, I think it'll be helpful to find out what, you know, have another meeting of the committee. The committees. To see what kind of progress. What changes they're making and where we can be helpful. I think we've, we've started to. So I think we, I have, I have. Not a roadmap, but we have at least a map somewhere. About, you know, what, what's out there and what we, and what we can do somewhere to go. We have established connections with different community, different groups. And so I think we can work on that. And summits are notoriously failures. I mean. I mean, I think about, I think about the, the different summits that have happened in our lifetimes. And what has come out of them, you know. So I was not real fan of this from the beginning, but. But I, but I, and I'm kind of relieved that they pulled out. So that we didn't, we have to be the ones. If we were going to do it to say, let's not do this, but. So it sounds like our next steps are to. And as like consultants, the support is in the process to have the, the committee and committees meeting to support the. Working on the solutions that they offered in their equity report. And then do I don't know, do we want to give ourselves a timeline to circle back? You know, does it make sense then like July to. Like circle back about like bigger. Like next steps, next steps where, yeah, what is. Or in the end, what, what else am I missing from what's being said? Sorry, I'm not taking good notes. Well, if I may. I have to remember we are an advisory committee to the council. Yeah. And, and I think. What we need to, what we need to do is to get information now. And then pass that along. And I think I was obviously Cameron. And passing information to the council based on who worked with. With the city city staff. And. And our work, I think, is to try to. To gather information from the, the people who are not staff. And that's why I think it's crucial to be working with the committee. You know, the committee on committees. And find out what they're doing, what, where they see their next step going and then. Can, you know, combine that information with what Cameron is collecting from her. And people she works with. You know, then make, make, make some presentation to the, try to figure out what we can say to the council about where we think the next steps are going. I like the idea of having another committee on committees meeting and then talk through the equity report. I, we didn't do that in the last one. It was more of like a get to know you. Right. Check in with people. Yeah. Maybe you have time to give, to give sort of updates on what the city is doing with the report. And then how those groups can assist. I like that Cameron. I think. I do feel, I saw really positive feelings about how that committee. Committees meeting went. And the groundwork that was laid. And so. Getting more specific with what came out of the equity report. Makes sense to me too. I think it's a good idea. I think it's a good idea. I think it's a good idea. I think it's a good idea. I think it's a good idea because they're like. Just another tangible next step to get folks thinking more about. The action to take. On equity. Um, Should we dive into that? Yeah. I think we did that about like six weeks timeline last time. I just took the calendar six weeks from now is end of the year. And so yeah, I don't know if we did that like the first week of March, you know, like the week of March 7th. Does that make sense for. For folks with, with really this goal of. You know, probably like doing outreach about the, the equity report. This stipends on the budget. Sharing more about the equity summit. The equity report and the next steps there and continue to build the relationships are those kinds of main goals. I could see. No, good. Once we get into the agenda design, like. Kind of using the recommendations. So, but yeah, I think that's basically. Right.  No. Just. Sorry. Just. You don't have to raise your hand, but you do. Shout out. Should we. Pick a time, pick a day. Like, does that. Should we do that right now? And so then we can kind of get it on the agenda and start doing the outreach. Yeah. I think. Do we do an evening time slot the first time? Yeah. Yeah. I guess I don't, you know, Wednesday is normally city council or or. School board. So I can't remember what day we did it last time. It's not coming up immediately, but like Tuesday, the eighth or say the 10th. So looking at calendars, I usually recommend Monday, Friday, at least likely to have another meeting. Friday is basically nobody has committee meetings. Because we don't want to run up against another meeting, right? So. I would recommend a Monday because Fridays, you know, people are starting.  And so I think a Monday was a good idea. I would move it back a little bit. I think the. It is always a kind of a cleanup period after, after election. Yeah. So I would, I would go to the middle or to the end of March. I think there's no harm in, we don't have to rush into this, but I think. I like the idea of, yeah, make sure we avoid any conflict with other committees. So if Monday is a good time, I would go for a Monday in late March or early April. So I would go to the middle or to the end of March. I think there's no harm in, we don't have to rush into this, but I think. I like the idea of. Yeah. I would go for a Monday in late March or early April. Just a note. I'm going to be gone for about three weeks. March 20th to April. Whatever that means. That's exciting. Are you traveling? Yeah, we're, we're. We bit the bullet. We made plans. We got to do what you got to do. Hope it's somewhere warm. Warmer or not. It's not. We're going to Spain to visit some friends. It'll be to our Vermont blood. It'll be very mild. Short, so it'll be good. We get to 30. It's mild. Yeah, right. See. So let's throw out some dates. March 14th. April 11th. April 18th. I'll work for me. I would say. Would be good. 18th is Easter Monday. Oh yeah. I clearly do not have holidays for 2022 on my calendar yet. So. When is the, do we know when school is out? Yeah. For the, you know, for the spring, spring break. Helen looking at you. No school break. I have a break. March. But I don't know my kids. I don't know. So spring break for the high schools is April 18th. Through the 22nd. So April 11th. Good day. Yes. Maybe 530 to seven. I like that. We're calling it that. It makes no sense. And I love it very much. Yeah. I'm going to send a hold to everyone right now. Just so everyone has it. Great. And then you'll put that on the. City calendar and yeah, hold it out. Perfect. So we can talk more about, we'll have time to talk more about the agenda and things for that. Coming up. Just. I'm like, in the interest of time, but it's only 835. Yeah. Yeah. Anything else for the committee and committee is right now, I guess. Look at it, Michael. Back to talk again. Sorry. Just kidding. I'm trying to think about how we. Do we ask. Some other folks to come besides just committee. Besides committee members or chairs. Do we want to get any presentations? I don't think we need to have any more presentations from. The discord. We just have to circulate the report again to them. But I'm thinking about, for example, we, we now have a contact with the, with someone about the housing, you know, what's coming down the road for housing. We want that to be part of a presence of presentation. I don't think that's going to happen. Because it would have some impact on what other, what some of the committees are doing. I can think of, you know, at least three or four. Companies where more information about what's going, what the possibilities for housing. That money that may. How that might help the city. Planting planning. I don't know if there's. Is there anybody else or any other issue that we're. We've taken up yet. I think the. I imagine the goal being more about. Each committee reflecting on the recommendations. And kind of imagining within their scope of work. How they might. Kind of fold those in.  So I don't know about picking any specific topic. To go deep on. I think it's. It's still more of. Kind of reaction to the equity recommendations and thinking about. How committees move forward with them. Okay. And thinking about primarily with like this. Not primarily. Including. You know, I don't know. I don't know about that. Jeremy, do you want to just give a quick update on the stipend. Budget. Report back. Yeah, so long ago. So my personal big takeaway. From that. City council meeting was. You know, I think it was really important for our city staff and counselors. And the tireless, you know, kind of work. It takes to run a city. That was a long one.  To doing the work of keeping our city. Running. And so that was really impressive to me. It was very interesting. And I'm considering stipend. It looked like it was going to tank tank. I think there was some, some voices. Either ambivalent about it or feeling it wasn't. A thing to be doing right now to include in the budget. But then I think we had some, some great advocacy from. The mayor and Lauren, of course. You know, reminding folks why the stipend, what the, what the stipend is really trying to do. And how it's important to building kind of equitable participation in city government. And so I think that that was enough to convince some folks who were on the fence. And I think also just reiterating the fact that this is a pilot. It's a small scale of test. I think folks didn't quite have that on the, on council didn't quite have that kind of perspective when they were thinking about it. So that was really helpful thing to reinforce. And so in the end, it was, I think it was a positive response. And I think the budget amount we had suggested was maintained. Now that was quite a few weeks ago. So I don't know where things are now, but you know, I thought it was a good discussion. And at that moment, council was in support of including in the budget. So I don't know if Cameron, you have other updates since then to share. No, it hasn't been removed or anything that is in the final budget that council will be having public hearings on. So it'll be a good time if you all want to come and reemphasize support for that. If that's something you're up to doing, but, you know, it's still in the budget. You're fine to walk through your, it's still in the budget. The sort of what I could see being a really important next step for this committee before 2020, 2023 budget kicks in is coming back to council with a full. So that they can, you know, be comfortable with that. So your implementation sort of protocol and how you see that working fully fleshed out what committees should be included a couple. Honestly, I would see a couple of different proposals coming to council because that was the biggest chunk. What Jeremy said. Of that conversation really was like who would get it versus. It was an interesting in the weeds conversation about a concept that was presented. So. But I, but I saw like meeting the implementation. What committee should be included. And just giving that back to council. Before. You know, the summer when, if the, if this passes the budget, right. That's what, but otherwise, you know, I thought it was a really interesting. Introduction to the concept. For those of us who missed it, what date was that? I mean, we can go back and look at the, look at the video of it. Do you remember when that was? No, but I'll put a link in the minutes to it. So you can watch it. Good. Thank you. Right now. So I remember to do that. Yeah. Minor detail. Lesson learned for me is when you send a spreadsheet with multiple worksheet tabs, you need to really. Tell people that they're there because. That's another thing that happened when I sent the spreadsheet. People didn't realize there were these different scenarios. To review. And so they don't have to do that. And so they just found the one that opened up the spreadsheet and another like detail that. Got missed, but. Yeah. Shayna. We have not done the minutes and stuff. And I just want to make sure we. Thank you. Sorry. I didn't see the minutes and I'm sure I. Should just pull them up. Yep. They were attached to the invite. And they're always on our website. Always on the website. I know that's what I was like. Work hard enough. Here we go.  Getting Essex to come in in a couple of months. Yeah. Yeah. Should we do that? Like the week before the. You know, the meeting before the. Before or after the April committee and committee's meeting. My recommendation to y'all is to wait until after. So you can do the committee on committees and then you can focus. On questions. Yeah. And responding to that. Yeah. I'm sorry. I'm just pulling up the minutes. Still being. Yeah, I don't know if this is. Thing that was happening with them. The community fund too. If I pull it up in there, it's just like a white page. And it's not giving me the minutes. So it still seems to not be working. For me. If I send the link for folks. Okay. Or share a screen or something. Yeah, but I get the agenda. Which is what. Yeah. Me too. Okay. Oh, that is a long link. Yeah. That's not working for me either. Do you want to just share your screen? Does that make sense? Yeah, I will do that right now. Sorry. I think it's working for other people. Sorry. I lost stuff going on. There we go. Awesome. The next. Memo. That we talked about. Okay. Cool. I don't want to make a motion to approve. I'll move that. Make that motion. Michael. Helen, do you want a second? I second. Any opposed? Awesome. We've got our minutes. Can we send the link so that we can. I can download it on my files. Yes. Do you see the chat? Yes. That's the link. To the website. I hope that works for you. If it doesn't, let me know and I'll just send it to you as an attachment. Whoa. That's quite a little bit of a dress. No, it's a, it's an intense link. Yeah. Sorry. Wow. I'll just send it out again as an attachment. It is in your invite as an attachment. Hopefully I'll just send it out again. So you have it. Okay. I'll send out all the things as attachments. All right. Thank you. And then does anyone have any other. I'll comment learning round table report backs from other committees. Anything else to discuss? I will just ask a question. Sorry. Sorry. Do we have any. Information on them? I am an immigrant, right? So I just wonder. How we communicate. With them what's happening. And I see a couple of people, not that much. But there must be some. We can reach out. I think it is also a great opportunity. So I just want to bring this. We don't have to talk about it. But I have been thinking this for a while. So what can we do for them? What's happening because they are really. Invisible. You know, so if we want to. Include people for this volunteer. City birds. So about reaching out. Immigrants too. So. Just the idea for. For the future. Discussions. Yeah, I think we mostly we're approaching that through like the English language learning. Piece of it. And that that was one of the priorities coming out. That's kind of like, I don't know, it's a frame or the approach for it. And that came out. As one of the big priorities. And I think it's. I think it's a good idea. I think it's a good idea. For the future. Discussions. Yeah, I think we mostly were approaching that through like the English. Language learning. Piece of it. And that, I think it's a good idea. As one of the big priorities of the equity report that the city is working on. Doing like. Concerted outreach to English language learners. And to. And providing. You know, language specific outreach and. I'm working with the schools on, on developing that. And so, yeah, I don't know. I don't know if we have that right now or. No, I mean, we have a line. You know, you know, as we go through this recommendation, that one is. One that I think I would need help with. And I really do what Pellin's point is, is like, how do we connect with like refugee action networks or something like that? Like really. You know, like I have a, I have a, we have the recommendation for increased language access, right? But like, is that what actually, is that what people need? We don't, I don't know. I don't know. You can walk through. We did, we did make a connection to adult basic education. Way back when we started talking about this and we, we didn't do anything with it. Except I think.  The other group that comes to mind to me is, is one of the other committees that I sit on the. The other. The other. This is gone. And that is the community friend. We made, made. I don't. I think 19 of the 36. The next grants that we recommended to the council are for service organizations, human services organizations that can that operate in the county or in the area and, and those would be a good. That's another constituency where where we could go to like the committee on committees we could invite those people those organizations that received grants from the city. So the board to, you know, meeting also similar similar to the committee on committees, because they are the ones who have connections to all the different groups that we are talking about who are especially marginalized groups. Sorry, Michael. There's a safe place I think in the capital plus, but they are helping with the citizenship test and, and other, maybe they, they might know some data.  I don't remember the name of the office. Maybe you remember it's like when you go to capital plus and walk to the j morgans it is left side. That's all basic education right. That's the adult basic education. Yeah, okay. Yeah, that's fun. I mean, I, the last time I spoke with them. There was a small number of people who were using that service, but they, they might have the connections to organizations that are working with. Right, I think Cameron said there's also the central Vermont refugee action network which is volunteer run group that started in 2018 that's been doing a lot of work with afghan refugees as well as the kind of whatnot like not through the refugee program but asylum seekers and things like that. So, um, I think let's maybe like hold on to that conversation for now we can kind of mull on it as well about like what that looks like. If that makes sense. Yeah. Great. All right, well, um, have a good couple of weeks all and we're meeting again on January 26. All right. All right. Bye. Bye.


is Daniel Sadrak. Daniel Sadrak, please share your screen. Thank you, Ali. Let me share my screen now. OK, the floor is yours. Yes, yes. Thank you, Ali. Thank you, all the organizers, for inviting and in this wonderful current conference. I'm going to talk on the lower molecular dynamics and related methods and biomolecular interaction. And the main focus of my talk will be how sovereigns and the conformational fluctuations of biomolecularly is important and affect the interaction of the two. So I'll give a very little background. And the pipeline drug design is a long process and takes a long time for one drug to be approved and got for clinical market. Ideally, it takes about 12 to 15 years, with costing about $1 billion for a drug to be in a market. So this is true traditional drug design approach. And recently, we have other sort of scattered tools that can help literally reduce and shorten the process, time, and also reduce the cost. And one of these approaches is to employ also computational methods. Again, they also help to reduce the related reasons for drug failure, example, quesadability, and toxicity, because we can start and predict all these things. So in this, I'm going to share with you one of the tools that we call molecular dynamics, classical. So in classical molecular dynamics, here we are only focused on the Newton's law of immersion, this one. And by integrating this one, then we need the potential to do that. And therefore, we can see how the molecule is really moving and evolving with time. And this can be used as a microscope to dissect and understand the atomistic or molecular interaction, and can help also to bridge both theory and experiment, and can predict and suggest further experiments. So in this case, we can also understand the binding process and the binding process of a drug to its receptor, or the protein, as we can see in some of this image here. So my talk is going to be in two areas, in protein ligand interaction and the nanoparticle drug interaction. So for the nanoparticle protein ligand interaction, I would go first with discovering the heat shock protein inhibitor for cancer treatment. The heat shock protein 90 is a molecular capillone, and that exists in two conformational states. When the end terminal, this one, could be open. When the ATP, it is not bound. And when the ATP bound, then it closes the end-ping terminal. So these functions by maintaining, controlling the function of many molecular capillones and other client proteins that are responsible for cancer. So inhibiting the activity of this protein is an idea that we can kill and stop the function of more than 200 known client protein that depend on this protein. So how do we do this? This is an example for client protein that if we have an inhibitor, we inhibit the function of this at the ATP site at the end terminal domain. We are able now to induce protosemotygladation of this client protein. But if we don't inhibit, then it's very, very good. And then cancer continues in our body. So it is an idea. So we tested and did some experiments computationally on how we can identify some molecules that could be potential inhibitors. So we performed a drug lipoposing and assisted the lower of water and the conformation of fluctuations in HST inhibitor. As an example, in the left panel here, we can see that we have different catch-off of water. So we have a different amount of water in the protein that is a crystal structure. And then we can see that water plays an important role and affect the bind, the thermodynamic binds of a ligand to a receptor. As an example, this molecule here, this Draghi, Domperidon, if the binding of it to the receptor is little depends on the amount of water that's available. And we can see that an optimal amount of water, less secure amount of water could be important for its function. But again, when there is no water, it is functioning. It does not work properly. And when there is more amount of water, the function of it becomes less. Then we were interested in understanding the lower of conformation of fluctuations. How does it affect the binding of the molecule? We found that when a protein undergo fluctuations, literally there is a little difference in the lower of water. So water plays an important role. But again, the fluctuation of the protein has an important role to see how it works in different structure. As an example, today right here, the water here that's dotted in a reddy board, they are showing how they are able to facilitate the interaction of a ligand in the Hitchcock protein 90. And here's a two-dimensional product that's shown the hydrogen bonding of the water mediating the interaction and forming hydrogen bonding with the molecule when it is in the active site, which again, it brought increased the thermal energy binding and that into good favorable binding. But we do all of this by doing a talking and there are algorithms for talking that are challenged by that. They don't accommodate protein flexibility. In order to accommodate some protein flexibility, then we need to do what we call the lexical complex scheme. In this scheme, we need to perform a molecular dynamics. And then we can extract some simple structures from the long simulation that we had. Then we need to perform or we can do some clustering. Then we can do docking to these clusters. And then we can assess the binding and it to different clusters. And then we can see also how the binding is affected by the conformation of this. So as an example, we performed some docking calculation from different ensemble structure and assess the binding in comparison to crystal structures. And we found two ligands, for example, this molecule here as T-MIP and Peter was starting binding at the pocket, but with different binding affinity because of different conformation of the protein. We have tried to compare some previous experimental work. As an example, we performed the calculations on the whole ensemble. And also we compared with an upper ensemble. And then we found that the whole ensemble with a molecule which is bound to a more stable tends to improve the binding in age and tends to have the binding in age than to the upper ensemble and when they are having a molecule which is not stable bound to. We have tried to compare with some recent result where also they performed an experiment on various cancer series. And they found again, Peter was starting like what we observed in the computation simulations tends to have a lower binding in age and show that an effective concentration which is a good, we can say may comparable compared to other molecule here. Again, we have been using different computational methods in the discover law for natural productive inhibitors of the COVID-19 disease. And one of the strategies that we are focusing on is to inhibit the virus to enter into the human body. So what we can do is that before the virus enter into the host cell, it needs to attach it to the angiotensin conventing enzyme two, which is this one. And this attachment is also activated by this TPA-RSS2. Then it's a good idea if we can inhibit this one and also can inhibit the activity of the two, then we can inhibit this one. Another approach is either to target on the virus itself. So inhibiting the viral RNA synthesis and recreation. So far some molecules that have been reported to be important inhibitor for the cell entry is the snathomostat. But again, we have a lot now of natural products here. So we have screened natural product that we had previously selected in one of our group here in Tanzania from different brands. And these brands, for example, this one, the Tridential Parian, have been used the locary to manage and control the spreader of COVID-19 in Tanzania seems to be effective. So we did first the screening and then we performed repurposing. So repurposing is using already known drug that is approved before the disease, but useful another indication. So using the natural product scaffold, then we identified three molecules that's reconstructed the flavonoids that seemed to be effective against the many targets. So as an example, to the right here, we assessed the stability against the many proteasin of the SAS COVID-19. And we found at least one of the molecule was more stable compared the other. So I think this one here, DB112665 was more stable when we compare with the other measure by the ERMSD. And then the stability of this, we assessed using the ND.3NH methods. This included the molecular mechanics poison, Botsman, surface area and arena interaction NH. And we found that this molecule is interacting with people in the less use of the active site. And again, with this also Ligand, but this Ligand did not interact favorably. And we observed that it was moving out of the pocket and hence a very little binding energy. The other idea was now to focus on screening compound, just targeting the, at the interface of the spike. I mean, the receptor bind domain and the acid. So it's made up with these residues here. So these residues here is for the receptor bind domain and this is for acid. So if we can stop this interaction here, then we are able to stop this, the virus from fusion into the human cell. So we performed against screening and then we found one again, Fravonauts, which is binding effective to the acid pocket here and stopping the weakening interaction between the host. So we performed again the relaxed complex scheme to assess the effect of protein flexibility. And we found that protein flexibility then here improve the results. So as an example for this Ligand number 80 here, although the difference is not much bigger is the order of two kilo calorie per month. But we found that relaxed complex scheme would improve the binding energy of this molecule when compared to the crystal structure. Then we assessed the stability of this by measuring different parameters, including the distance. And we assess this in a 100 nanosecond. So we measured this stability. So as an example for this molecule, we found that at the time it was changing and moving out of its pocket. As we can see the initial configuration is binding related to the interface. But after some time, it was really going out maybe because the strength of binding between the acid and the receptor band domain and the acid to make this really strong affinity than the affinity that the Ligand could find so it would be dispersed. But we went further on trying it to look on the distance between the acid protein at the interface when there is drug and when there is no drug. And we found that the distance was a little bit changed but not significant when compared in the absence and in the presence of the Ligand. Then we were interested looking at how water mediated the interaction of the protein and the Ligand. As we know that what is a biological solvent and the very important and the pre-lose in the interaction of the protein Ligand. And we found that water is really helping mediating the interaction of the Ligand and the protein in a particular way that we can say. So, for example, we have here our molecule and interacting with the residues from the receptor band domain and from the acid. And water is trying to bridge the interaction and to make stabilization here. And to the right here is just the radio distribution for different water and different residues. For example, this residue in water and the Ligand and the water. Then the binding affinity with this we assessed it by using the re-interaction energy and the molecular mechanics Poisson and Poisson surface area. We found that at the interface more amino acid residues from the acid to contributing to the interaction when compared to the receptor binding domain which is from this range of amino acid residue. And when we compare the binding energy that is obtained from MMPBCA and from the interaction energy of course they were all compared this binding energy is in kilojoule per mole that we obtained minus 64 and this one was also in the kilojoule per mole. Then we want to understand the binding and binding pathway. And here we perform the molecular dynamics simulation. So as an example here I wanted to understand the first unbinding process of a molecule. So in the top panel here we have just the time dependent where the drug is unbinding and when it comes to unbind to bind again it's where we stop the calculation and then we calculate and see how the unbinding process is going. So we can see for example here this dominating mode which is at this stage here that is at the binding at the interface but with time it unbind proceeding the residues with the receptor binding domain of the virus and binding fear this pathway instead going through the acetyl residue. And this interaction is now said to have three states that we have the natural complexity then separated by the barrier of photobalcula jupamol and we have the pre complex and the unbonded complex when the drug is completed separated from the protein which is again represented by this state here when the drug is completely moved out of the pocket. Now we are doing some clinical testing of this one to continue evaluating with a scientist from Sweden but the same compound have been locally used here and they seem to be very much effective and we have some of the extracts we used we have extracted and they are used a lot in the community and for people I don't know if people can see it. Then in my last talk I'm going to focus on the law of servant and the pH in a nanoparticle drug interaction with an implication to drug delivery system. As we know that drug formulation always take place in the solvent and the solvent really affect of this. So we used some model molecule or model drug compound that we also isolated in Tanzania and we did this the interaction of a drug and Kato-san nanoparticle and we wanted also to validate some experiment because this was performed on experiment and we did the theoretical work on this and we found that what are praise and important and destabilization or solvent but not every solvent is suitable for different for the formulations. So for this case here we compared the two solvent which are clinically relevant water and DMSO. In this case we can see that water is really favoring the interaction between this molecule here is called to something A and Kato-san compared to when we used DMSO and the binding stability was more favored by in the formulation with the water. And thus we found that DMSO had a tendency when Kato-san is dipped into DMSO tended to make the Kato-san to be more folded and in water to be more unfolded and hence when it is unfolded then to make a strong interaction and hence there is more commission of water and bonding and interaction and hence sustaining the release of a molecule compared when it is in DMSO. Then we were interested to understand the conformation and perpetuation of a molecule inside the nanoparticle and then we found that the solvent again plays an important role. So for example, this molecule here it was something that we had been looking at in the presence of water may existing maybe two, three conformational state with where we are trying to point the end to end the distance and the Kato-eno distance. So it could be existing in more of bent conformation and with the Kato-eno pointing toward and toward the Kato-eno and outward the Kato oxygen. But in DMSO is a different behavior that we can see. So we have only conformation we say only two conformation state is pointing toward and you know and also bent compared to water. Then we can see that the water would tend to form some netway. So how do you- Daniel, I should try to conclude this. Yeah, okay. Okay, okay, yes. Then the last thing before I conclude is that and pH has an effect on the drug formulation. So before we formulated this experimenter and then we tested the encapsulation on pora mydoama and dendrima. And this was really a motivation then that how can we computationally also view it at the atomistic level. So we're inspired also by this work that they did a similar work that we did experimenter and then they did computationally. Then we found that the pH has a little effecting on the grease and interaction of the molecule like what we found here. And I would like to give an acknowledgement to different number of institutions for operating together. I think that's it, P and MST. Thank you for presenting and for joining my talk. Thank you. Thank you very much, Daniel for this very interesting talk. The floor is open for questions. So there is one question by Mahmood Akbari who asks if you studied the interaction of S protein with the ligand. Did you study the interaction of the S protein with the ligand? S protein, yes. And what are the active sites of the S protein? For the S protein, if there's the active site, I don't know how I can show it here now, but for the S with the end with the interval, let me show you here, is this one for the S protein with the interface, the active site is here. But for the S alone, it has the active site somewhere S so I don't show it here. Okay, yeah. Okay. I actually, I have a question regarding this apparent low cases of COVID in Tanzania. So are you suggesting that it's because Tanzanians are having a lot of these natural products in their diet and that's why that's what's happening or what exactly? Actually, there's a number of factors. This could be one of the reasons because these print are printed available and whoever one that fears the symptoms because the government approved that take it, use it directly. Could be the reason, but there could be another factors. Okay. All right. Thank you very much, Daniel. We need to move on to our next speaker.


Good morning everybody, welcome back to another vlog. Today is Sunday, the day I'm filming this. We're gonna do a little Sunday fun day with our friends, Noelle and Josh. We haven't seen them in forever. We've all been so busy. So it'll be nice to get together and plan some Japan stuff because we are going to Japan with them in like a month and a half. That's crazy. So it's gonna be really fun. I just got myself dressed. We actually, I believe, are all gonna be matching with our shoes today because Drew ended up getting a pair of like Nike blazers I think they're called. And Josh already had some and then he got some for Noelle. They would always kind of wear them at the same time. And I would joke like, I wanna be part of the club. And so for my birthday, Drew got me some. So here's my outfit of the day. Don't mind the sound of the laundry. So I have this little split cardigan. This is from ASOS, I believe. Sorry, ASOS. I've been saying that incorrectly for a long time. And then these jeans are from Good American. These are the good 90s jeans. They're the best jeans in the world. These are the blazers. How freaking cute are these? I got the platform pink version. Freakin' adorable. I did a little bang braids moment and that is simply because my hair is greasy. Oh, our friends are here, so let's go to work. Blazer gang. Look at us. Our powers. Smoke signals.  To get my brows done, I was actually supposed to have a brow microblading appointment today. But about a week ago, I canceled it because I've just heard a lot of like mixed opinions about it. I'm just gonna, in the meantime, oh, I need to get gas soon. In the meantime, I'm just gonna keep doing like lamination and tinting, which is what I'm doing today. And I did lose my deposit, which sucks, cause it was completely non-refundable no matter when you canceled it, but it's okay, it's fine. I'm a little salty about it, but.  We had such a blast and we were literally home by like 3pm, I think. And like, we made a pizza, we sat on the couch, we watched the Grammys. It was like a nice way to end the weekend. It's just fun to like have those times where you just kind of cut loose and hang out with your friends and enjoy the beautiful weather. And like, yeah, that's one of the reasons why I moved here, you know, was to have days like that. So it was a great day. And now it's back to reality. So I've been working all morning. It's about noon right now. And I am headed to this brow place, which is also right across the street from an air wand, which is like a very fancy, kind of like overhyped bougie grocery store here in LA. They have a lot of like local stuff. They have a lot of like healthy stuff, but their hot bar is really freaking good. Really, really good. Even though it is very expensive. I love their breakfast burritos. I love their buffalo cauliflower. Oh my gosh, it's so good. I love the white bean kale salad. Love their Korean short ribs. Like there's just a lot of things that are really good. And it's like right across the street. And I am kind of hungry. So I may stop by and get some of that. We'll see. We'll see how I'm feeling after my appointment. It usually only takes about like 30, 45 minutes. The girl who does my brows is so fast. It's insane. I love it. And yeah, I'm just in the meantime, snacking on this sleeve of Ritz crackers. Why is it that you can eat like a half a sleeve of Ritz crackers and feel like you've eaten nothing? There's like no substance in them whatsoever, but I was just craving them. So anyways, I'm gonna go get these brows done up because they're very sparse. I have naturally like super light eyebrows. So I just really need to get them touched up, shaped up, I'll be a new woman when I leave. It's like one of my little things that I'm doing to treat myself. So let's do it. Let's get these brows done and go on with our day. Start off the week right? All right, back in the car. My face is red because I had my mask on, but I only ended up just getting a smoothie at Erwan because literally I just had groceries delivered this morning. Like I can go home and make lunch. And they didn't have the Korean shore ribs that I wanted. So anyways, okay. We're gonna try this smoothie. I decided to get a Pataya smoothie.  I don't know if I wanna try it. My body is really weird. I mean, obviously being an IBS girly, there's just a lot of stuff that I'm not willing to try for the first time when I have stuff to do. So anyways, okay. Gonna try this Pataya smoothie. It was $13. So not as expensive as the $20 like Haley Bieber Bella Hadid smoothies, but here we go. We're gonna taste test it. Let's see how it is. That's actually delicious. I'm like worried it's gonna stain my mouth and my teeth, but whatever. It is very vibrant in person. It's beautiful.  I mean, it's pretty much the same thing, but it's delicious. And I was just in the mood for something like fruity and cold and refreshing because I'm actually kind of warm right now with what I'm wearing. So anyways, I'm gonna go do my least favorite task in the entire world, which is get gas. I don't know why I hate getting gas so much. I would literally rather do anything, but that's the worst thing I have to do today then I'm okay with that.  It's actually now the next day. I have since washed off my brows. So here is what they're looking like 24 hours later. And yes, I did take off my lash extension thingies. They were bothering me and one of them was wonky. So I'm gonna redo them later. I am currently making some lunch.   Am I right? And here's what we've got going on for lunch. You're eating all my fries. Okay, so I did one of these chicken patties here. I'll show you. These are the just bear lightly breaded spicy chicken fillets. I haven't tried one yet, but Drew said they're pretty good. And then we've also got some zesty straight curly fries with their straight. I don't know. When Drew unboxed this with the groceries, it said zesty straight and he goes, me. So I'm gonna do like kind of like a McDonald's, like spicy McChicken.  I'm not a huge mayo gal. Don't come for me. Usually I try to do some sort of like salad for lunch cause it's just like a good way for me to get some nutrients in. I'm just not in mood for that today. I really wanted this. So we're gonna do a little bit of shredded lettuce and then the patty. And that's it. Then I air fried some fried one of that. And it seems like you're a little overdone, but that's okay. And would you look at that gorgeous, balanced meal. Let's taste it together. Can you grab me some ranch? Not bad honestly. Mm, it is spicy. Spicy, spicy. It needs a little ranch. I have a ranch girly in moderation, like for dipping chicken sandwiches, things like that. But I could never do ranch on a salad on popular opinion. Throwback to when I was in England and they had an American style salad at the grocery store and it was a salad with ranch and like bacon bits. I was like, wow, representation. Oh, and how could I forget the most important part? You guys, I caved. I bought another 12 pack. I don't want to talk about it. I've had one spicy water since then. Besides like if you count Oli Pop, it brings me joy, okay? If you're also trash like me. I see you. I'm one with you. All right, just took Layla outside again and I'm gonna take myself out on a walk but I have had these clean clothes sitting on our kitchen island because it's like right by where our washer and dryer are for like the last two days, three days possibly. So I'm gonna put these away first and just thought, you know, if anyone wanted to feel a little bit more seen, yeah. I just left my clothes sitting here for like two, three days and I walked past them 200 times. But I just couldn't be bothered until now, you know? And maybe if you need some gentle encouragement to put your own laundry away. Here you go. The crows reed with me. We're gonna do this. It's gonna feel so much better, but I hate feeling it. I don't know if it's even like visible from this angle but this is how dark our bedroom is in the brightest part of the day. It's actually kind of depressing. And that's like one thing that, you know, there are pros and cons to every place to live, but that is one thing that really is driving me bonkers about the place that I live right now. What is that? Oh, that's what I heard earlier. And I was like, what the hell? I don't know. Our ice machine is on the fritz. Good thing there's a warranty. That sounds horrible. Oh, please. We're having an emergency. Okay, that was an eventful side conquest there. A little bump in the road. But yeah, now we're gonna have to like, I think send our ice machine back and we've only had it for like less than a month. Ugh. I think we've got a dud, we got a lemon. Anyways, whatever. I'm just gonna finish putting away my laundry. I'm late now for my walk and I'm gonna run into like afternoon traffic. So I'm just gonna try to do my best to get out as soon as possible to avoid that. Not gonna lie, we didn't put it all away but we made progress. It's fine, let's go walking. Actually, before I go do that, I forgot that I ordered this package. And listen, I don't know what I was thinking, okay? I'm just going for it. But I have been contemplating getting bangs lately and I probably won't. Also, we're not gonna talk about how greasy my hair is. I probably won't do it. And the reason that I bought myself clip on bangs was so I could convince myself to not. Cause I know that they're not gonna look good on me. So, okay. I just got these on Amazon and we're gonna see what they look like. I don't think these are the right color. We'll work with it. It also comes with a roller. Okay, fancy. I'm not exactly sure why. And these are supposed to be a wispy.   Oh, so you look a bit up. Okay. Probably like should be fully ready before I do this. Like have some makeup on, have my hair styled, but whatever, okay. Let's try it out. Oh, these aren't too dark, but they just look really, really fake. First of all, it being in my eyes is already driving me nuts. Oh, I think it would, I think it would be a sensory nightmare for me. Oh God, it's all in my eyes. No, no, no, no. Okay, you know, it was a fun experiment. It doesn't like look too bad from far away, but it actually is like physically poking me in my eye. How do people with bangs do this?  Cause like this is how I would want them to look. It is giving Michelle Duggar a little bit, which is mildly concerning to me, but honestly, it's not as bad as I thought. Let me like try putting my hair up and see. Feel about it. It's obviously so super fake. I would maybe wear these for like a photo or something, but no. So I think it's gonna be a no, but it was a cute idea. I've just been like in such a rut with my hair lately and trying to figure out like how to style it, what I want to do with it. I've been styling my hair exactly the same since literally like I was in 10th grade, just like apart curls and that's it. I don't know, there's like not much else.  But yeah, I don't think these are it. This is hilarious though. Probably not in the cards for me anytime soon. Okay, I don't really have much time left cause I have lolly gagged and pushed this off for too long. And basically like my neighborhood starts getting really, really busy, come like 3.30 ish, just like a lot of stuff everyone's out about. So I want to try and avoid that if possible.   I'm gonna wash my hair, I'm gonna shave, I'm gonna do all of the things. And then we are gonna watch Love Island tonight.  I'm not current on Love Island because we are watching it here in the US just like as it comes on Hulu. So instead of like people in the UK who are two weeks ahead, we are about to face, I think like one of the first eliminations tonight besides David who went home in the, like he was the bombshell who went home. Hello, this is crooked. But I think this will be like the first guy and girl that'll go home. So it's gonna be crazy. I think I already know who it is. It's kind of hard to avoid spoilers if you're like a couple of weeks behind in a show, but we are just loving it so much. And it actually is fun watching a new episode every night, having another one to look forward to the next day. So it's gonna be fun. I've had such a great few days in this vlog. I've had so much fun like hanging out with my friends, going out in a bow, getting some drinks, doing some self-care stuff, getting my brows done. But thank you so much for being here. Thank you for spending your time with me. Thank you for watching. Let me know your thoughts on the bangs situation down below as well, because it's pretty bad. And like Besties, I will not be offended if you tell me it's bad because it's not real. It's clip-in, so don't hold back. And yeah, I will see you very soon in my next vlog. Bye.


So next we have Dr. Alison Halford, talking about unlocking the potential of sensors for the benefits of the environment, people, places and ethnic. Thank you. Thank you. So before I start, I want to manage our expectations about this presentation, because I notice you're really solution driven. And this project was not, it was very much about resolutions, because we didn't want to end up with a meter size. Now, what do I mean by that?  My sister is very similar size to me. She just turned 15 September last year, and she said to her husband, I really hate being this way. I want to lose weight and I'm going to eat more fiber. And her husband's an engineer and he said, don't worry, Jan, by Christmas, I'll have the solution. And during those three months, he kept saying, don't worry, I know exactly this is really what you need. And then she comes down to the sitting room, and for Christmas he'd given her an exercise by that he converted to grind wheat. And he's trying to solve a problem he created a whole set of problems, because she didn't speak to him till the new year. But that is what often we find that when we are focused on a solution, we miss the dialogue the context, the alternative narratives around that that discussion. So I'm going to do it. This writing retreat. Okay, I'm. Yeah, am I going to click. Yay. Okay. Oh, okay. Yes, this is it. We were ambitious. Now, most fighting retreats as you know quite passive. And they're also quite singular. It's about improving your writing. We went beyond that we definitely were ambitious in our vision. We wanted to see what happens when we bring together people working in this space and see what what they could produce in terms of a collective consciousness around the digital environment. Now, this is not without a prototype we know that I was involved in tomorrow's engineering research challenges so I had some insight to how it was delivered, but we just went that bit further. So, and our ambition now has expanded to beyond a briefing paper we intend therefore to also produce a journal paper from our findings. What's going to so who were the people who did we involve. Oops, I'm really good at this. Okay. Now I'm drawing attention to that not to single them out not in a way this is not a wall of shame. But I'm just drawing attention to the fact that we were very selective about who we invited out to the 67 we invited 24 agreed to come and 21 actually were able to attend the writing retreat. Now there's two things I want you to draw attention to firstly, that there's an appetite for it to have over a third of respondents come. There is definitely an appetite for this kind of activity. Secondly, because we were we, before we extend an invitation we actually read through papers that have been published by them. We looked at that biographies, we were very considered about who could attend that there was a huge challenge. If it were not for the CDE expert network, it would have been looking like in cupboards under the stairs. This whole people working in the digital environment are hidden away to comments in very strange combinations. One would think you would go to digital related faculty, but you'll find there in geography or sustainable development. I cannot emphasize how critical it is if we want more and more collaboration to have a central point where we can find those experts. So how did we do it. Okay, now we had varied activities and we're all it was all about disrupting the law. It was about taking these people into uncomfortable spaces, and a lot of it was about critical reflexivity. And that's different from reflection reflection is where you do it as an individual critical reflexivity is a feminist method where we take the discipline and hold the discipline to account. So we really interrogate long standing tropes and push back upon established thinking. After all those activities, what would we, and I'm always worried about the term success what do we mean by success, but the activities what were the ones where they engaged most that they found the most fertile that they were able to feel the most connected was none of these. The feedback that I got was that the activities that were the best was when they had meals together. It was those discussions. And I've reflected upon this when I was looking at the feedback forms. And I've come to the conclusion that in the act of breaking break together. What we do is we move connections from transactions to more communal expressions that we remove those hierarchies those labels, and we around dinner table, have an opportunity to to present ourselves beyond our work. So what insights did we gain from this writing retreat. At the moment I'm still processing we only finished last week so I'm still processing the data. And there's an awful lot. So I'm going to have a caveat I'm not talking about things. We are doing thematically analysis. I should also just reference the theoretical framework for the briefing paper is around data feminism. So that we can really push back around racism data. And they're all isms and patriarchy. So that is so there is that transparency and in of itself I don't have time to discuss that but that was a journey itself, getting people working in this space to think about theoretical frameworks. So the first insight can offer this idea of trusted authority. If you look at the image, what you'll see is a barometer. And one of the reasons is a part of our photo elicitation exercise was someone said, this represented to her unlocking the benefits of sensors for the environment, because it was trusted that it didn't matter how much there was new technology. And the notion that we become a trusted authority, I think really is relevant as we've seen more and more distrust occurs. So that says that as science replaced religion, science comes in the same trap as religion that it offers certainty when in of itself, it should embrace the uncertainty. In the bold you will see something that we I saw within all five groups. Now we did have five, what we did we divided people into five creative teams, so that they had an opportunity to work in smaller groups. So the value that they really all commented upon. What happens invariably is we're very reductionist about sustainable development goals and we're quite, you know, we just say we reference them in a very kind of generic way. And what becomes really apparent if you want to inform policy, you have to be explicit about how that work fits into that goal, not the tagline goal, but the categories, there are categories within the categories. There's a second insight and this particular image again one of the participants used it to show how the barriers we can limit, you know, stop us from reaching the beauty of the work we do. Now, to put simply the point where it will converge this idea of democratizing knowledge, I think I can put in really simple terms, you are gatekeepers. And the ability and the capability to allow others to understand your work. But once you are dazzled by the technology. Once you start talking in terms of alienate those around you who are outside of your sector.  And not only that you reinforce exclusive the exclusivity the knowledge hierarchies, the very antithesis of what you want to do. One of the privilege I have of having insights into your business I see the tremendous amount of good you're doing, but at times I do not understand why you are doing it and sometimes I don't know why I should care about what you're doing. This is a really critical point, we need to be able to tell our stories. So everyone can buy into our journey. The last and final point was about transformation and this is probably the point. So I'm just checking notes flying. And it's about transformative community practice. And the thing that became very apparent was there was a need for to work. I quite liked what they were talking about they wanted this idea of coming together as an imagined community and this comes from Benedict Anderson's idea that we don't have to have an actual virtual community we can have a virtual community an imagined community. Now I think this one is not without controversy. I think reading through people's comments, what they envision is a very egalitarian very inclusive diverse space addressing some of the issues we know we have within your community about retention about attracting those traditionally excluded or marginalized within this discipline, but I'm going to add a caveat here in asking for a central point, invariably someone is going to have to lead it. So even if you get the funding, if you get funding to one institution, we then start elevating one institution upon the other. And I came into academia late and I didn't realize the scale. I'm a Coventry University. And I have had experiences that make me realize that there is still, I thought we had moved on from this. There is still a lot of privilege associated to where you are located. And I think this idea of the place. And I think we need to think very carefully when we talk about centers is are we just reproducing privilege, and we can only a few can only access, or, and we're still in actual perpetrating the very thing that we claim we wish to, to avoid. So in conclusion. So what we thought again was to bring to the floor people places and ethics. So what did we do that. I think, yes, we started conversations and conversations change conditions. But there was three unexpected outcomes from this. And this was driven by the groups myself and I think this is what I said start we didn't know where we're going to land. I think this is what has made the journey exciting. I think one of the things was that they wanted to see a survey and they really wanted to understand the needs and aspirations. There is a concern that we are not retaining talent that we are having to rethink, particularly the neoliberalization of universities is that we need to think very carefully. There are people that are the brightest and the best and feel valued and have value that we respect and honor and dignify this profession. The second thing is about ideas about theoretical frameworks. That was something that for some groups they haven't accounted before. And the understanding was that you don't necessarily need a theoretical framework for the work you're doing, but you do need to ask yourself. How do you design sensors? You may think why would that, how does that reinforce inequality? And that's the whole question that should be your starting point. It is not about the technology. It is about what the technology does in the everyday lives of people. And lastly, this conceptualization of digital environment playgrounds. There was an appetite to have more fun. This is a serious endeavor and the opportunity to come together as a collective, to in a supportive, safe environment, to explore new ideas, to have opportunities to incubate, to think, to reflect, was seen something that can really help maintain not just the well-being of the individuals concerned, but actually amplify and advocate for digital environment. And those working with digital environment having a bigger platform. I think, in conclusion, I'd just like to say, the only, I believe the future in this profession is to ensure that you are informing and influencing beyond the academia. And that means you have to start to find a different set of skills. The papers are not sufficient. They are not going to give you the impact you need. And so I would challenge you to start thinking about how can we disseminate in different ways, so that we can encourage people to think differently, to attract people who are different career directories, so that we can continue to sustain and maintain a healthy, vibrant and connected ecosystem. Thank you. I didn't participate in any questions. Well, thank you very much. I thought that reflection on how difficult it would be to find people within the organizations. If this network exists, really is a challenge to us all to make sure that it's visible and that there are probably people who are still hidden. Yeah, we need as part of this community. And I was interested, what you were talking about that, that taking meals together and that being a really important time. Do you think that means that there's a need to bring some of that into the activities or do you think the fact that it's just a different thing to the activities is actually part of the white words. And I think, yeah, I think that that's a really good point. I think there's something very familiar about sitting around a table, so that if you are, and also something quite secure, that's me telling you. So yeah, I think there is that familiarity, but also I think it breaks the space becomes an egalitarian space a meal table a table when you sit around isn't in a classroom isn't in a presentation space. It is in a very neutral space so I think space matters where we discuss it. I think the other thing is there is an expectation that you will talk. You know, a meal tilt there is a certain amount of expectation that they will become a communal convivial or event, but I don't think that's the only only space you're right. I think sometimes it's giving them something they can do, and also allow them to step out sometimes because sometimes you don't want to talk so it's about doing that space so yeah, so yeah I'm not advocating that you just turn a conference and just you know, unless you go to Spain, it's more traditional. Yeah, the culture. And Steve's asking what form might a digital environment play ground. Right. Yeah, no, so this is their exploring that what they envisioned was it would all again be that inclusion that universities would open up their labs or space and hosted Sunday, and it then that was going to just be selecting right here rather than an open call and allow people interested. It did people who don't normally work in that space to come together. And so I sort of the vision that this particular group have other groups have similar visions was about ensuring that they had didn't come with an aim to produce anything, but to explore ideas that they haven't got the time to or the intellectual space to do. So I think that would be, and it's, again, also allowed those that have less access universities that perhaps so I look at that we can't go to a building like this and not be taken in by, you know, the sheer scale and, you know, access to resources they have. And I think it behoves us as a community to open up to school. So that's, that's a political speaker, don't I? That's how I feel. Right, I think that's it. Thank you very much. Any other questions?